Just a story

[starmac]

Safety has some perks, but not only has it reduced production in a lot of fields, it took the fun right out of work, I basically left construction on account of it.

On the slope, safety is number one, even if it means exactly nothing gets done, with every job up there. My son in law mechaniced up there and they were happy paying a guy 10 or 12 hours for the same job that they would be fired here in town for taking 2 hours on., It is what it is, there has been a lot of change during my life, at least some of it has been for the better, but I think a lot of it has put our country out of business in a lot of ways.

[Boaz]

Safety has some perks, but not only has it reduced production in a lot of fields, it took the fun right out of work, I basically left construction on account of it.

On the slope, safety is number one, even if it means exactly nothing gets done, with every job up there. My son in law mechaniced up there and they were happy paying a guy 10 or 12 hours for the same job that they would be fired here in town for taking 2 hours on., It is what it is, there has been a lot of change during my life, at least some of it has been for the better, but I think a lot of it has put our country out of business in a lot of ways.

Safety is good , saw 2 men die I worked with , one died in my arms . Two more died on the tire before mine ...we cleaned up the mess . It's not a good story for a public forum . We all knew the risk , we all took it on and for the better part we loved the challenge of it . But it only took one mistake to lead to something bad ...it's why we worked and looked out for each other .

The oilfield will never be like we remember , different times ..different folks . But it's ok .

[rancher1913]

well boaz your prayer came a little late, we got our bit stuck 18000 feet in the hole. spent the whole 12 hour shift going from pumping 6 barrels a minute to none trying to get the bit to jump what ever it is hung on. had one seat go out on the pump that we got lucky with, came right out.

[Boaz]

And so it goes on . I understand . LOL , my day would shoot/unscrew bottom collar , Washover pipe and try to screw back in with jars and yank it out . If cones or bit 'chunks' were gone run a magnet and basket .
Lot of trippin ahead at 18000 . Deepest hole I ever helped with was 15000..and that at the time was adventurous to say the least .

Push come to shove cement 200' above and deviate ? My technology is old .

[Boaz]

Pump seat ..lucky it popped out , usually takes a puller or got to wash em out with a torch .

[starmac]

Well as I said before, when I did my time on a rig was after the bust and companies had tightened down on every penny, which put us to working with what would have been considered junk in better times.
One night we had a union wash out on the stand pipe, not a huge deal and we had a new one right there in the dog house, so we started to change it. Now like I said, times were hard and one of the things they pinched pennies on were tools, the only hammer we had was a 20 pounder, even if you had to climb the ladder and knock the pins out of the a leg to lower the derrick, it was a 20 pound hammer or nothing.
The tool pusher stayed on site in atravel trailer and woke up and came to see what the problem was. He stopped us from changing the union and told us to just softline it.
Well as you can imagine, as soon as we pressured it up it blew out, sooo now beat it back apart and softline it again, but put a little grease this time, same story, so beat it back apart and softline it again,but this time, use a whole tube of grease. lol same story and several more times of the same.
Ok, so I am the worm and swinging this hammer falls under my job description, finally I handed it to the pusher and told him, if we continued this foolishness, I was going to let him swing the hammer from here on out.
He huffed up and walked off the floor, telling us to stand by until a welder got there to weld it up, knowing full well that we would finish drilling on that hole the next day, and a welder would have to come back out to cut it off.
Sometimes the decisions trying to pinch pennies just amazed me.

[starmac]

One time we had finished a hole and were in the process of tearing down. Being the worm my job was just about anything Iwas told to do while we were tearing down or setting backup, anytime really.
I forget what I was doing, but the pusher came up and told me to climb up and knock the pins out of the a legs, being I was a worm he explained every detail of how to do it. lol

He walked off and I continued on with what I was doing, he came back a few minutes and I guess thought I didn't understand how to do it, soooo took his time and explained every little detail again and left again.
That time when he came back, he ask why I hadn't done it and wanted to know if I didn't understand.lol It don't take a whole lot of know how to knock a couple of pins out.
Any way I ask him if the derrick hand didn't make more money than I did, he said yes, I told him maybe he should explain what he wanted to him. lol
He got mad and said, I am telling you to do it, at which point I told him I was a floor hand and we were standing on it, if he wanted those pins out, he should probably tell Tony to do it. lol
He then mentioned either do it or go home, at which point I mentioned it just wasn't going to work trying to threaten me with my job, as I would consider it a favor to be fired.

