Wells – Submerged well – Wellhead
Reexamination Certificate
1999-06-08
2001-01-23
Tsay, Frank (Department: 3673)
Wells
Submerged well
Wellhead
C166S332300
Reexamination Certificate
active
06176316
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a subsea wellhead assembly, of the kind comprising a spool assembly having a vertical production through bore for receiving an insert comprising at least one valve element having a vertical bore coaxial with the vertical production through bore, and a valve actuator for rotating the or each valve element to control fluid flow through the insert, the actuator being fixed on the spool assembly and being advanceable, in use, radially of the coaxial bores into the valve insert so that one end mates with the valve element allowing operation of the valve element. Such a wellhead assembly will be referred to as the kind described.
2. Description of Related Art
Examples of such a wellhead assembly can be found in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,078,921 and 3,115,934.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
A disadvantage with such assemblies is that when the insert is locked into the spool assembly, stack up tolerances make it very difficult to guarantee that the alignment between the spool assembly and the insert is sufficiently accurate to allow the or each actuator to engage properly with a corresponding valve element.
According to the present invention, a wellhead assembly of the kind described is characterized by a cylindrical sleeve mounted coaxially around the one end of the actuator and rotatable relatively to the actuator about the common axis of the actuator and the sleeve, so that, when the actuator engages with the corresponding valve element, the sleeve bridges the gap between the spool assembly and insert so as to lock the insert to the spool assembly.
As the sleeve is mounted to the valve actuator as described, when the sleeve locks the valve insert in place, the valve actuator is guaranteed to be in exact alignment with the appropriate port in the insert and the actuator can be rotated to operate the valves.
REFERENCES:
patent: 3078921 (1963-02-01), Edwards
patent: 3115934 (1963-12-01), Rector
patent: 3592489 (1971-07-01), Baugh et al.
patent: 4154298 (1979-05-01), Gano
patent: 4637419 (1987-01-01), Hughes
patent: 4637470 (1987-01-01), Weathers et al.
patent: 4681133 (1987-07-01), Weston
patent: 4732215 (1988-03-01), Hopper
patent: 5992527 (1999-11-01), Garnham et al.
patent: 6053252 (2000-04-01), Edwards
patent: 6109352 (2000-08-01), Edwards et al.
Cooper Cameron Corporation
Duke Jackie Lee
Tsay Frank
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