Just a story

[Boaz]

Year would have been bout 1975 . I was a floor hand on a drilling rig ...Luke Grace Drilling . We moved to near Stoneburg TX to drill a well . I was working morning tire , now 'tire' was Texan for ..tour , the shift you worked on . Back in the day 'tour' didn't mean anything to the old steam rig hands and to closest they could relate to tour was 'tire' so it lived on through the 70's .

Morning tire was from 11 pm to 7am ..the night shift so to speak . Morning tire laid the water line from the source (river , stock tank , creek , ect ) to the rig . Some time a short distance some time miles . Had to have water for drilling mud . I was working for a driller named Don Hale , Don is still with us , I see him from time to time a good guy , always liked Don . It was summer and it was hot , we laid bout 2 miles of 2 and 7/8 upset tubing , 30' joints in a day . Did I mention it was hot ?

As we got closer to the rig laying pipe we passed right by a windmill with a big galvanized stock tank , a pipe was sticking out of the mill and a steady trickle of water kept it full . I waked over and looked at it from a ways . DANG ! It looked cool .

We got the line laid and plumbed in , crews worked till near dark rigging up , got the derrick raised . I offered to 'dry watch' This was during the 70's oil boom and thieves were stealing boxes of drill pipe or any equipment . 'Dry watching ' was a term related to 'dry camp' which meant camping out with no water available . You got an extra days wages to dry watch .

I dry watched a lot , had a 12 volt bulb on a long extension and carried reading material . I thought about that stock tank , after dark I got down to my underwear , took a hand towel and headed out across the prairie with a flashlight . Had worked 12 hours in the heat , was tired and I'm sure I stunk pretty bad but I kept seeing that cool tank of water in my mind . Had to get through one bobbed wire fence (got to be careful getting through bobbed wire fences in your underwear) , tank was only bout a quarter
mile away .
I got to the windmill ! It was beautiful , the moon was out and the tank looked like a mirror , the mill was slowly turning , the water was dribbling into the tank making pretty rings , the moonlight was reflecting off the water like a pastoral picture . It was inspiring !

I I pulled my underwear off , hung em on the windmill with my hand towel , climbed the ladder and wanted to jump in to enhance this event ! I jumped into the tank expecting an amazing experience ! I cannonballed into the tank !

I came up and started gagging . The top of the water was pretty but the tank was 2/3 full of cow xxxx , it hadn't been cleaned out in a long time . Made it back to the rig carrying my towel and underwear . Going through a bobbed wire fence necked is dangerous . I had a one gallon bucket of drinking/coffee water ..it didn't make a dent in getting cleaned up . Next day my crew shunned me ..I stunk .

So ! What would be the moral to this story ?

[M-Tecs]

Don't jump in with both feet until you know what you are getting in to.

The question I have is how does a water tank get 2/3 full of cow xxxx?

[Texas by God]

Don't work in the oil field?
Mitchell Energy Summer of 80 alumni here!

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G930A using Tapatalk

[Boaz]

LOL, you were a clinger ...boom bottomed in 79 . Hats off to you sir !

[Boaz]

Don't jump in with both feet until you know what you are getting in to.

The question I have is how does a water tank get 2/3 full of cow xxxx?

Hot country , cows hang round a tank and by chance , inadvertently are just in the right place when they let go backed up to the tank ...over time it builds up . Normally tanks are drained and cleaned .

[starmac]

I didn't work on the rigs until after the bust, and worked the relief crew, which meant missing 2 days sleep a week the way it worked out.

I don't know about the spelling, but we called it tower, not tire when I was in the patch, which wasn't all that long. Two days daylight, two days swing, two days morning, then two days off kept you screwed up all the time.

[Boaz]

Tower could be . Texans back then had many different terms ..state is big . On rigs you worked 7 days a week ..LOL , no holidays , no weekends ...7 days a week less you could get someone to double and you paid back 2 days for one ..standard deal .

[starmac]

Like I said, I didn't get involved until after the bust and from what I understood a lot changed, hince the 6 on 2 off deal, we also lost a hand per shift from what I understand.
most of the wells I worked on were from the Huntsville area over to Bryan college station up to Corsicana, all shallow 7day holes. The company would send everyone home for one day every time we laid the rig down and called us laid off, just to mess with our overtime.

[Boaz]

Understand ...worked on lay downs , the 'bookkeeper' who ever they were figured the least time . I broke in with standard rig builders that cut their overalls off 4'' so they wouldn't step on em and fall out of a wood derrick ..I predate you a bit . Talked to the ones that ran the steam engines on the rigs ..many died . BUT ..lol many kept on .

[Boaz]

Like I said, I didn't get involved until after the bust and from what I understood a lot changed, hince the 6 on 2 off deal, we also lost a hand per shift from what I understand.
most of the wells I worked on were from the Huntsville area over to Bryan college station up to Corsicana, all shallow 7day holes. The company would send everyone home for one day every time we laid the rig down and called us laid off, just to mess with our overtime.

Times were hard , boom was bust . The old ways fell to the way side , companies figured cheapest way out and hands didn't want to work 7 days a week ..'space age roughnecks' . Time was figured to benefit contractor . I agree .

[Texas by God]

Worked on a barge rig in the Arkansas Wildlife Refuge by Freeport in 81/82. To this day that's the hottest and coldest I've been. Gulf humidity sucks. Land rigs were 8hrs/7days/365, out there we were 12hrs/2 weeks on/2 weeks off. I made a lot of money and spent it all and perfected my cussing skills.

[Boaz]

LOL , perfected cussing skills ...yep. Part of the coarse . Always wanted to work offshore but never made it . Hired out to Loffland Brothers to work on a rig out of Malaysia but never happened . Being hot and cold I will not discuss , people don't believe it anyway . Many a night 90 foot off the ground tripping with only a sweatshirt on I knew I would not survive it , but you got home to a hot bath , 6 hours sleep and a can of Wolfe brand chili and could do it again .

[Texas by God]

As Merle sang-"In the good old days;when times were bad" It shaped and mis-shaped us, didn't it?
Thanks for the story.

[Down South]

Always wanted to work offshore but never made it.
I started offshore in 83. worked through the bust of the 80's. I was 30 yrs old when I started. I was a sawmill millwright and construction millwright before offshore. I worked offshore for 25 yrs until my back went south. I've been a desk jockey for the same company for the last 10 yrs.
I've got 35 yrs with this company now. Someday soon, somebody else can worry with it but, I'm going home.

[tommag]

Boaz, thanks for the chuckle! I've filled my canteen from tanks a few times. It usually tasted better without those silly iodine tablets and never affected me a bit, other than maybe that frequent urge I get to graze on cheat grass and wild onions.
The only moral I can think of is to be sure the pond isn't actually a cesspool.