[TreeKiller]

Dressed a paddle bit ! You exceed my time . I understand a paddle bit but you must be old ..very old .

I worked for about 30 days on a cable tool rig in PA. and got the pleasure of sharping an 8 inch bit. Had a gas forge got the end red hot and the driller and i got after it with a 10# sledge. Beat it out to where a piece of casing would just slip over it. Thought that it would take both lungs out of my chest.

[rancher1913]

No tripping for us, it's 18000 feet of one pipe. Usually if we cannot get unstuck, wireline runs down through our pipe and drops a load of acid that cuts the bit from the motor.

At my age I could never do like you guys did. I sit in a recliner and try to stay awake most shifts, have a nice little heated doghouse and run everything by remote.

We have computers that tell us what is going on Downhole and track everything.

[starmac]

One 18,000 foot pipe, man I would love to see the derrick on that rig. lol
I just couldn't resist.
At my age and health, there is no way I could even attempt, but the guys in the oil patch tended to take care of the old timers when I was working it. We had an old timer on our rig, but different crew that couldn't hardly get up the stairs to the doghouse, but they kept him on and the rest just pulled most of his weight, even after the rigs had cut back on hands.

[Boaz]

No tripping for us, it's 18000 feet of one pipe. Usually if we cannot get unstuck, wireline runs down through our pipe and drops a load of acid that cuts the bit from the motor.

At my age I could never do like you guys did. I sit in a recliner and try to stay awake most shifts, have a nice little heated doghouse and run everything by remote.

We have computers that tell us what is going on Downhole and track everything.

I understand , I have watched documentary's on drilling now . It is unbelievable the automation , equipment and technology involved . It's a new world out there on a rig now . I would be lost there .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNY0CGG2FfA

When I started rough necking in the late 60's the oilfield was running on fumes . There was a small boom in the 50's and then cheap Mideast oil killed our oilfield here . Rigs and producers struggled to keep going , when I started rough necking for E W Moran I was making $2.30 an hour . The rigs were junk ..deathtraps . Everything was worn out from the crown to the ground . Boxes on the drill pipe were so thin and worn they would cut our hand to try and pick one end up , we had a dressing tool to reshoulder em so they wouldn't leak much . The pipe was full of pinholes , we would cut 4'' pieces of baling twine and try one knot in it and every connection would drop bout a coffee can full in the pipe to help seal the holes .
Continual beakdowns , chain and cables were spliced or clamped to repair . We did it all ..no nipple up crews , we dug the mouse hole , dug all the ditches by hand , no contract labor ... Had a cathead , rope , chains and snatch blocks , use the traveling blocks to move stuff or proving pulling /lifting . We mixed old motor oil in the red lead pipe dope to make it go farther , used diesel and water to wash the rig , it was cheaper than rig soap . Used old motor oil in the drippers on the chain compounds . Engine radiators full of holes that cost too much to repair so just left water running in them steady . Gears totally worn out on the old starting engines ..we would cut slivers of wood to feed between the gears to get them to start the engines . It was a struggle to keep em running .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aqLALzUft8Y

[Boaz]

One 18,000 foot pipe, man I would love to see the derrick on that rig. lol
I just couldn't resist.
At my age and health, there is no way I could even attempt, but the guys in the oil patch tended to take care of the old timers when I was working it. We had an old timer on our rig, but different crew that couldn't hardly get up the stairs to the doghouse, but they kept him on and the rest just pulled most of his weight, even after the rigs had cut back on hands.

