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New Symmetrix trial

June 19, 2014

Drilcorp Ltd - new Symmetrix 131 trial

Drilcorp Ltd based in Seaham, County Durham has been awarded a de-watering contract in Aberdeen AB12 3QA in the north east of Scotland, consisting of 220 boreholes to a total depth of 7,5 m. The site has between 5 m and 7 m of overburden comprising sand and gravel of mixed lithology’s and large to very large granite cobbles and boulders then onto granite bedrock. Some excavated boulders have been recorded at over 1 m in diameter. These strata’s have proved problematic to the drillers on site.

"John was so impressed with our equipment and helpfulness that he agreed to purchase a second Symmetrix system including a second COP 54 hammer based on our recommendations, on the spot."

James Mollon ,Area sales manager in UK
The Director of Drilcorp Ltd, John Gowans, asked me to propose a solution to the situation on site, the obvious choice was our new Symmetrix Retrievable N-model R168/10-132 complete with a new Secoroc COP  54 hammer to run it. I put the package together and had it delivered to site. On Thursday 19/6/14 I attended the site in Aberdeen to commission the new system and check that the operators were using it correctly. The rig was a Massenza MI6 with a tilt out head and 3,6 m stroke and the compressor was an Ingersoll Rand 400 cfm/200 psi custom tracked unit. We set-up the new system and began drilling at 12:10 pm, running the compressor at 10 bar with low rotation speed (no gauge on the rig) and encountered numerous large boulders which were no match for the system.


The operators were slightly apprehensive using the new kit in front of an Atlas Copco employee but still managed to have the borehole to the total depth by 12:40 pm. The operator joked that it would take him longer to pull out the casing than it would to drill the hole (it did). I have personally drilled similar ground conditions using the old design of retrievable Symmetrix system N-model and did so for some years, and I can confirm that the new Symmetrix design “is a weapon!”. The increased flushing capabilities dramatically improve the system and from a quality point of view it should be able to sustain a lot more punishment than its predecessor. Even just drilling to 7,5 m on this site I could see a vast improvement. The latching in and out of the ring bit has also dramatically improved with less rotation required due to the 5 no latching points. It seamlessly glides into latched and unlatched positions effortlessly and this was also noted by the operators from Drilcorp Ltd.

Epiroc operated under the trademark “Atlas Copco” prior to January 1, 2018.

International Customer story 2014

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