[starmac]

Iirc it was 83 that I started on a rig too, I finished in 83 too. If the company I worked for hadn't messed with our overtime so bad, I might have stayed, but the last time we layed the rig down and they laid us off, my driller stopped at thelocal watering hole, and I had another job before we left it.

Boaz, that was a triple I was on, we were just drilling shallow wells, 7 to 9000 feet iirc.

One of the side benefits of working that relief shift on the 6 on 2 off schedule was, we were lucky enough to trip all, and I mean all of the pipe. Many times when we drove up, they would be just starting to rig up to come out of the hole. lol

[rancher1913]

well I was going to try and post a photo of what night shift left us, but can not get anything to work. we do 14 on and 7 off and with travel we are doing 16 hour days, gets hard on an old man but ranching just don't make ends meet. I am part of a coil tubing crew, kind of like a real portable workover rig, we do drill outs after fracking, fish jobs, pyrotechnics, and clean outs. we carry 20,000 feet of 2 and 3/8 pipe on a big reel and use a special injector head to stuff it down the well, the head acts as a snubbing unit and hoist all in one. we use water to help pull the pipe through the well, kind of like a big jetter, and have a motor and mill that is run by the water for drilling. we run about 6 barrels a minute down the tube at pressures around 5000 psi, sometimes as high as 8000 psi.

been off a week so today was our "monday" and night shift left us with a birdsnest of pipe on the reel with half of it hanging off, if you have ever seen the photos of when a snubbing unit slips and makes spaghetti, well its kind of like that but in a nice roll.

just for comparison for the oldtimers, we did a fishing job one time and had a double crew for some reason so we decided to set a drill record. from the time we pulled onto location to the time we were headed in hole was 1 hour, we got the fish first try and were packed up and gone with a total time of 5 hours. I think the depth was about 15,000 feet, we were able to go 180 feet per minute in hole but had to slow down coming out hole, we were dragging loaded guns that wireline had lost.

[starmac]

Maybe you old time roughnecks can answer this for me.
As I said my short roughneck carreer was iirc in 83, naturally I was the floorhand, they had cut back on the crews, so a crew consisted of a floorhand, motorman, driller and derrick hand. The motorman was also the chainchunker.

Since it was my first job on a rig, I was called a worm.
Now the question I would like to ask is about a supposed custom in the oil patch back then.
Supposedly it was some sort of initiation for all worms, for the crew to pull there pants down and give them a liberal dose of pipe dope.
Now here is the deal, I am fairly about who gets my pants down and what gets done once we get that far, and roughnecks and pipe dope was never a fantasy of mine, so when they tried, I strongly objected. They didn't try again until we finished the hole and laid the rig down, at witch time there were 2 crews working. Now my strong objections were ignored until I got my old timer out and open.
Was that actually a custom, and if so, how in the world did that ever get started? or was this just something those crazy coona$$es I worked with dreamed up?

[Boaz]

Maybe you old time roughnecks can answer this for me.
As I said my short roughneck carreer was iirc in 83, naturally I was the floorhand, they had cut back on the crews, so a crew consisted of a floorhand, motorman, driller and derrick hand. The motorman was also the chainchunker.

Since it was my first job on a rig, I was called a worm.
Now the question I would like to ask is about a supposed custom in the oil patch back then.
Supposedly it was some sort of initiation for all worms, for the crew to pull there pants down and give them a liberal dose of pipe dope.
Now here is the deal, I am fairly about who gets my pants down and what gets done once we get that far, and roughnecks and pipe dope was never a fantasy of mine, so when they tried, I strongly objected. They didn't try again until we finished the hole and laid the rig down, at witch time there were 2 crews working. Now my strong objections were ignored until I got my old timer out and open.
Was that actually a custom, and if so, how in the world did that ever get started? or was this just something those crazy coona$$es I worked with dreamed up?

Naw , that was no universal custom , just the bunch you were working with . There would have been killins over a deal like that in my country . It was customary to torment the living snot out of the worms though . Right of passage so to speak , we all went through that .

Worm defined; The lowest form of life on earth with aspirations of being a roughneck . Only use is doing jobs that require no brain , constant subjects of scorn , cruel jokes and verbal abuse . A constant source of problems for real hands to try to keep them alive with little reward for the effort since they would quit as soon as they got their first paycheck . Worms were often referred to as one week wonders .

[Boaz]

I started breaking out when I was a freshmen in high school , lied about my age , was 15 years old. Would double on weekends for hands that wanted off . First rig I went out on was morning tire , Moran Drilling rig 6 . Was making hole for Arco near Walnut Bend on the Red River near Gainesville TX . I was scared to death .

[Boaz]

well I was going to try and post a photo of what night shift left us, but can not get anything to work. we do 14 on and 7 off and with travel we are doing 16 hour days, gets hard on an old man but ranching just don't make ends meet. I am part of a coil tubing crew, kind of like a real portable workover rig, we do drill outs after fracking, fish jobs, pyrotechnics, and clean outs. we carry 20,000 feet of 2 and 3/8 pipe on a big reel and use a special injector head to stuff it down the well, the head acts as a snubbing unit and hoist all in one. we use water to help pull the pipe through the well, kind of like a big jetter, and have a motor and mill that is run by the water for drilling. we run about 6 barrels a minute down the tube at pressures around 5000 psi, sometimes as high as 8000 psi.

been off a week so today was our "monday" and night shift left us with a birdsnest of pipe on the reel with half of it hanging off, if you have ever seen the photos of when a snubbing unit slips and makes spaghetti, well its kind of like that but in a nice roll.

just for comparison for the oldtimers, we did a fishing job one time and had a double crew for some reason so we decided to set a drill record. from the time we pulled onto location to the time we were headed in hole was 1 hour, we got the fish first try and were packed up and gone with a total time of 5 hours. I think the depth was about 15,000 feet, we were able to go 180 feet per minute in hole but had to slow down coming out hole, we were dragging loaded guns that wireline had lost.

Dang ! Wish you could have got a picture up , hard in my old mind to visualize your 'rig' . You were fishing for a shot tree (perforating) ?

[rancher1913]

Yah wireline was shooting perfs for frac and they lost the guns downhill. One of the other crews fished a set of live guns and just as they broke surface they went off, few hands got so scared from having ball bearings being shot at them they quit right then, one frac tank took a hit but all the rest of the shots hit dirt

[rancher1913]

Have you ever done hydro shocking. We were doing that and I was told not to excede 9500 psi as or pumps were only rated for 10000 psi. Did several that went off at 6000 like they were supposed to but one went to 9500 and still did not go off, we were waiting for the engineer to figure something out when it finally poped, felt like an earthquake and scared a few unsuspecting vip's

[Boaz]

Sounds like fun , lol .

[Boaz]

No never 'hydroed' . Helped the shooters put trees together and run em . Usually an easy job , just in and out . Never heard of a tree getting lost .

