Although you may not realize it, you are a very interesting storyteller in a way in which even someone who has no previous knowledge can learn alot from you !
learning for when I start get oil out of my wells in new Mexico and Oklahoma, I hope soon at some point lol nice thanks , Zack how could I get the oil people a drillers to start pumping they say the have been forced to stop 🛑 the process of getting started acquiring the angle drill sites they are going to be drilling from two miles out down to the pool and there is a ton of people that are in the down stream royalty of the operation lol thanks BigAl California
Yea. You explain well and concise and deliberate explanation. I like machinery and mechanical stuff. Not experience or ever been around oil field stuff but just found you last week and like your videos. Also that your not afraid to show other stuff besides what it seems your main content is.
Great comment. I guess you could say he very relatable as a story teller. I do need point out somewhat common spelling error. The word "alot" is incorrect. The correct way is: "a lot." One of my OCD things, sorry. God bless!
Driving across the country and seeing those oil wells pumping along the freeway I always wondered how they actually worked and processed oil. I just learned more about oil wells than I ever thought I would know. Thanks for the vid.
My Dad worked for Haliburton in Michigan back in the early 80's so i grew up hearing stories of stuff out on drill /well sites. Your videos help to bring visuel to those stories. Keep them coming, your an awesome story teller/ teacher.
I really enjoy your videos. They’re interesting I’ve never worked in the oil fields. But I’ve been around a lot of different types of industry and you do a great job of describing what’s going on and it’s not hard to pick up on the dermatology. I also appreciate that your language is real clean, not vulgar. Thanks great job
Funny how few people recognize how handy a gin pole can be. Amazing what you can lift and move with one if you can appropriately manage a sketchy sketch setup. You hardly ever see them anymore. Simple, cheap, useful for all kinds of stuff if you understand leverage. You can walk a house with one if you need to. Old feller by the name of Archimedes once said; “Give me a lever long enough and a fulcrum on which to place it, and I shall move the world. ” Well I copied that quote but that aint what he said, he didnt speak English. Neither do I, but that dont stop me from tryin. Now that I think about it, I'm not sure English was yet invented in his day. I have freaked people out with a 10' 4x4 oak beam and a concrete block. A buddy was coming to the house and I was going to move a 62 Chevy Chieftan pickup, I think it was a 230 straight 6 in it. So I set up a lever. When my buddy got there I asked him to help me move that truck. Sure he says. He thought I was gonna roll it back but I told him to lift up on the bumper. He grabbed on and I pried the front end plumb off the ground with that lever. You shoulda seen the look on his face! LOL You literally could lift the front end, both wheels off the ground with one pinky finger. I have a knack for leverage cause dad started me real young thinking about what you can do with ropes and beams if you understand leverage. I had a 100 foot rope tied off to a telephone pole and drug the ass end of an 85 Sentra straight sideways across asphalt just by walking in to the middle of the rope until I got enough angle that I ran out of leverage. Even if you get out a napkin and a pencil to draw out some pictures and math, they cant believe their eyes. Nobody thinks that way anymore, just wanna go grab a machine and let Caterpillar and diesel fuel do all the thinkin.The one I still cant wrap my head around is how many yards it takes to fill a ditch. Cant be right, figure it again........
Zach your livelihood is amazing to me! I'm a gearhead and have worked on cars and small engines 25 of my 40 years of life. Up here in the northern midwest oil isnt a thing. I wish it was! I can't think of a better livelihood than fixing, maintaining, and running oil wells! What an amazing family legacy you have! Wish I could apprentice a guy like you to learn the trade.
Zach man your content is fantastic. I had a brief career on little single drilling rig in Drayton Valley, Alberta for about a year before the price of oil dropped and I decided to go into a trade. Ever since I'm always on the lookout for anything about the history of oilfields and oilfield equipment, the basics of how oil wells work and the nuts and bolts of the production process. Your channel is a gold mine and it wouldn't be half as good if you didn't have a great clear way of explaining things. First of all it should be required viewing for any oilfield green hand, seriously lol. Furthermore, I'd recommend that anyone working in any mechanical trade watch this stuff in order to pick up those little tips and tricks when it comes to pulling equipment apart, machining tolerances and other generalities like even a bit of old school safety wisdom. I hope you keep up with the channel, and just remember no matter how boring a little job feels when you're working on the lease there's probably lots of us who'd be interested to learn about it. Thanks!