Yea , everyone help the old timers , we figured we 'might' get old some day .

[starmac]

Boaz, after the boom busted it was tight,we worked with junk till we couldn't, but not to the extent you did. The crews were cut back and we had to hand dig all the trenches and mouse holes similar to your time. I never worked them during the boom, but understand that all that was outsourced till just a few months before I started.

One of the things my company did was try to curb any stealing, ALL the wrenches we had on the rig was welded to a chain, if you needed a 1/2 inch wrench you had to drag the whole set along, which was just crazy.

[Boaz]

Rough necks had a bad rep , better than half the experienced hands were alcoholics , lots of fights and just general hell raising around civilized folks thus Oilfield Trash . But they would do the work , after the boom started in 71 there was a great influx of 'worms' and by 75 dope had hit the oilfield and just grew to what it is now . The old hands were disappearing and the rigs had a lot more injured and killed ..inexperience and drugs came into play . You couldn't find a crew of good hands , lucky if you had one hand that knew what they were doing , that's when I lost interest in being a driller . The boom was going full tilt and the oilfield was crazy .

[Rufus Krile]

Yup... crazy. I went to work for Baroid in Feb/'73 and my first day off was in late Mar/'74. Times I was covering 5 rigs over 450miles/day. Flat salary of $683/month to start and there were times that I had 3 uncashed pay checks in the glove compartment. Went two years without even owning a hardhat... I learned a lot about my craft back then but was a bit, we'll call it cranky, at the time. People living like that sometimes get a reputation of being somewhat 'trashy'. A lot of us were recently returned vets that society wasn't real proud of anyway, so we didn't worry much what some folks thought. Still don't.

[starmac]

Shoot man, all that beer drinking, fighting and general hell raising was in good fun. The old saying work hard play hard probably came from the oilfields.
I was in it in the 80's and we had good crews, with no drugs that I am aware of. Maybe the bust weeded some of that crowd out.
Most of the guys I worked with had been around the oilfield and were fairly safe to work around, though most of them were missing at least one finger.

[Boaz]

In my day you hired out to the driller , he was responsible for you ...whatever you did wrong and to keep you alive . No employment applications , no drug tests ..checks were brought to and handed out at the rig . Driller was in control from the time you got in the vehicle till you got out when you got back . Seen many drillers get run off because of a hand they hired screwed up ....kept the drillers on point to head off trouble before it happened . You were responsible to him , he hired you and would be the one to fire you .

There was a blackboard at Youngblood's filling station in town . Old man Youngblood was ex oilfield , got too old to drill . If you were looking for work you put your name on the board , lol the old man was smart . Everyone filled up , got ice , gloves and a lot of beer at his station .

[starmac]

Boaz, the labor café was like that in Odessa, but if the gent set you up with a job and you didn't make a hand, your name would not go back on his board, from what I understood.

The driller hired and fired, and if he twisted off the whole crew did too, I can say I had a good driller, he was a tool pusher the last several years of the boom, went back to drilling when things slowed down so much.

[starmac]

Boaz, the labor café was like that in Odessa, but if the gent set you up with a job and you didn't make a hand, your name would not go back on his board, from what I understood.
From what I understood if you wanted a job, be there during shift changes, if you were broke he would stake your coffee and food.

The driller hired and fired, and if he twisted off the whole crew did too, I can say I had a good driller, he was a tool pusher the last several years of the boom, went back to drilling when things slowed down so much.

[Boaz]

Well I'll be dang ! I hired out at the Labor Café , drilling was slow here and went to Odessa looking for work . I think the old man's name was Joe . Yea anyone that needed an oilfield hand went there , always a lot there in the mornings looking for work . He would stake you with sack lunches till payday with a pair of gloves stapled to the top of the sack and smokes or chewing tobacco .

Did you know Clint Walker was his nephew ? I met him in the café and drank coffee with him ..real nice guy .

https://www.westernlegendsroundup.co...estern-legend/