[bedbugbilly]

Sounds like a crappy experience to me . . . LOL

Thanks for the story and a daily chuckle Boaz . . . and Happy New Year . . . let it be a good one! :-)

[Boaz]

Sounds like a crappy experience to me . . . LOL

Thanks for the story and a daily chuckle Boaz . . . and Happy New Year . . . let it be a good one! :-)

Thank you sir !

[Down South]

Maybe you old time roughnecks can answer this for me.
As I said my short roughneck carreer was iirc in 83, naturally I was the floorhand, they had cut back on the crews, so a crew consisted of a floorhand, motorman, driller and derrick hand. The motorman was also the chainchunker.

Since it was my first job on a rig, I was called a worm.
Now the question I would like to ask is about a supposed custom in the oil patch back then.
Supposedly it was some sort of initiation for all worms, for the crew to pull there pants down and give them a liberal dose of pipe dope.
Now here is the deal, I am fairly about who gets my pants down and what gets done once we get that far, and roughnecks and pipe dope was never a fantasy of mine, so when they tried, I strongly objected. They didn't try again until we finished the hole and laid the rig down, at witch time there were 2 crews working. Now my strong objections were ignored until I got my old timer out and open.
Was that actually a custom, and if so, how in the world did that ever get started? or was this just something those crazy coona$$es I worked with dreamed up?

Yup, heard of it. I'm somewhat like you. I've had a few things tried on me that didn't work. It didn't take long that the oilfield bunch figured out that they didn't fool with this ole country redneck. I was rough, tough and full of snuff in my younger days.
Anybody that would screw with an old sawmill millwright would be crazy anyway.

[tinsnips]

I threw chain and worked derricks,in the 70s boom in North Dakota. It seemed like all we did on the night shift was trip pipe in an out of the hole.

[Boaz]

One of two things was happening for your crew to do all the tripping . Ya'll were running the old cheap mill tooth bits (probably Security Bits) good for 24 hours or the evening tire driller was pouring the weight to the bit to wear it out so he wouldn't have to trip it . Been there , lol . When Hughes came out with the carbide button bits (J-22's ,J-33's ) They would stay drilling 3-4 days minimum or up to 6 days in shale . A rough necks dream come true .

[birch]

My old man worked workover rigs for Beckman Oil in Central/western michigan during the eighties. There was one winter that I only saw him one day a month. He worked 16 hour plus days and the days he had off, he slept. It was a rough life for a little feller who wanted his old man.

[starmac]

My old man worked workover rigs for Beckman Oil in Central/western michigan during the eighties. There was one winter that I only saw him one day a month. He worked 16 hour plus days and the days he had off, he slept. It was a rough life for a little feller who wanted his old man.

Pretty sure it was rougher on the old man.

[Boaz]

Yes sir . I was a driller , ran pulling units , drove rig up trucks , worked production . It was all every day 7 days a week . I would think you would be proud of your dad ?

[Echo]

Criminy, but I LOVE reading this stuff! Born & raised in Texas (Houston), and heard a lot about drilling etc., but never got involved. Been to Spindletop (Uncle Johnny was a petroleum engineer, after flying a B-17 in WWII), and no way anyone born & raised in Houston could NOT know SOMETHING about oil, but not to the level of you guys. And my BIL knows more about refineries than GOD, designed and built 'em, but other than that, can't bait a hook - but I digress...

[Boaz]

Was workin for Linmor Drilling Just west of Bartons Chapel Tx . We were changing bits and goin back in the hole , got about 2/3 of the long string in the hole headed for bottom . Already mudded up mixing bar , suppose to a gas several possible gas zones.
We started smelling gas then drilling mud started flowing out the rotary table , In was a double pole job , no way to get out of the derrick except to ride the blocks down . The derrick man (his name was James , later killed when he ran into a concrete embankment drunk , his car ran on propane , had a 20 gallon tank in the trunk , blew him to pieces) was screaming ...Get me down , get me outta here ! The driller had tied the brake down and him and the other floor hand took off running and disappeared into the mesquites . The toolpusher was there for the bit changin , he ran up to the rig floor screaming Get that man down , get that man down ! I untied the brake handle and tryed to let the pipe in the hole , didn't like but about 10' to be able to set the slips and unlach the elevators . Drill string didn't want to move , it was trying to go up ! Hydrolic pressure from the gas . Set the blocks on the top of the pipe and it slowly went down , set the slips and Started up with the block to get James , he jumped on the elevators and got him down on the floor. And he ran off the location lol ! Toolpusher and me killed the draw works engine and light plant (It was night), mud and gas were blowing about 30' high out of the rotary . We got under the sub and started trying to close the antique blowout preventer , it was a piece of junk . It was the law that you had to have one but no body ever ran maintenance on em . We were struggling with cheater pipes try to turn the wheels to close it and John just stopped and stood there , the gas was so bad you couldn't draw a full breath . I said .. shut it turn that wheel! He said .. I don't remember if it's got rams in it ! My heart sank and I knew we were goin die . Dying in a gigantic fireball wasn't how I want to cash out .The rams are what grabs the pipe to keep it from blowing out of the hole and seals the mud off to stop the blowout . Long story short we got it shut in ......kinda . The rams were junk but they held till Haliburton got there with the bar wagon to get the weight up on the mud . And everyone lived happily ever after !

[rancher1913]

our BOP's set about 20 feet in the air, we have to cycle them each well and visually see the "guts" work. we have gone from the traditional 4 valve set up to the 2 valve combi unit.

we were on a pad and the company man came running out of his shack yelling to shut everything down, guess he seen a big plume of gas from the flowback tanks headed to our motors, luckily a gust of wind turned it just before it got to us.

the scariest job I have done so far was in the far southwest corner of wyoming, they had a bad H2S problem so we had monitors and supplied air masks all over. the safety trailer had a green light on top of it, if it turned red and a horn went off you were supposed to drop everything and get a mask on. I was operating the crane and my monitor started beeping and wailing like all get out, got hit with a small pocket of H2S, you will know why they call it stink gas if you ever smell any. held my breath as I was starting to bale when a gust of wind blew it away, nobody else got hit and they all were looking at me like I was crazy, showed them my monitor and the recorded event.

[starmac]

The last hole I worked on you could see bubbles in the hole while we were tripping pipe, Like I said earlier, I was a worm and didn't realize what that could mean. Everytime I lit a smoke the motorman/ chain chunker would tell me to put it out, as those bubbkles were gas and dangerous. I kept telling him, if it was too dangerous to smoke it was too dangerous to be there. This went on for quite a while until finally the driller ask what we kept argueing about. I told him and he walked over and looked in the hole, just as the mud was coming up, he jumped back and yelled at the derrick man to bail out and for and to run, and no them bops didn't work. lol
Tony rode the suicide line down just as she blew out, it never ignited, but sure made a mess out of things. The casing crew had been getting ready and had the casing laid out and the thread protectors removed, we had to wash everything and clean all those threads, what a pita.