Watching the light diffract through that gas boiling out of the tank was something else. I learned a bit today. Always good to find out something new. Thanks man!
I had an Army buddy who lived in Tyler Texas who had a well that was drilled and maintained by a company. He had no knowledge of how the well worked, other than when it pumped it pumped money. Thanks for explaining how the well worked. I ride in Michigan and they have some of these pumps where we ride. Now I know how they work. Also, my Wife's Grandpa, who lived (he is now dead) in Ky also had a well and they used the gas to heat with and cook. They used to use coal, which was also strip mined off his land. The whole area went from dirt poor and heating and cooking with coal (dug by hand from a coal seam) to relative wealth and heating and cooking with gas.
@@covenantoftheark2924 it's way more than those 2 around Tyler! Use to be a LONG list of operators there! XTO was one of the majors but give it a few years it will be a new list with new names. The always changing oilfield! Last time I worked there was over 13 years ago.
I retired from the Oil industry and move away from it. The best job I had was operating a water injection field. We had winch truck and we’ll service rig. Thanks for making these videos. I sure do enjoy watching them.
Really enjoyed this and the one with the 100 year old well. Grew up in the Rangely oil patch in the 1960's. While not affiliated with the industry directly, I have aways loved the old pumpjacks and still enjoy being shown how they work and how it all fits together. Oil not only "smells like money" to me, it smells like home.
I really love the simplicity in oil production down there! Here in Frostbackistan a winch truck is a half million dollars and it take ten of them, four bed trucks and two million dollar pickers to move a rig across the yard.
Sorry, to answer your question. Yes. Most of the gas wells produced more than a barrel of light crude a day. I suppose when you're drilling down three or four thousand meters it's a bit more of a production haha.
Strangely interesting, and quite mesmerising. I know there's a lot of these small wells all over the place, and yet when people talk of oilfields, I instantly think of the big pump jacks covering thousands of acres, and yet, these little machines still turn out worthwhile amounts of oil. Good luck, and God willing there'll always be a market for oil.
Domestic oil pumping receives a lot of very favorable tax incentives, deductions, or direct financial assistance. Up to $10B in the current budget. Otherwise we'd be paying $3 a litre like in western Europe.
Extremely interesting. One thinks he understands a system, only to find out there are several more layers of complexity to it. Thanks. Well explained (no pun intended).
Awesome video. I been pumping a 64 year old well in Kimball county NE for the last 15 years that consistently makes 10 bopd but what I think is really cool is that, not only does it make a consistent 10 barrels every day, but in it's 64 years in total, it's made 1.7 million barrels. Good ole girl. Not too many good ole girls like the one you have, and like mine!
Great video Zach. Nothing requires so much thought and planning as working in the oil field by yourself. I'm certain the house nearby appreciates the polish rod lube box. Many times I see and hear a pump without one. Keeps the rubbers lasting much longer, but helps keep it quiet. Great to hear about this old legacy well. Build a frame for that spark plug your dad or his dad changed. If that could talk.........
Found your channel yesterday Zach. Been binge watching since. Great videos explaining the basics of oil and gas production . My west Texas oil career 1980 to 2015 was drilling services. Shallow 2000 ft to 29000 ft wells. They are all basically the same process. Your real time production teaches me a lot about completion and producing oil. Thanks for taking us along. I miss the oil patch small and big.
Zach I really appreciate your videos. I’m new to being an operator. With no previous knowledge of the way things are with the RRC and everything else that goes with it. I’m learning from you. Every little thing you teach is very helpful to me. I’m also in Texas. Thank you for taking the time to teach what you do. I would love to work with you and be able to ask first hand advise. I need an oil field worker friend with lots of experience that is honest. I have met lots of people who just want to take advantage of every situation. I have some old wells that produce and some inactive wells. Stay safe.
I liked your spark plug story! I work quarries that have been in my family on my father’s side for six generations. I find metal “treasures “ that are from the ancestors. The junk or treasures make my day when I find their old tools, broken or just lost
Depending on how much electricity your pump eats I’d think about making a electronic controller that would stop the well for a day and start back up for 2-3 so you get a bit more profit and less water.
i don't know anything about oil wells except what i have learned from your fantastic videos so far, and actually, that's getting to be much more than i thought. I am the first person in my last 2 generations of family to actually be self employed, everyone else works for a paycheck and cannot understand, or won't understand, the lifestyle commitment that I feel this is. Thanks for videoing some of your activities and perspectives. I was thinking maybe a remote for the winch? It is another point of failure and more complexity in the machinery for sure, but perhaps it can make it more efficient when you are working on the pumps.
