Patent · US Expired

Acoustic method of connecting boreholes for multi-lateral completion

US6026913A · kind A · utility

55Cited by
6References
21Claims
0Family size

Assignee

Inventors

Key dates

Filing dateSep 30, 1997
Grant dateFeb 22, 2000
Priority date
Expiry dateSep 30, 2017

Classification

  • Technology area (CPC E)Fixed Constructions
  • CPC primaryE21B47/0224
  • WIPO fieldCivil engineering
  • WIPO sectorOther fields

Abstract

The invention is a device and related method of finding from at least one receiver the location of a source of a transmitted acoustic signal. Both signal source and signal receiver are downhole. The invention uses either or both the triangulation method and the holographic method to determine signal location. The triangulation technique uses the relationships existing in Pythagorean's theorem to find source location. In contrast, the holographic technique uses a known velocity structure to assign propagation velocities to volume cells surrounding the receiver. By variational calculus, a ray path and start time may be assigned to a hypothetical source location for a particular receiver position. This is repeated for each receiver position. Where the hypothetical source locations and start times match for multiple receiver locations, the likely position of a source has been found.

Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.