[Down South]

I was operating the crane
I never worked at but one location that had a minor H2S problem. I was the Senior Mechanic at the time. I had one gas compressor engine that I could not keep some bearings in without going bad over a short period of time. I finally looked at a current gas analysis and saw the trace of H2S in the fuel gas and figured out what the problem was.

Anyway, I was also a crane operator, API Certified. Was a API certified Crane Inspector too back in those days. We normally had several crane operators on shift but when the seas were rough, 8-10ft it was me that had to offload and back load the boats. Man, the cargo would be packed in tight. I could get it off easy enough but getting the back load was tough with a boat bouncing around in 8 ft seas was tough to load sitting 80 feet below with a 100 ft of stick on the crane.
It got worse, I went deep water on floaters. Not only was the boat moving around like a cork in the water, the platform was moving too and I was running a crane with 140 ft of stick.
I remember one load out that I finished years ago when a squall was coming through, I was finishing up and lifting the riggers off the boat and lighting struck my crane boom.

[Rufus Krile]

When I came back from VN, almost nobody was interested in hiring one of us drug-crazed babykillers... except the oilfield. Went to work for Baroid as a mud engineer in 1973 and trained under some of the graybeards that had started as rig builders or roughnecks on steam rigs. Interesting times. Worked mostly in South Texas between Laredo, Victoria, and Brownsville. Spent about 8 months in Farmington. A couple years in North Louisiana. The oilfield of the 70's was quite a bit different from the present day practices. The pipe dope story (called 'Jimmy Gray') rang true... the new guy was usually incapacitated by treachery and two large guys. Never happened to me, but I suspect that was because I was always armed and everyone knew it. (When you have to get out and open gates in the deep brush at 0200, you tend to be more than a little paranoid. There's an area over close to Zapata known as 'mil ojos' or 'thousand eyes' and it's for a reason.) As rough as the business was back then, it was at least fun. You could do anything you were big enough to do and nobody thought much about it. Been known to take a drink. The only rule back then was that there was no malingering from drink... it doesn't matter if you hurt as long as you do your job. I've watched derrickmen too drunk to walk merrily ride the elevators to an ice-covered board and never bat an eye. Saw a couple of them quit when they were told they couldn't ride anymore... had to climb the ladder. Watched some set fire to a guys boots to wake him up and get him back to work. OSHA would have a field day now. Retired in 2012... it just isn't fun anymore and I'm too beat-up to start over.

[Down South]

it just isn't fun anymore and I'm too beat-up to start over.
I'm in the same situation. My body refuses to take it any longer. I was blessed to get a desk job so I might go another year or two.

[Texas by God]

When I started they offered to "dope my b@lls" but I convinced them I'd notch an ear or two if they tried. However I did fall for the "Check the water table" order from the driller. Carried a 5 gallon bucket of water to the top of a double. No way was I going to quit. Got up there and the derrick hand was laughing hard. I asked where do I pour this water? He said that if it was him, he'd pour it out- but I could carry it back down the ladder if I wanted! Of course all on the floor were laughing so I tried to pour the water on them, yelled "Headache!" And dropped the bucket.
Out in the Gulf, our BOP was at sea level and the Schlumberger logging shack was on the bottom deck beside it. We got some dry ice from the galley and threw it in the water by the BOP and pounded on the door. "What does this mean?" We asked the loggers. They got REAL EXCITED and panic almost ensued till they noticed us laughing so hard.....

[Boaz]

The times were wild in the 70's . LOL , setting folks pants and rags carried in a back pocket on fire were common ..all in good fun . Never heard the Jimmy Grey story ...As I said earlier would have been a killin over something like that . But they were wild times.

Last derrick job I had I walked out first trip I had to make and told the driller (David) to let the elevators down to ride em up . He was young , we were working on a double Wilson portable (hardest board to work known to man) . He refused , said it was against the rules to ride em up , had to use the 'new fangled derrick climber' . Told him I'd walk off tire ..was not climbing what I could ride up on the elevators ..stupid .

He haimed around and finally asked me what to do , told him to lower the elevators and carry me up . I would flag him when to stop and when I stepped over just come out of the hole . LOL , he was scared to death he would kill me , been taught in 'drillers' school in Oklahoma City drilling school ' . He clacked up to the board , I flagged him and got holt of the deadline ..jumped to the board . I know he was scared to death by something that had been normal for us old hands for years , never head anyone killed riding the elevators .

I liked David ..I might have been a bad influence . Being an 'old' style driller I probably polluted his politically correct training .

Was working morning tire , evening set surface pipe . We came on and hooked up the flow line , shaker , finished plumbing the jet lines .
When we come on tire the toolpusher was there , his name was Ronnie . We had bad blood between us ..I had whipped him twice roughnecking with him ..we didn't speak .

He had wrote down instructions what to do while the surface pipe was setting up and wanted 90' of drilling line slipped off the drum . David read his instructions , looked him in the eye and said ..We'll get er boss . LOL , soon as Ronnie left David turned to me , I was pulling my Red Wings on and said ..Can you slip that drilling line ?
I just stared at him ..and said ..you don't know how to slip the line !! He just said no ! ..But I figured you would ! LOL , I nearly laughed till I cried ...HE WAS THE DRILLER ! Not me . But we got er done . Was funny .

[Boaz]

When I started they offered to "dope my b@lls" but I convinced them I'd notch an ear or two if they tried. However I did fall for the "Check the water table" order from the driller. Carried a 5 gallon bucket of water to the top of a double. No way was I going to quit. Got up there and the derrick hand was laughing hard. I asked where do I pour this water? He said that if it was him, he'd pour it out- but I could carry it back down the ladder if I wanted! Of course all on the floor were laughing so I tried to pour the water on them, yelled "Headache!" And dropped the bucket.
Out in the Gulf, our BOP was at sea level and the Schlumberger logging shack was on the bottom deck beside it. We got some dry ice from the galley and threw it in the water by the BOP and pounded on the door. "What does this mean?" We asked the loggers. They got REAL EXCITED and panic almost ensued till they noticed us laughing so hard.....

Dang it this 'doping' thing must have come after I left the field . NOBODY would have stood for that in my time . But worms were tormented .

[Boaz]

Roughnecking is a young mans game but I loved it .