Really enjoy your videos. Worked as a roustabout in west Texas during summers in the 70’s. Helped me pay for school. More importantly, I learned how to work hard (for a roustabout), respect others and turn a wrench.
Bro!! I don't think people understand how dangerous starting this well up actually is. Volatile at ambient temperatures and atmospheric pressures are explosive on surface, especially in the summer. I was in the oilfield for 30+ years and can relate to all that you're explaining. An open tank of this wellbore fluid has the possibilities of being catastrophic with the gas vapors boiling off. The violent actions of a soft flowline, moving gas at surface, can cause issues. I'm sure this would be fun to watch from a distance and be on pins and needles trying to manage the start-up. Your explanation of the process is on point. Really loved this video...
Watching you hang the rods on the hanger bar without the door and come all the way off with the winch line gave me anxiety lol but there’s more than one way to skin a cat lol
Good explanation. I'm a geologist and chased drilling rigs all over the Permian Basin. Thanks, the general public thinks oil is in an underground lake and all you have to do is put a straw in it. It does smell like money. Thanks for the memories..
Thanks for the explanation. Growing up in Minnesota, I always speculated on how these worked. This explains why those pump jacks sometimes are shut off. Cool video
I once worked as an operator in one of the oldest fields in the Gulf Coast off of the Mississipi River that still had about 250 wells still operating out of around 1200. Some of the wells I operated were drilled in the late 20s and early 30s and were still producing. I reopened a well one time that had been shut-in or over 30 years and it had over 3,600 psi on the tubing. After making sure the flowline was still in good enough shape the well produced 72 barrels and 10 bbls water per day on a 12/64ths choke with 1.270 psi of flowing tubing pressure. If they didn't mess with the well it's probably still flowing. What generally happens is you get some engineer who wants to start messing with what you have by opening the choke and it ends up pulling water in and killing the well. I have had that happen so many times I couldn't tell you. You go from not producing anything and stabilizing a flow rate that makes them money every day to screwing up what they have. It was always a constant source of stupidity that I became really disheartened about helping them out. I believe I was able to get around 32 wells flowing and producing every day but I digress. Good video.
GREAT "hands on" video ...... THANKS ! Love hearing how "regular folks" keep us going, even at 2 bbls a day ! Best of luck to a "salt of the earth feller" doin his thing in the oil patch ! Keep up the good work and best of luck to ya !!
Zack you missed your calling. Teacher I'd say. You have excellent videos. I spent 33 years in natural gas distribution welder twelve of those years. Now I'm learning the first phase of where natural gas comes from
Treat... your oil well.. That's all I got. Try this -- go for a jog and burn carbohydrates, but go for a drive and burn hydrocarbons. Coincidence? Maybe... Excellent video, thanks for sharing.
That well is a year or so younger than me, and it's still kickin' butt. I, on the other hand have long since seen the end of my butt-kickin' days! Great video, Zach!
I'm an old driller on spudders Zach, broke out on an "H" Cardwell truck mounted on an old Dowell frack truck back when they ran the Allison aircraft engines, talk about shake the ground with 2 setting side by side and us up on the 210 tanks making sure one didn't run dry before the other, 25 Walkaneers too and one old Cooper,,,,, Good times!!!! Great presentation spot on, wished I could remember all the pays (zones) names, Tar springs warsaw salem devonion oxvasis McCloskey,,,,,,,
Recently found your channel and absolutely loving it. I live in NW PA and only 15 minutes away from Titusville, PA which is home to the first commercial oil well. Drake Well was drilled in 1859 to a depth of 69.5ft and produced oil to 1861 at a rate of 12 to 20 barrels per day. Also not far from me is McClintock Well No.1 which is the world's oldest continually producing well. The well was drilled by the Kickdown method using nothing but leg power to a depth of 620ft back in 1861. It produced 175 barrels a day up to 1920 and is now only producing half a barrel a day.
Had three gas wells in the medina formation in western New York, the shut in pressure was 900 psi. We used a bullet perforator to pierce the casing. Not much oil but each well was good for 20K cubic feet per month. If you pushed the well you'd get up to 40k, but you would get salt water intrusion. Low and slow bro. This was before Albany declared a moratorium on fracking. Apparently they don't know it gets cold in the southern tier south of Buffalo. Wouldn't even let us use our own mineral rights to keep from freezing to death without a hassle.
