The mechanical properties of rocks are of high importance for oil and gas wells drilling, production, and future development. Rock mechanical properties are needed for maintaining borehole stability during drilling and completion stages in oil and gas wells. Additionally, these properties are needed to select the optimum production rate especially in soft formations.

The evaluation of such properties requires a number of cores as well as sophisticated testing equipment. When there is a lack of core samples or testing equipment, rock mechanical properties can be predicted using indirect tests or correlations.

In this study, a simple scratching cell was developed and data generated using this cell was used to develop a universal correlation for predicting the unconfined compressive strength (UCS).

We hope that this paper will be a useful addition to rock mechanics and petroleum engineering disciplines, and we expect further developments after finishing the remaining phases of this study.

Keywords:
Engineering, compression machine, mechanical property, Upstream Oil & Gas, universal correlation, Saudi Arabia, Reservoir Characterization, strength, rock strength, reservoir geomechanics
Subjects:
Reservoir Characterization, Reservoir geomechanics
Copyright 2013, Society of Petroleum Engineers
You can access this article if you purchase or spend a download.