[starmac]

Well Boaz, we didn't exactly stand fer it in my time either. After they tried with both crews and the old timer got them off of me, we still had both crews there the next day.
My driller was a friend and my next door neighbor on the river, I rode back and forth with him, I told him on the way in, that he needed to not be a part of it if they tried again.
The next morning when he picked me up I had my browning hipower, he just looked at me and said your serious huh. lol
They decided it wasn't this worms time to be doped. lol

They did get me though, the motor man/ chain chunker, name of Johnny was helping me out, being as I was new and had never worked a rig before. I didn't actually know what I was suppose to do, nor what everyone else was suppose to do. I didn't mind hard work, but after two weeks, I told the driller (my friend) to get another hand. When he ask why I was leaveing, I told him that no man alive should have to work this hard. He just laughed and said it wouldn't be so bad if I wasn't doing all of Johnnys work two., so we had us a little talk about my job description. lol

[Boaz]

When I started they offered to "dope my b@lls" but I convinced them I'd notch an ear or two if they tried. However I did fall for the "Check the water table" order from the driller. Carried a 5 gallon bucket of water to the top of a double. No way was I going to quit. Got up there and the derrick hand was laughing hard. I asked where do I pour this water? He said that if it was him, he'd pour it out- but I could carry it back down the ladder if I wanted! Of course all on the floor were laughing so I tried to pour the water on them, yelled "Headache!" And dropped the bucket.
Out in the Gulf, our BOP was at sea level and the Schlumberger logging shack was on the bottom deck beside it. We got some dry ice from the galley and threw it in the water by the BOP and pounded on the door. "What does this mean?" We asked the loggers. They got REAL EXCITED and panic almost ensued till they noticed us laughing so hard.....

Dry ice thing would have been good ! I am thinking now I wish I'd thought of that back when , I see many opportunities in my mind .

[Down South]

We had all kinds of games we played with new inexperienced hands. Most were harmless. Sending them off to look for tools that didn't exist, "like a sky hook". Two sets of stairwells, one on each side of the rig, we would tell them one was for coming up and the other was for going down, etc.

[DoubleAdobe]

As Merle sang-"In the good old days;when times were bad" It shaped and mis-shaped us, didn't it?
Thanks for the story.

Ha, good one. That is a descriptive kind of song. God bless brother Merle, wherever he may be!

[Boaz]

We had all kinds of games we played with new inexperienced hands. Most were harmless. Sending them off to look for tools that didn't exist, "like a sky hook". Two sets of stairwells, one on each side of the rig, we would tell them one was for coming up and the other was for going down, etc.

Yes sir they sent me to another rig you could see the lights after dark to borrow a 'sky hook' . Was a well known joke the driller on the 'other' rig asked me what size . I hadn't been given a size so had to go back to my rig and ask my driller . He immediately jumped all over me for not knowing the size to get but gave me a numerical size to ask for . Went back to the 'other' rig and told them the size . Driller said they didn't have that one but would one size smaller work . I drove back to my rig to ask my driller . He said no but to ask if they had one size bigger . They kept me going for 3-4 hours bouncing back and forth ..Both rigs were enjoying my stupidity , the amazing life of a worm .

[Down South]

Things have changed in the offshore world since Macondo. SEMS came into play. "Safety and Environmental Management Systems".
The offshore world has been evolving since way before SEMS but SEMS had a big impact.
Playing a trick on anyone can get you in deep dodo now.
Used to, we had a good time, did it safe and had a lot of fun. Not anymore. Someone is always looking over your shoulder looking to make points with the HSE "Health, Safety Environment" department.

[Boaz]

Pretty good crew , looks like they are taking off after setting surface ..dang Kelly is turnin and burnin . Probably in Red Bed . Drilling this fast was to bout 1000' to 1500' in my country before you hit shale and it slowed down .

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

[DoubleAdobe]

I worked out in the desert here in Arizona for and old oil well driller from Oklahoma. Toughest little sumbitch I ever knew, bar none. Just a different kind of a cat, and he said when he was a young man, that he wasn't anything special.
Just an amazing, good guy. He would tell me stories about oil drilling that was just so foreign to me, the depth and the weight of the tools, etc.
This is because he came to Arizona in the 50's to drill water wells, big old irrigation wells, but would drill you a domestic well too.
He showed me how they used to forge the bits on those old spudder rigs.
Bucyrus-Erie, he had two of them, a big one for the deep stuff and a smaller one for house type wells.
That old man had more knowledge than any one man could ever soak up.
I still miss him.
He had one eye and he came around to the rig one evening while the driller and me, were out of the hole with the bit. Sitting on the edge of the casing with the brake double set.
Was welding some more hard casing rod on the edge of the bit, cause it was just not making any hole.
Old Homer was standing there BS'ing with the driller when I struck an arc with the welder, and next I knew, the welder died, I flipped up my hood and trying to figure what was going on.
He looked at me with his one good little rheumy, watery eye and told me, I like you, son, but if you ever strike an arc without hollering "Cover", again, you will walk home and it was a long, long walk.
He said I got one eye, and am trying hard to make it last and you ain't helping.
Man, that was a lesson learned, haha.

[Boaz]

It was a pleasure to work together with a good crew . Everyone looked out for the other .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIZDjyjZYA8

[Boaz]

I broke in drilling when I was 23 years old . It was about unheard of to be a driller at that age back then . The old drillers had broke in on steam rigs and were ..old . Experience was valued , I was looked at as a 'kid' . It was 1973 and the boom was on , drillers and any experienced help moved up fast . I figured out I didn't like being the 'boss' , I tried to only work derricks . Little more money , you worked alone and it was fun .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQZ7NUbvHjk

[Boaz]

Tried to find an old style derrick man vid but no luck . This guy has too many safety belts . We had one rope and a waist belt ..not all this harness stuff . And wearing the belt was even optional ...your choice .

[Boaz]

Ha, good one. That is a descriptive kind of song. God bless brother Merle, wherever he may be!

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

[starmac]

Cable tool rig.

[DoubleAdobe]

Yup, old spudding cable tool rig.
They still use those bits. as a matter of fact, Homer had a couple he traded for. Had the name Bo Tucker written in hard facing on the upper part of the bit. That was Tanya Tuckers Dad,he was a driller in that country for a while. San Simon Valley between Lordsburg and Willcox.

[birch]

--just found this post again.

Yes---I am very proud of my old man. I bring him up to my kids almost daily it seems these days--life lessons and he is always there.

I also got my share of the pie as well. I worked at a foundry in Northern Michigan--auto axles and such. We worked 12 hour shifts for 13 days straight with one day off. Then, we did another 13 days straight. My shift was 6 in the evening until 6 in the morning. I was on the breaking line. We worked 14 pound sledge hammers on sand cast molds to retrieve 46 pound axles. We did this all night long. There were some mornings I had to take a sit down break on the way to my car after work--not enough energy to make it the 8th mile to the parking lot.

I see my dad in most everything I do. My kids never met him, but they know him through me. For example--I went to look at a VAC Case tractor the other day. My 7 year old said, "boy dad, that one is a peach" (one of my dad's favorite sayings when something was pretty).

All you oil riggers are indeed a breed of your own. My hat is off to you.

[Boaz]

Pretty good explanation how a rig works .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7UfhtA08EL0

[Boaz]

Lol ..Al Dean and the All Stars ! South Texas band , they were all rough necks . They nearly made the big time but all kind of had a 'drinking problem' . Band fell apart and they ended back on rigs . Worked with the fiddle player on a rig near Quanah TX , boy was good .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oU7Ln9-z95c

They were quite a few oilfield songs back then .