Borrowed phone. I painted tank batteries , worked at a internal coatings plant. Watched a paint crew make it snow tx in august. 4 tanks, equip, trees the ground rudolfs right antler had White tip.
Hey Zach; greetings from Colombia. Very interesting your videos; really enjoy your explanations even with my basic English; but you make it easy and I gotta say there's a lot of useful information and you show details which normally the People don't talk about in the middle of dayly tasks....Thanks a lot Zach. I already suscribed to your channel
@@TheZachLife I subbed, which makes your day no doubt. Retired Okie landman here, so I enjoyed the two vids I watched. You're pretty darned handy when in proximity to a pumpjack. 😁
My grandfather from Electra, Tx had a well like that. My father got like a $20 royalty check maybe once every so many years or at least did .I don't know anymore. But from the stories I can remember they had maybe 2 wells still running from the 50's I was just old enough to remember seeing them in the early 80's . I went to work for Boots & Coots Special Services (International Well Control) in 95 till they sold out to Halliburton in 2000. Not once did I even mess with a single well. I was contracted working on Union Pacific Property.
Just discovered your channel.....always fascinated by pump jacks since little kid (born in Port Arthur).....then played o & g game starting in early 1980's (Ada, Ok)....then sneaked into deals with Houston insiders...via local friend ensconced in River Oaks crowd......first well near Kirbyville...then on to Damon, Alvin, etc., etc.....probably 15 wells over 20 years....mostly SE Tx area. Read many books on geology and oil biz...was hooked bad......with juicy free flowing 'gushers' to inevitable dry holes.....playing the game was my goal.....a wild ride.....love hearing history of wells and details of their quirky production, etc. This well is in interesting location surrounded by trees and brush....but in sweet spot..still making oil after 70 years......thanks for sharing....btw, any interesting prospects in your area?
When I was in high school I'd help my Uncle with his water well business in West Texas. We pulled windmills and changed leathers and pulled regular water tubing with electric pumps on the bottom. A lot of the equipment looks the same and brings me back to working on a winch truck with him. One time the wind wasn't blowing and I had to climb to the top of the windmill and spin it so we could see if the well worked. Good times. Really enjoying your channel!
Wow, Zach...awsome video!! I enjoyed every minute of this. Brings back so many memories of my grandfather and father's wells here in SW Indiana. I remember checking the tanks and hearing the oil splashing and echoing into the tank battery. Oh to only smell that raw crude again, absolutely love it!! On hot summer nights you can smell the gas in the air from the surrounding wells and tank batteries here. Many wells around here in the Illinois Basin still flare off the gas, really neat to see them glow in the night sky. Back in the 70s I loved spending time checking the wells and just taking in the mechanics of it all. Thanks for sharing your excellent knowledge, your passion for your work sure shows in your videos. I still drive around looking at the wells around here and over in White County, Illinois across the Wabash River. There is nothing like the oil fields. I can't get enough of your oil field videos, keep them coming please!! PS LOVE your winch truck.
Grew up in the oilfields in Kansas. I went to work in it right outta high school. I worked on the subsurface pumps for like 3 years repairing them. Tubing and rod pumps. So I get most of your talk about here brother. Lol 👍
I just found your channel and am enjoying what I see. I was born and raised in the oilfield and you got a good grasp on what's going on with these wells. I am going to watch some of your other videos because they are very interesting. Thanks for sharing Zach!
Friendly advice from 50 years in the oilpatch? Need to flip your hook on your winchline, should always be open side down. Cable pulling into the closed side of the hook, or you could indeed lose something you'd rather keep. Like your old hotrod truck. My Dad worked for Sinclair waay back there, I spent a fair amount of time as a kid riding in a Ford winch truck. Used to pilfer salt tablets out the dispenser next to the water can.
Although you may not realize it, you are a very interesting storyteller in a way in which even someone who has no previous knowledge can learn alot from you !
Thank you.
@@TheZachLife I second that. Your awesome.
learning for when I start get oil out of my wells in new Mexico and Oklahoma, I hope soon at some point lol nice thanks , Zack how could I get the oil people a drillers to start pumping they say the have been forced to stop 🛑 the process of getting started acquiring the angle drill sites they are going to be drilling from two miles out down to the pool and there is a ton of people that are in the down stream royalty of the operation lol thanks BigAl California
Yea. You explain well and concise and deliberate explanation. I like machinery and mechanical stuff. Not experience or ever been around oil field stuff but just found you last week and like your videos. Also that your not afraid to show other stuff besides what it seems your main content is.
