DRILLING OR DRILLING TOWER

The derrick or drilling tower is a steel tower used in rigs underground.

Its purpose is structural, because it serves to store the drilling rods during the same, but also withstand the stresses of the injection system of the drilling mud , the voltages of the ' winch and the weight of the top drive . 

The main and almost exclusive use, it has the oil rigs, but also can be wrought in plants (increasingly large caliber) that deal with the drilling for geothermal purposes or for the construction of water wells.

The construction of drilling rigs is regulated by the rules API (American Petroleum Institute), and applies worldwide.

The rules stipulate the API building materials that must be used depending on the application, the construction and design criteria, but also the application of each tower of a type plate, that brings its serial number, the year of construction , the manufacturer's name, the availability of methods of the manufacturer, the place of construction, the steel used to achieve tensile properties and the number of the rule that respects.

The drilling towers are of different types, in function of the system in which they must work. They can also be simple telescopic tubes, in the case of plants fast moving , ie drilling rigs that are easily and quickly be moved from one site to another. As a rule, the fast moving , are constituted by commercial means ie trucks with flatbed modified to accommodate the drilling tower, which as stated is of the telescopic type. In this case the tower is not mounted, but only controlled with a system of hydraulic jacks that allow it to be extended to its maximum length. Before performing this operation, however, the truck must have been well fixed to the ground, and the tower must be in a perfectly vertical position, as well as constrained.