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40xWRyYbluA

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2_H4w1Id7yE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DMOKQ9tdrAY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OULJ1yOxshk

[Boaz]

My country ran junk far as rigs went . We were 10 years behind times . When I started in the 60's drilling was a hard go for a drilling rig contractor . Mideast oil was cheap and domestic producers fought to make penny's , in 71 the boom hit and we were totally unprepared . We didn't have the equipment and personal to get er done We were backwater far as technology was concerned , rigs were more or less deathtraps . Open chain drives , no safety precautions to speak of . Rigs overseas had the best , we had ...nothing . Not but a few had a hard hats ..wore caps and cowboy hats ...long as we were drilling no one cared . Steel toed boots were a joke , cowboy boots reigned . You looked out for one another...you looked out for yourself . Everyday you improvised .

[starmac]

When Ileft the oilfield I went back to running heavy equipment, I generally had to work out of town, but the money was better and so were work conditions. A couple of months after I had twisted off I was headed back to Madison county one Friday night, (home) and could see the lights of a rig north of Huntsville, so I detoured and shur nuff, it was my old rig. It was sleeting and everything was covered in ice, Icycles hanging off of the crews beards. lol I climbed up on the floor and shot the bs for a minute, and one of the hands offered me 300 bucks to finish his shift, it was colder than the proverbial well diggers a$$, I told him sorry, but I might skin my eelskin work boots. lol

I bought a pair of steel toed oilfield redwings, when I started, it was pretty much mandatory, wore them one day, and went back to my regular redwings, nobody checked after you hired on.

[Boaz]

one of the hands offered me 300 bucks to finish his shift, it was colder than the proverbial well diggers a$$, I told him sorry, but I might skin my eelskin work boots. lol

I really enjoyed that , lol .

[Boaz]

Yea freezing weather you struggled to keep everything from freezing up . Scattering out metal dope buckets with cottonseed hulls and diesel burning , built wood fire with mud pallets under the rig . Had to keep all pumps and engines running or they would freeze up . Walking around with propane torches thawing out the shaker and water system .

If you made a connection or trip the driller would have to 'rattle' the derrick to get to ice off it . Seen long chunks the size of a 2x6 rain down on the floor . Shovel it off to walk and spread sacks of soda ash to walk on . It was miserable .

[lightman]

Enjoyed the oil patch stories! I never worked the oil fields but the stories remind me of being the new guy on a line crew in the 80's. Lots of rough guys and rough horse play. But the guy that busted your lip during lunch would have your back that night in the bar! Hard work but good work. And OSHA would have a hemorrhage about some of the stuff that we considered normal work practices!

[Texas by God]

I broke several fingers doing it but I did love throwing chain when we had a case of blackleg!
And I just remembered that some of the Quanah boys called a worm apprentice a gensel.

[Boaz]

Enjoyed the oil patch stories! I never worked the oil fields but the stories remind me of being the new guy on a line crew in the 80's. Lots of rough guys and rough horse play. But the guy that busted your lip during lunch would have your back that night in the bar! Hard work but good work. And OSHA would have a hemorrhage about some of the stuff that we considered normal work practices!

Lightman I understand . Things were different then . We were young and enjoying it . I'd love to go back and do it all over again .

[Boaz]

I broke several fingers doing it but I did love throwing chain when we had a case of blackleg!
And I just remembered that some of the Quanah boys called a worm apprentice a gensel.

I never heard 'gensel' but I worked in Texas , New Mexico , Oklahoma and Louisiana terminology varied . Worked with a California rough neck and he called a cheater pipe a snipe . Long as everyone was on the same page ..it was good .

The old steam rig hands called a worm a bole weevil or a bronc. Most all the old hands were farm boys , they went from the cotton 'patch' to what they named the oil 'patch'. That's where the oil 'patch' got it's name .

Yea I broke some fingers , broke my right wrist twice with lead tongs , broke the small bones in my feet . We were hauling a load of 8 7/8 surface pipe the rig on the Matthew's Ranch down by Throckmorton on the Brazos River . Had one joint lagging off the side so I got on top of the load to see if we could jack it back up without unloading . My swamper flipped a boomer and the whole load started coming off , jumped far as I could and broke my feet up when I landed on a rock . Three months on crutches but didn't get killed with that pipe falling .

Most here would not know what 'blackleg' is . It meant the derrick was full of stands of drill pipe needed be run back in the hole ..tripping .

[Boaz]

Just an odd fact most don't know . During world war 2 people were 'frozen' in positions deemed to be necessary to national security or the war effort . All oilfield workers were frozen in their jobs . Domestic oil was all we could depend on as most oil producing countries were fought over by European governments allies and Germany / Japan ? Oil , rubber , metal ...basic material of building and maintaining superiority . I talked to a lot of old hands that were locked into their jobs back then , many were young and wanted to enlist but were not allowed to . They served on the rigs .

[Rufus Krile]

The rigs in the rockies often ran on propane. It got cold enough they had to build fires under the propane tanks to keep the pressure up... It became the motorman's job to maintain the fire... if the pressure got too high he'd start shoveling snow to cool it back down. No warm and fuzzy feelings there... Just one more story: Signal Drilling Co drilling on the Vermejo Ranch in NM (now Ted Turner's)... we all stayed in Cimarron and frequented a local emporium called 'Augie's'... Augie would keep it open as long as anyone wanted to drink beer and/or play pool, so rigging up during the day was a real chore. New hand (worm) was malingering from drink after the lunch break and refused to rally. Crew ran the geolograph cable over the spool and tied one end to his ankle (while he reclined on the metal bench in the doghouse) and tied the other end to a surface bit out on the floor. Kicked the bit off the floor, dragging worm down the bench, up the wall, and broke his leg in two places... I had to take him back to town. OSHA would freak now...


Yea freezing weather you struggled to keep everything from freezing up . Scattering out metal dope buckets with cottonseed hulls and diesel burning , built wood fire with mud pallets under the rig . Had to keep all pumps and engines running or they would freeze up . Walking around with propane torches thawing out the shaker and water system .

If you made a connection or trip the driller would have to 'rattle' the derrick to get to ice off it . Seen long chunks the size of a 2x6 rain down on the floor . Shovel it off to walk and spread sacks of soda ash to walk on . It was miserable .

[Rufus Krile]

Well, maybe just one more.... Same crew, same hole... You had to be careful to not run over all the elk on this place. They'd get out on the road and look at you like cattle. Crew roped a yearling and announced they were going to smuggle it out of the ranch in the back of MY truck... Two gates into this place, one at Raton, the other 10mi out of Cimarron... Told 'em I wasn't getting caught up in that mess, so they tucked it up under a skinny aluminum camper shell and away they went on days off. Came back with knots and bends all over the camper shell... seems the yearling got loose somewhere around Abiiqui and they had to draw lots to see who would open the tailgate.