Great comment. I guess you could say he very relatable as a story teller. I do need point out somewhat common spelling error. The word "alot" is incorrect. The correct way is: "a lot." One of my OCD things, sorry. God bless!
Ur videos make me miss the oil patch so much. Retirement sucks
This video is great because it shows real world work, and that is rare in today's virtual online world.
Enjoy watching your videos. Brings back the 60's and 70's in the old oil patch. You are doing a good job of explaining how things work.
Driving across the country and seeing those oil wells pumping along the freeway I always wondered how they actually worked and processed oil. I just learned more about oil wells than I ever thought I would know. Thanks for the vid.
It is complex - oil in ground. Dig hole in ground. Pump oil up. Pipe into in tank.
No one in this world can defeat a man with a box full of tools who knows how to use them.
And a pickup truck. Don't forget the pickup truck - preferable Ford.
The boiling propane and then the huge spree of barrels it makes was such an interesting story. Science meets engineering meets economics.
My Dad worked for Haliburton in Michigan back in the early 80's so i grew up hearing stories of stuff out on drill /well sites. Your videos help to bring visuel to those stories. Keep them coming, your an awesome story teller/ teacher.
Thanks.
I really enjoy your videos. They’re interesting I’ve never worked in the oil fields. But I’ve been around a lot of different types of industry and you do a great job of describing what’s going on and it’s not hard to pick up on the dermatology. I also appreciate that your language is real clean, not vulgar. Thanks great job
Thanks.
Funny how few people recognize how handy a gin pole can be. Amazing what you can lift and move with one if you can appropriately manage a sketchy sketch setup. You hardly ever see them anymore. Simple, cheap, useful for all kinds of stuff if you understand leverage. You can walk a house with one if you need to.
Old feller by the name of Archimedes once said; “Give me a lever long enough and a fulcrum on which to place it, and I shall move the world. ” Well I copied that quote but that aint what he said, he didnt speak English. Neither do I, but that dont stop me from tryin. Now that I think about it, I'm not sure English was yet invented in his day. I have freaked people out with a 10' 4x4 oak beam and a concrete block. A buddy was coming to the house and I was going to move a 62 Chevy Chieftan pickup, I think it was a 230 straight 6 in it. So I set up a lever. When my buddy got there I asked him to help me move that truck. Sure he says. He thought I was gonna roll it back but I told him to lift up on the bumper. He grabbed on and I pried the front end plumb off the ground with that lever. You shoulda seen the look on his face! LOL You literally could lift the front end, both wheels off the ground with one pinky finger. I have a knack for leverage cause dad started me real young thinking about what you can do with ropes and beams if you understand leverage. I had a 100 foot rope tied off to a telephone pole and drug the ass end of an 85 Sentra straight sideways across asphalt just by walking in to the middle of the rope until I got enough angle that I ran out of leverage.
Even if you get out a napkin and a pencil to draw out some pictures and math, they cant believe their eyes. Nobody thinks that way anymore, just wanna go grab a machine and let Caterpillar and diesel fuel do all the thinkin.The one I still cant wrap my head around is how many yards it takes to fill a ditch. Cant be right, figure it again........
Zach your livelihood is amazing to me! I'm a gearhead and have worked on cars and small engines 25 of my 40 years of life. Up here in the northern midwest oil isnt a thing. I wish it was! I can't think of a better livelihood than fixing, maintaining, and running oil wells! What an amazing family legacy you have! Wish I could apprentice a guy like you to learn the trade.
Zach man your content is fantastic. I had a brief career on little single drilling rig in Drayton Valley, Alberta for about a year before the price of oil dropped and I decided to go into a trade. Ever since I'm always on the lookout for anything about the history of oilfields and oilfield equipment, the basics of how oil wells work and the nuts and bolts of the production process. Your channel is a gold mine and it wouldn't be half as good if you didn't have a great clear way of explaining things. First of all it should be required viewing for any oilfield green hand, seriously lol. Furthermore, I'd recommend that anyone working in any mechanical trade watch this stuff in order to pick up those little tips and tricks when it comes to pulling equipment apart, machining tolerances and other generalities like even a bit of old school safety wisdom. I hope you keep up with the channel, and just remember no matter how boring a little job feels when you're working on the lease there's probably lots of us who'd be interested to learn about it. Thanks!
Thanks.
