78 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



November 1, 1920 



the well, and the picturesque walking beam begins its task, one 

 which every oil man always hopes will be a never-ending series 

 of "ups and downs." 



BELTING 



When the stage is all set for an "oil drama," rubber is ushered 

 in in an important role in the very first act ; that is, the operation 

 of "spudding in" or drilling a well. It is needed primarily for 

 belting. The big oil companies of the South\ve.';t have tried all 

 kinds of belts for driving drills at high speed 24 hours a day in 

 the fields, both by the rotary chiselling or "percussion" process, 

 in which a 625-pound bit is lifted and dropped into the hole; and 

 the boring method, in which a 100-pound bit with a serrated tip 

 is revolved at the bottom of an 8 or 10-inch iron pipe to which 

 additions are being constantly made ; but the one belt that the 

 workers find stands the hardest kind of abuse and gives the great- 

 est efficiency is that made of rubber. 



Rubber belting is preferred in the oil fields because it is tougher, 

 more flexible, more cohesive and has greater tensile strength than 

 leather; it hugs the pulleys closely, making anti-slip "dope" un- 

 necessary; there is no stretch to it, hence no time lost in take- 

 ups; it is uniform in its construction, joints being eliminated when 

 measurements are sent to the factories for endless belts; there 

 is no limit to the width, thickness, quality, or design in which 

 it can be made up ; it is water-proof and can be made practically 

 impervious to oils, acids, gases and steam; and it can withstand 

 the roughest service in sandy sections and extreme variations in 

 temperature. A fact of no little interest, too, is that rubber 

 belting costs less than leather. 



A familiar type of rubber belt used on oil well drills is 12 to 

 14 inches wide and made of 6-ply canvas duck with a good quality 

 of friction. For a few special cases 8-ply belts are made to 

 order. All such belts, drillers say, withstand the heavy, uneven 

 jerks caused by the weight of the tools and the spring of the 

 cable much better than leather. When a well has been set up 

 and a gasoline or electric-driven pump has been installed, the 

 transmission belt that is preferred to connect motor and pump is 

 a 4 or 5-ply heavy duck well frictioncd with rubber and generally 

 a foot wide. The durability of such belts often amazes the 

 users, many giving five and six years of service despite oil, grit, 

 slush and rough usage. It might be added that such belts are 

 generally of the type having the plies stitched and the surface 

 rubber-covered to make it moisture-proof. 



OIL HOSE 



Another article of even greater utility in the oil industry is 

 hose ; and many are the varieties used to meet exacting conditions. 

 It is first employed in the primary or drilling operation, espe- 

 cially where the rotary method is used, and with it water is con- 

 stantly pumped down the slender hollow shaft to cool the drill 

 and to keep it from getting clogged with sand and pulverized rock, 

 as well as to flush out the bore-hole. The type of hose used 

 ranges from 2 to lYi inches internal diameter, is made with a 

 thick, tough inner wall, and generally has from five to eight plies, 

 except at the ends of the 30 to 50-foot length, where it is rein- 

 forced with one or two additional plies of fabric to withstand 

 coupling strain. All such hose has a protective armor, being 

 closely wrapped with either round or half-round wire, commonly 

 No. 6 gage, for rough handling. Some types for pressures of 

 250 pounds or more have fiat wire wound through the cores to 

 safeguard the hose further from grit abrasion and to prevent 

 bends from straining it too much. For compressed air needs, 

 many use plain wrapped duck or braided hose, 5 to 9-ply, with the 

 core made of an oil-resisting rubber; but the demand is increas- 

 ing for hose with wire armor, which gives added strength and 

 longer life for rough work. 



For conducting oil from tanks to barrels the hose most used 

 has four or five plies of frictioned duck with the center 

 lined with an oil-resisting rubber compound, and with a closely- 



set spiral flat wire extending through the core not only to protect 

 the compound from possible corrosion but also to prevent the 

 hose from kinking or collapsing through the high vacuum so 

 often occurring in hose used for this purpose. For general oil 

 conveying a hose is used that has four or five plies with a spe- 

 cially-made canvas lining to protect the rubber, and also a round 

 or flat wire helix in the core to check sharp bending. 



To draw oil from shore tanks to steamships or tankers, or 

 to reverse the process, a suction and discharge hose of excep- 

 tional strength and caliber is employed. It has to be made to 

 witlistand the utmost extremes in weather, the harshest handling, 

 continual contact with rapidly-growing masses of oil, and usually 

 high pressure. Spun metal hose has been tried, but, while such 

 hose may give fair service in selected cases, the big oil com- 

 panies much prefer to put their trust in rubber. As they say, 

 all transfers of oil cannot be made with ships moored to docks; 

 often tlie big hose has to be stretched a long distance from the 

 shore, and sometimes it has to be fastened to a string of floats 

 in rough water when a ship cannot be brought near a wharf or 

 where wharves are lacking. They must have a hose that will 

 not break if it bends. If in using a spun metal hose in such 

 cases the hose were to snap in two, as is always possible, such an 

 accident would mean perhaps serious loss and delay to shippers 

 and customers. 



One type of suction and discharge hose which is considerably 

 used on the Pacific Coast ranges in internal diameter from si.x 

 to eight inches and often lasts a year with steady use. It has 

 a heavy, oil-resisting cover, under which are four plies of 32- 

 ounce duck frictioned fabric. Under the latter is a braided steel 

 cable wound spirally, then four plies more of fabric, next a 

 heavy rubber lining, then two layers of canvas frictioned on the 

 reverse side, and finally a heavy galvanized iron flat wire helix 

 for the core and so pressed into the canvas as to give quite a 

 smooth bore throughout. Surprise is sometimes expressed that 

 external wire winding is seldom used on such hose. The reason 

 given is that it is not safe, as friction of the metal covering with 

 stones or on concrete docks might cause a spark that would 

 mean a disastrous fire. A few concerns, however, have in use 

 a type of hose which has all the features of that just described 

 (except the cable) and with a flat wire or rope wound around 

 the outside but protected with a specially-treated canvas covering. 



For oil discharge only, a 4 or 5-ply hose with a compact, 

 smooth-bore rubber lining is ordinarily used. A more durable 

 type is made of four plies of fabric, a heavy tubing compound, 

 four plies more of fabric, and a heavy rubber lining. Some 

 buyers require manufacturers to conform to the United States 

 War Department specilications or to those of the Southern Pacific 

 Railway, while many of the large oil companies buy only ac- 

 cording to their own specifications. 



GASOLINE HOSE 



Some complaint has been made that gasoline sellers often use 

 old or inferior hose in filling automobile tanks, with the result 

 that particles of partly-dissolved or disintegrated rubber are drawn 

 into the needle valves of carburetors, interfering with engine op- 

 eration, and sometimes causing motor car owners much vexa- 

 tion and expense. Investigation, however, has revealed but little 

 basis for such complaint. In a few cases at out-of-the-way sta- 

 tions some dealers may have used old garden hose temporarilv 

 in filling tanks, and some dissolved rubber from worn lining or 

 joints may have given a few motorists annoyance, but the amount 

 of such trouble has really been negligible. An increasing number 

 of gasoline sellers use a hose nozzle having a 60 to 80 wire mesh 

 strainer to catch lint, dirt, etc., that may be in gasoline. Ex- 

 perienced "gas" sellers say that if the nozzles arc fastened in 

 the hose to prevent the fluid from reaching the fabric, there 

 will be rarely any disintegration trouble. As an improvement, 

 some stress the need of couplings that wlien inserted in hose 



