Custom Rig Design and Construction for Nabors

In 2006, Nabors Drilling identified a need for a purpose built coiled tubing rig for the North Slope of Alaska. The rig would address requirements from ConocoPhillips, Alaska to improve recovery in the existing oil fields on the North Slope. Harlan and Shawn Smith worked collaboratively with the client, Nabors Drilling, to develop a new rig design that would significantly improve coiled tubing methods and efficiencies on the North Slope. That rig was built, and it went into operation on the North Slope of Alaska in 2009, designated Nabors CDR2. The unique coiled tubing rig allowed a single rig to support the drilling and completion of up to 8 laterals from a single well bore.

In 2015, Entro received a contract to design and fabricate a sister rig to CDR2 for Nabors Drilling designated CDR3. The new rig was patterned on the original design, with enhancements and features that further improve efficiencies for the specialized crews that work in the arctic environment.

The rig itself consists of two purpose built trailers—a substructure module and a service mud module—which allow efficient operation all year round in harsh arctic conditions. The rig structure was fabricated in Kelso, Washington and then assembled at the Columbia Business Park in Vancouver, Washington.

The rig-up facility is large enough to assemble the entire trailers indoors throughout the wet winter months. In the summer of 2016, the rig was eventually brought out into the rig-up yard to install the mast, then loaded onto a 400-foot-long ocean-going barge for the trip to the North Slope.