Watching the light diffract through that gas boiling out of the tank was something else. I learned a bit today. Always good to find out something new. Thanks man!
I had an Army buddy who lived in Tyler Texas who had a well that was drilled and maintained by a company. He had no knowledge of how the well worked, other than when it pumped it pumped money. Thanks for explaining how the well worked. I ride in Michigan and they have some of these pumps where we ride. Now I know how they work. Also, my Wife's Grandpa, who lived (he is now dead) in Ky also had a well and they used the gas to heat with and cook. They used to use coal, which was also strip mined off his land. The whole area went from dirt poor and heating and cooking with coal (dug by hand from a coal seam) to relative wealth and heating and cooking with gas.
It's probably maintained by BASA or maybe Vess. I Used to work on the pumps in the area.
@@covenantoftheark2924 it's way more than those 2 around Tyler! Use to be a LONG list of operators there! XTO was one of the majors but give it a few years it will be a new list with new names. The always changing oilfield! Last time I worked there was over 13 years ago.
I retired from the Oil industry and move away from it. The best job I had was operating a water injection field. We had winch truck and we’ll service rig. Thanks for making these videos. I sure do enjoy watching them.
You explained that very well. That is the first time I ever saw oil that came out of the ground.
Hey thanks. I’m in Andover Ohio for the eclipse. Saw wells everywhere and needed to learn what they are all about. Now I know. Thank you.
Awesome Thanks for watching.
Really enjoyed this and the one with the 100 year old well. Grew up in the Rangely oil patch in the 1960's. While not affiliated with the industry directly, I have aways loved the old pumpjacks and still enjoy being shown how they work and how it all fits together. Oil not only "smells like money" to me, it smells like home.
I really love the simplicity in oil production down there! Here in Frostbackistan a winch truck is a half million dollars and it take ten of them, four bed trucks and two million dollar pickers to move a rig across the yard.
I bet your wells produce more than 1/2 barrel a day I'd bet.
@@lciummo1 the 15 years I spent in the patch we drilled for gas. North east Alberta had lots of old oil production.
@@danielgratz7611 I clarified my original comment, which was not understandable due to typos.
Sorry, to answer your question. Yes. Most of the gas wells produced more than a barrel of light crude a day. I suppose when you're drilling down three or four thousand meters it's a bit more of a production haha.
I’ve drilled in Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan and the Arctic so I feel your Frostministan my friend.
Strangely interesting, and quite mesmerising. I know there's a lot of these small wells all over the place, and yet when people talk of oilfields, I instantly think of the big pump jacks covering thousands of acres, and yet, these little machines still turn out worthwhile amounts of oil.
Good luck, and God willing there'll always be a market for oil.
Domestic oil pumping receives a lot of very favorable tax incentives, deductions, or direct financial assistance. Up to $10B in the current budget. Otherwise we'd be paying $3 a litre like in western Europe.
Extremely interesting. One thinks he understands a system, only to find out there are several more layers of complexity to it. Thanks. Well explained (no pun intended).
Haha Thanks
Awesome video. I been pumping a 64 year old well in Kimball county NE for the last 15 years that consistently makes 10 bopd but what I think is really cool is that, not only does it make a consistent 10 barrels every day, but in it's 64 years in total, it's made 1.7 million barrels. Good ole girl. Not too many good ole girls like the one you have, and like mine!
I agree, some of these old wells are amazing.
@@TheZachLife So approximately how much $$ is 10 barrels a day
I have never worked on a oil well or even been very close to one but you made learning all about it very interesting.
WOW !! ... most entertaining and informative ... thank you and please keep these conversations coming our way ...
Great video Zach. Nothing requires so much thought and planning as working in the oil field by yourself.
I'm certain the house nearby appreciates the polish rod lube box. Many times I see and hear a pump without one. Keeps the rubbers lasting much longer, but helps keep it quiet.
Great to hear about this old legacy well. Build a frame for that spark plug your dad or his dad changed. If that could talk.........
How true that is. I agree I may have to hold onto that plug.
Found your channel yesterday Zach. Been binge watching since. Great videos explaining the basics of oil and gas production . My west Texas oil career 1980 to 2015 was drilling services. Shallow 2000 ft to 29000 ft wells. They are all basically the same process. Your real time production teaches me a lot about completion and producing oil. Thanks for taking us along. I miss the oil patch small and big.