Okay, okay... A crew off Field Drlg Co Rig 18 got chastised and sent away by the good folks of McAllen, TX for wanting to play shuffleboard on a court in a city park. Alcohol may have been involved... Anyway, the crew were told that the shuffleboard court was for the convenience and entertainment of the 'snowbirds' down there for the winter. ("Bring a $20 bill and a white shirt and never change either of them...") The crew decided that these disparaging remarks were inappropriate and downright insulting so they came back to the rig. Helped them load a 55gal drum of burned motor oil and sent them back... Headlines ran for a week.


Why do I think we could do this all night?

[Boaz]

OSHA would have went into spasms at everything back then . Was drilling for Mesquite Drilling ..a crappy lay down rig . !2 hour tires , piece of junk rig . Got relieved by the Smith family , nasty pack of low life , drunks , stunk and filthy . Lazy and just worthless .

Cold as heck , as you said had to heat the propane tank with a small fire , I had to light a mud sack with diesel and constantly heat the regulators on the gas industrial engines to keep em running .

Daddy rat of this low life family was driller ..name was Big un .
When they relieved us I told him we were heating the tank and to warm the regulators or engines would die

When my boys got in the car to go home Big un had his 'crew' stacking wood pallets against the big propane tank . I knew he would blow it . Got off the lease , hit the blacktop I was watching in the rearview mirror , saw a plume of flame go up probably 90 foot , figured they had blown their selves up . Stopped 15 miles down the road and called the rig owner , told him his 'boys' had most likely burnt thierselfs up . He went wild and said for us to go back , I was said ..You hired um ..you clean it up .

Well heck ! Big un and his crew (family) didn't burn , pop off on the tank blew and saved um .

[Boaz]

Well, maybe just one more.... Same crew, same hole... You had to be careful to not run over all the elk on this place. They'd get out on the road and look at you like cattle. Crew roped a yearling and announced they were going to smuggle it out of the ranch in the back of MY truck... Two gates into this place, one at Raton, the other 10mi out of Cimarron... Told 'em I wasn't getting caught up in that mess, so they tucked it up under a skinny aluminum camper shell and away they went on days off. Came back with knots and bends all over the camper shell... seems the yearling got loose somewhere around Abiiqui and they had to draw lots to see who would open the tailgate.


Okay, okay... A crew off Field Drlg Co Rig 18 got chastised and sent away by the good folks of McAllen, TX for wanting to play shuffleboard on a court in a city park. Alcohol may have been involved... Anyway, the crew were told that the shuffleboard court was for the convenience and entertainment of the 'snowbirds' down there for the winter. ("Bring a $20 bill and a white shirt and never change either of them...") The crew decided that these disparaging remarks were inappropriate and downright insulting so they came back to the rig. Helped them load a 55gal drum of burned motor oil and sent them back... Headlines ran for a week.


Why do I think we could do this all night?

I agree , LOL . Too many stories ...it was crazy .

[rancher1913]

nowadays on turners ranch they have ranch hands with radar guns that clock the traffic on the lease roads, get cought speeding you were blacklisted from the property.

we had one guy got a speeding ticket on a lease road in Greeley and we finished the job on his day off, we told him him and his speeding ticket got us kicked off the job because he did not pay it, all B.S. but we had him going for about 2 weeks, made him bring breakfast every morning for the crew, even made him bring the canceled check in to prove he paid. he finally found out we were screwing with him and he would not talk to us for a month of Sundays.

[Rufus Krile]

OSHA would have went into spasms at everything back then . Was drilling for Mesquite Drilling ..a crappy lay down rig . !2 hour tires , piece of junk rig . Got relieved by the Smith family , nasty pack of low life , drunks , stunk and filthy . Lazy and just worthless .

Cold as heck , as you said had to heat the propane tank with a small fire , I had to light a mud sack with diesel and constantly heat the regulators on the gas industrial engines to keep em running .

Daddy rat of this low life family was driller ..name was Big un .
When they relieved us I told him we were heating the tank and to warm the regulators or engines would die

When my boys got in the car to go home Big un had his 'crew' stacking wood pallets against the big propane tank . I knew he would blow it . Got off the lease , hit the blacktop I was watching in the rearview mirror , saw a plume of flame go up probably 90 foot , figured they had blown their selves up . Stopped 15 miles down the road and called the rig owner , told him his 'boys' had most likely burnt thierselfs up . He went wild and said for us to go back , I was said ..You hired um ..you clean it up .

Well heck ! Big un and his crew (family) didn't burn , pop off on the tank blew and saved um .



Are you sure their names weren't 'King'? Knew a family just like you described that decided they could use an oxygen bottle to start an air-start cat motor. It didn't work out well...

[starmac]

The derrick hand on my crew was Tony, his brother we called basketball, never knew his real name was on one of the other crews as was Flop. These three guys were 14 karat koonases and a hoot.
One time we were laying the rig down, so both crews were there, and as always some one hooked the air hoist to the degas pipe before we moved the stairs, so someone had to climb up and unhook it.
Basketball went up and just stayed up there, with the plan on riding the unit down after we moved the stairs. The problem was driller had already told flop to unbolt the degas unit and I was watching it move ever so slightly every turn on that last bolt. Me being the worm, I ask Tony what held it up if all the bolts were removed, He said nothing, she will come crashing to the ground. lol I told him basketball was fixing to get him one heck of a ride. lol

All three of them guys was working on another rig, with a different shift, 14 days on iirc, anyway they stopped at a bar in Flatonia iirc and Tony gets in a pool game, somehow he decided someone (or maybe all the locals) cheated him out of some bucks, anyway the fight started. They wound up getting thrown out, but Tony had a 44 mag lever action in the car, and unloads it trying to shoot the hinges off the door, not realizing the bar was pretty much across the street from the local leo. Now the car chase was on and they threw the rifle out the window, but a mile or more down the road wound up spinning out. The law gathered them all up, drove back to where they had tossed the rifle and picked it up, then went to the police station. Flop was the only one of this crew that had a license, but was not driving, so one cop was questioning Tony and another one was questioning Basketball, Flop was just waiting his turn, they wouldn't tell who did the shooting.
Basketball was all he would tell them for his name, which was chapping the local leo, Finally the cop told him, this is your last chance, who are you. Basketball answered basketball, if you don't believe me ask Flop. Flop said the cop just about lost it then.

They never admitted who fired the gun, finally they brought in the judge, sort of kangaroo style and fined Tony 1100 bucks, since he was driving. they had just got paid, so Tony told them, if there was a place he could cash his paycheck, he would gladly pay up, at which time, the judge ask how much is the check. It was 1800, so they just changed the fine to match, problem solved. lol

[Boaz]

Well looks like this thread is through . To all you old hands ...May you never have to come out of the hole with a mud bucket again . I pray you never have to fish for a lost collar again . May you always work days with a good driller in nice weather on a good rig. May a chain never break nor a cable ever snap on your tire . May you never lose circulation or foul a cathead . May your geologist want few samples and the vis on the mud stay constant . May you get to play a game of poker on the bench in the doghouse and drink a lot of coffee . Just keep it turning to the right .

