Simple Frictional Analysis of Helical Buckling of Tubing R.F. Mitchell, SPE, Enertech Engineering & Research Summary. Previous analyses of helical buckling of tubing have not considered frictional forces. In this paper, {ifferential equations are derived and solved for two simplified cases of interest: downward motion of the tubing—e.g., when buckling occurs during the landing of the tubing—and upward motion of the tubing—e.g., when buckling occurs as a result of thermal and differential pressure loading subsequent to landing. While somewhat more complicated than the conventional frictionless buckling equations, these solutions are still suitable for hand calculations. These solutions, however, do not represent general solutions to buckling with friction. Load reversals and lateral frictional forces add complications that would require computer analysis. Several examples are examined to evaluate the relative importance of friction, which has a significant impact on tubing length change for loaded cases. For instance, the choice of a conservative value for the friction coefficient may allow the solution of a difficult seal-design problem by reducing a large predicted length change. Friction also has an important effect on set-down loads. Frictionless buckling calculations do not give conservative results for this problem. Introduction ‘The buckling behavior of well tubing has an important impact on well design and production operations. Lubi ski et al.! first analyzed tubing buckling comprehensive- ly. Hammertindt?* applied the same basic buckling ‘model to more complicated situations, including combi- nation strings and intermediate packers. ‘The mechanical basis for this buckling model consists Of the following features. 1. Slender-beam theory is used to relate bending mo- ‘ment to curvature, The tubing must remain elastic for the analysis to remain valid 2. The tubing is assumed to buckle into a helical shape. ‘This assumption is reasonable for a vertical wellbore but might not be valid for a deviated wellbore. 3. The principle of virtual work is used to relate the buckling load to the pitch of the helix. 4. Certain conditions on bending moment at the pack- cr are implied by the formulation. It has been shown that these boundary conditions influence the solution of the buckling problem. 5. Friction between the buckled tubing and the con- straining casing is neglected Recent work” showed that the virtual work analysis is not necessary to derive useful approximate solutions to bbuckling equations that satisfy Item 4. These results are summarized in Appendix A. ‘The friction assumption is often mentioned in the buck- ling literature, and the importance of friction is often stat- ced. In Fig. 14 of Ref. 2, for instance, the 50% deviation ‘of the measured buckling length change from the predicted length change is attributed to friction. In this paper, the buckling model is modified to include the effects of fric~ tion for two special cases. The elementary theory of frie- tion is discussed and the history-dependence of friction forces is described. Two simple load histories are de- ‘ont 186 Sabet Peli Enger ‘SPE Driling Engineering, December 1986 scribed that give analytical solutions: tubing loaded at the packer and tubing slacked off at the surface. Sample prob- Jems based on the cases presented by Lubinski etal. are calculated to illustrate the importance of friction. The ac- tual technical development of the buckling equations is presented in three appendices. In Appendix A, the bbuckling-force/pitch relation and the contact forces be- tween the buckled tubing and the constraining casing are determined by an approximate solution to the slender- ‘beam equations. In Appendix B, the differential equations ‘governing the buckling force when friction is present are ] crude. ‘The fluid in the tubing is displaced with 15-Ibm/gal [1797-kg/m?] cement. Finally, surface pressures of 5,000 and 1,000 psi (34.4 and 6.9 MPa] are applied tothe tub- ing and annulus, respectively. ‘The buckling-force distribution for this case with zero friction and with friction coefficients of 0.01 through 0.4 Fig. 4—Buckling force distribution for loaded case. 460 ‘SPE Dailing Engineering, December 1986Fig, Buckling force distribution for landed case. is illustrated in Fig. 4. The no-friction buckling force has {straight-line distribution and is compressive from about 1,400 ft [427 m] to bottomhole. The tubing is buckled cover that interval. For the friction cases, the buckling force decreases more rapidly near the packer and forms a curve parallel to the no-friction curve far from the packer. This ‘means that friction is more important where the buckling force is large—near the packer. Note also that the spac ing between curves decreases for higher friction coeffi- cients. This means there is less sensitivity to friction coefficients in the 0.2-to-0.3 range than in the 0-t0-0.1 range. ‘The tubing-length change with friction is given in Fig. ‘5 Both the buckling and piston-effect length changes are given because both are affected by friction. Over the fric~ tion coefficient range of Oto 0.4, the piston-effect length ‘change varies by less than 50% while the buckling length change varies by more than 50%. For a conservative fric- tion coefficient of 0.2, the piston-effect length change var- jes by 38%, the buckling length change varies by 78%, and the overall length change varies by 53%. Case 2—Slack-Of. This case is identical to Example 2 of Ref. 1. In this example, the same tubing/casing com- bination is considered before application of the squeeze- ‘cementing loads. Here we are assuming that the packer thas limited downward motion so that we can slack off at the surface and load the packer. In the example, the slack- ‘off load is 20,000 lbf [89 MNJ. Fig. 6 shows the buckling-force distribution for the slack-off case. The important number is the force at 10,000 ft [3048 m]. For the no-friction case, this load is 20,000 Ibf (89 KN], the same as the slackoff force. ‘This set-down load reduces to 16,400 Ibf [73 kN] for f=0.1, 14,000 Ib [62.3 KN] for f=0.2, and 11,200 Ibf [49.8 KN] for f=0.4. This is clearly a case where neglect- ing friction is not conservative. The effect of friction on slack-off has been recognized by the petroleum industry— c.g.» figures in Ref. 9 relate slack-off to set-down loads. Unfortunately, the analysis used to produce these charts is not available, nor are the friction coefficients. Fig. 7 shows the effect of friction on buckling and piston length changes. Interestingly, there is very little effect. ‘One reason is that friction works against weight in the slack-off case, whereas friction works with weight in the ‘SPE Dring Engineering, December 1986 Toading case, as shown in Fig. 3. Thus the change in the load curve in Fig. 6 with friction is much less dramatic than the changes in Fig. 4. Finally, there is much less ‘buckling inthis slack-off case than inthe loaded case. In the slack-off case, about 3,000 ft (914 m] of tubing is buckled, while inthe loaded case, almost the entire length ‘of tubing is buckled. Because the friction is coupled to the actual tubing force only over the bucked interval, the result is less sensitivity to friction. Conclusions ‘Simple analytic solutions to two buckling-with-friction ‘eases have been developed. While somewhat more com- plicated than the conventional frictionless buckling equa- tions, they are stil suitable for hand calculations. These solutions do not represent general solutions to buckling with friction. Load reversals add complications that can- ‘not be dealt with easily. ‘The buckling-with-friction solutions are based on the assumptions used to develop the Lubinski et al.! buck- ling analysis and are subject to the same considerations. Friction has a significant impact on tubing length change for loaded cases. The choice of a conservative value for the friction coefficient may allow the solution of a difficult seal-design problem by reducing a large predicted length change. Friction has an important effect on set-down loads. The results of frictionless buckling calculations are not con- servative for this problem, Nomenctature area corresponding to tubing ID, f? {m?] area corresponding to tubing OD, ft? {m?] packer bore cross-sectional area, ? [m2] cross-setional area of tubing wall, 2 [m7] 461