Zach I really appreciate your videos. I’m new to being an operator. With no previous knowledge of the way things are with the RRC and everything else that goes with it. I’m learning from you. Every little thing you teach is very helpful to me. I’m also in Texas. Thank you for taking the time to teach what you do. I would love to work with you and be able to ask first hand advise. I need an oil field worker friend with lots of experience that is honest. I have met lots of people who just want to take advantage of every situation. I have some old wells that produce and some inactive wells. Stay safe.
I liked your spark plug story! I work quarries that have been in my family on my father’s side for six generations. I find metal “treasures “ that are from the ancestors. The junk or treasures make my day when I find their old tools, broken or just lost
Depending on how much electricity your pump eats I’d think about making a electronic controller that would stop the well for a day and start back up for 2-3 so you get a bit more profit and less water.
That sorta what i do. I just manually turn it off and on.
First time I've ever intuitively understood all those old film movie clips of wells turning into geysers of oil.
i don't know anything about oil wells except what i have learned from your fantastic videos so far, and actually, that's getting to be much more than i thought. I am the first person in my last 2 generations of family to actually be self employed, everyone else works for a paycheck and cannot understand, or won't understand, the lifestyle commitment that I feel this is. Thanks for videoing some of your activities and perspectives.
I was thinking maybe a remote for the winch? It is another point of failure and more complexity in the machinery for sure, but perhaps it can make it more efficient when you are working on the pumps.
Thanks.
Really enjoy your videos. Worked as a roustabout in west Texas during summers in the 70’s. Helped me pay for school. More importantly, I learned how to work hard (for a roustabout), respect others and turn a wrench.
Enjoyed your interesting commentary always ready to learn about the ins and outs of drilling and maintaining oil wells. Thanks again.
Thanks.
Lmao!!! I haven't heard the term "educated guess" since my grandfather from years ago!!! Thank you for the reminder
"smells like money"
Never truer words!
Bro!! I don't think people understand how dangerous starting this well up actually is. Volatile at ambient temperatures and atmospheric pressures are explosive on surface, especially in the summer. I was in the oilfield for 30+ years and can relate to all that you're explaining. An open tank of this wellbore fluid has the possibilities of being catastrophic with the gas vapors boiling off. The violent actions of a soft flowline, moving gas at surface, can cause issues. I'm sure this would be fun to watch from a distance and be on pins and needles trying to manage the start-up. Your explanation of the process is on point. Really loved this video...
Thanks.
Bro my respect for this man talks very well salute brotha 💪💯🖤🛢️ shout out from Aurora Chicago IL
Thanks.
Watching you hang the rods on the hanger bar without the door and come all the way off with the winch line gave me anxiety lol but there’s more than one way to skin a cat lol
Very cool explanation. Thanks for taking the time. Love the old 12 valve
You have an exceptional ability to explain while keeping our attention. You would make great speeches or lectures.
Best explanation I’ve ever heard.
Good explanation. I'm a geologist and chased drilling rigs all over the Permian Basin. Thanks, the general public thinks oil is in an underground lake and all you have to do is put a straw in it. It does smell like money. Thanks for the memories..
Every time my grandad smelled oil as we drove around west Texas, he would remark “I smell money”.
Watching this makes me miss my old pumping and roustabout days.
I want a jar of that just to smell of every once in a while.
Haha
@@TheZachLife could be a merch idea.
Smells like ...victory !
Thanks for the explanation. Growing up in Minnesota, I always speculated on how these worked. This explains why those pump jacks sometimes are shut off. Cool video
I once worked as an operator in one of the oldest fields in the Gulf Coast off of the Mississipi River that still had about 250 wells still operating out of around 1200. Some of the wells I operated were drilled in the late 20s and early 30s and were still producing. I reopened a well one time that had been shut-in or over 30 years and it had over 3,600 psi on the tubing. After making sure the flowline was still in good enough shape the well produced 72 barrels and 10 bbls water per day on a 12/64ths choke with 1.270 psi of flowing tubing pressure. If they didn't mess with the well it's probably still flowing. What generally happens is you get some engineer who wants to start messing with what you have by opening the choke and it ends up pulling water in and killing the well. I have had that happen so many times I couldn't tell you. You go from not producing anything and stabilizing a flow rate that makes them money every day to screwing up what they have. It was always a constant source of stupidity that I became really disheartened about helping them out. I believe I was able to get around 32 wells flowing and producing every day but I digress. Good video.
Thats amazing.
Yeah, excellent storyteller, no bullshit.
Learned lots! Thanks from Alberta.