[starmac]

I haven't been around many roughnecks for years, even on the slope I never am around them. I remember several years back when the price of oil started climbing and they were bringing rigs out of mothballs, there was a labor problem, big time. A lot of the old hands that found themselves without a job when the oil patch shut down, found other industries to make a living and had no interest in coming back.
I had a friend that was pretty high up with brown drilling and he told me they had every rig running that they could man, the pay had gone up considerably which was good money, but they still had rigs stacked, because they couldn't man them.
I didn't think much about this, but a month or two passed and I was in a little truckstop when a crew come in to take a shower, these guys were basically baggy pants, long haired, gangster looking wannabes. I thought, no way these are roughnecks, but ask one of them. he grinned big and said yes, I am the driller. I was literally floored, and told him the oil patch had sure changed. Iirc he told me they were making something like 33 bucks an hour and they had a hard time finding hands.

This was in liberal Kansas.

[Boaz]

I haven't been around many roughnecks for years, even on the slope I never am around them. I remember several years back when the price of oil started climbing and they were bringing rigs out of mothballs, there was a labor problem, big time. A lot of the old hands that found themselves without a job when the oil patch shut down, found other industries to make a living and had no interest in coming back.
I had a friend that was pretty high up with brown drilling and he told me they had every rig running that they could man, the pay had gone up considerably which was good money, but they still had rigs stacked, because they couldn't man them.
I didn't think much about this, but a month or two passed and I was in a little truckstop when a crew come in to take a shower, these guys were basically baggy pants, long haired, gangster looking wannabes. I thought, no way these are roughnecks, but ask one of them. he grinned big and said yes, I am the driller. I was literally floored, and told him the oil patch had sure changed. Iirc he told me they were making something like 33 bucks an hour and they had a hard time finding hands.

This was in liberal Kansas.

I understand . I talk to many , they are knocking down average $25.00 - $30.00 per hour . They talk about how hard it is and talk of safety glasses , safety belts over 6' , week on ..week off with full benefits .......

I don't talk about how it use to be to them ...they don't believe , they can't conceive . But it's ok ..the patch is still there . LOL , we are history ...it's ok .

[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.com/biography-of-clint-walker-actor-singer-and-western-legend/

[starmac]

Didn't know about Clint Walker.

I also understood that if you stiffed him when he staked you, you were going to have a hard row to hoe in the Permian basin.
Inever hired out of the café, but knew several that did, I never did any roughnecking in the Permian basin, but did do a little roustabouting there when I was younger.

[starmac]

Boaz, just to prove oilfield trash was serious about beer drinking, when the bars closed in Odessa, we could make a dash for the border and time zone change and get one more. lol

[Boaz]

Didn't know about Clint Walker.

I also understood that if you stiffed him when he staked you, you were going to have a hard row to hoe in the Permian basin.
Inever hired out of the café, but knew several that did, I never did any roughnecking in the Permian basin, but did do a little roustabouting there when I was younger.

In that time a man would know that , the café was a system and everyone had to be right . I would bet the ones that hired through there made sure he got what was owed him

[Boaz]

I hired out at the café the second day to muck BS out of tank batteries , heck of a nasty job . But had my name up for rig work , after bout a week Joe said a driller needed a floor hand and would be in that morning . Got on a treble rig floors , stayed till the well was completed . Motel and eating was costing too much so got my check and went back to the house . The rig didn't have another location . Went back to Wichita Falls and did hit and miss work till I got on a rig .

Every rig I worked on I remember the view from the derrick ...the basin was barren but you could see a long ways .

[Boaz]

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.

Hauling mud was dang hard work 24 hours a day if need be . Hats off to you sir .

[lead-1]

Had a couple guys I went to school with get jobs on the rigs but it was about done at that time around here. Three of the guys went to work for a well logging company and was put on a crew together so basically they were unsupervised, smoking weed and drinking, but hey the job got done.
For laughs they would take the radioactive pill out of the container and toss it around like a hot potato, having fun saying look at us we're going to turn into little green men. Long story short they were in there early 20's and all dead within thirty years and all from agonizing deaths from cancer. I still believe it was from them playing with that pill all the time.

[lead-1]

Btw, I was a worm for a short time on the rigs, small company with ten rigs or so, mostly junk and as said, by the 80's the crews were a bunch of partiers and I was just waiting for some one not to make it home. Our driller did the hiring and firing on our shift and you played by his rules, if you wanted a job you met at his house each night and rode to work with him, four of us in a 1970 Wagoneer with very little heat and a plastic bag rear window.
Also it cost you ten bucks a day to ride with him so he made 210 bucks a week off us crew, you didn't pay, you didn't work, lol.
After about 5-6 months we shut down for Christmas and never went back to work, the rig I was on sat in the same spot for close to a year before it made it back to the company yard. I never went back to work on a rig.

[starmac]

One of my cousins was married to a roughneck, maybe still is, but one night he was headed back home to Stephenville and rolled his pickup scattering his whole crew among the rocks and throwing him off in a canyon of sorts.
The ambulance came and loaded all of the crew except him, apparently they were all unconscious and didn't tell them there were 5 people instead of four, leaveing him off in a ravine.
He came too sometime in the night and crawled up to the road before passing out again, he was found something like 2 in the morning, busted up pretty bad but survived.

[Boaz]

Back in the 60's and 70's there were no cell phones , a few rigs had a radio but they were pretty worthless in cold weather , bad weather or if the rig was in a low spot . You had to call the mobile operator , tell them who you were and they called pusher , company man , ambulance or whatever on the phone and verbally repeated the conversation to each party . but most rigs back then didn't have one .

If someone got hurt you loaded em up and hauled em to the closest hospital ..could be up to 80 miles off . You were on your own far as doing the best you could in emergencies of any kind . A hand named Jody , he was bout 40 years old , dang good guy but a bad drunk . went crazy on morning tire . He was talking to his self , started seeing big bugs coming to get us , talking about people in the next room had a lot of beer but the wouldn't give us any . We tried to talk to him but he didn't even know we were there , he was screaming and going crazy . We fought him and got him tied up with sash cord , carried him down the stairs and loaded him in the back seat of the drillers Buick .

We were drilling at Bug Scuffle , bout 20 miles south of Bowie Texas . I drove and a floor hand sat in the back with him bout 50 miles to Wichita Falls . Took him to the county hospital . He ended up at the State Hospital on the alcoholics unit . The driller and other floor hand kept the rig running till we got back .

[Boaz]

Good ending to that story was Jody got straightened out several years later and made tool pusher . We never talked about that night .