Thanks.
You are the man Zach! I have learned so much from your videos. It's like I'm there with you. I would love to hang with you on the job for a day.
Really Enjoyed this video, thank you !
No idea how the youtube algorithm got me here but I can't stop watching your videos. Very cool stuff
Hahaha Thanks for watching.
Zach gonna start capping wells if he get too successful on line - then he'll be an influencer full time and he can retire his tool set.
GREAT "hands on" video ...... THANKS ! Love hearing how "regular folks" keep us going, even at 2 bbls a day ! Best of luck to a "salt of the earth feller" doin his thing in the oil patch ! Keep up the good work and best of luck to ya !!
Thanks.
Perty neat as he dropped back where it was....I guess 👍👍👍👍
Zack you missed your calling. Teacher I'd say. You have excellent videos. I spent 33 years in natural gas distribution welder twelve of those years. Now I'm learning the first phase of where natural gas comes from
Treat... your oil well.. That's all I got. Try this -- go for a jog and burn carbohydrates, but go for a drive and burn hydrocarbons. Coincidence? Maybe... Excellent video, thanks for sharing.
Haha thanks.
We need more of these wells and more oil and gas refineries built in America.
I agree - right next to that coal-fired electric plant in Merrimac. It's time NH lives up to its motto.
good old Detroit baby so wild to see that well kicking like that.
Reminds me of riding with my uncle who was a pumper for a company in Oklahoma. I always liked riding with him and 'helping.'
That thar is black gold, Texas tea!! First thing you know ole Zach's a millionaire!
Hahaha
@@TheZachLife You're gonna start capping wells if you become a successful CZcamsr! An "oil well influence".
Truck sounds great!
Really interesting videos Zach. Thanks for taking the time to do them for all of youtube.
Thanks
I was about to tell you how much I liked your winch truck but then I saw the homemade RV you built.
I think that's going to be my favorite.
Hahaha.
Very interesting video. Thanks for sharing your knowledge with us.
That well is a year or so younger than me, and it's still kickin' butt. I, on the other hand have long since seen the end of my butt-kickin' days! Great video, Zach!
Hahaha Thanks.
I'm an old driller on spudders Zach, broke out on an "H" Cardwell truck mounted on an old Dowell frack truck back when they ran the Allison aircraft engines, talk about shake the ground with 2 setting side by side and us up on the 210 tanks making sure one didn't run dry before the other, 25 Walkaneers too and one old Cooper,,,,, Good times!!!! Great presentation spot on, wished I could remember all the pays (zones) names, Tar springs warsaw salem devonion oxvasis McCloskey,,,,,,,
We have the exact pump jack setup in the oilfields of Trinidad and Tobago. It's nice to see similar setups in other countries like the USA
Great video. Thanks for sharing
Recently found your channel and absolutely loving it. I live in NW PA and only 15 minutes away from Titusville, PA which is home to the first commercial oil well. Drake Well was drilled in 1859 to a depth of 69.5ft and produced oil to 1861 at a rate of 12 to 20 barrels per day.
Also not far from me is McClintock Well No.1 which is the world's oldest continually producing well. The well was drilled by the Kickdown method using nothing but leg power to a depth of 620ft back in 1861. It produced 175 barrels a day up to 1920 and is now only producing half a barrel a day.
I'm from Mercer Pa.
Zach is a damn good American, it’s my favorite channel. Great knowledgeable video.
Haha Thank you.
Had three gas wells in the medina formation in western New York, the shut in pressure was 900 psi. We used a bullet perforator to pierce the casing. Not much oil but each well was good for 20K cubic feet per month. If you pushed the well you'd get up to 40k, but you would get salt water intrusion. Low and slow bro. This was before Albany declared a moratorium on fracking. Apparently they don't know it gets cold in the southern tier south of Buffalo. Wouldn't even let us use our own mineral rights to keep from freezing to death without a hassle.
Borrowed phone.
I painted tank batteries , worked at a internal coatings plant. Watched a paint crew make it snow tx in august. 4 tanks, equip, trees the ground rudolfs right antler had White tip.
Hey Zach; greetings from Colombia. Very interesting your videos; really enjoy your explanations even with my basic English; but you make it easy and I gotta say there's a lot of useful information and you show details which normally the People don't talk about in the middle of dayly tasks....Thanks a lot Zach. I already suscribed to your channel
Great info, best well description I've seen
I was in the natural gas compressor business for almost 40 years and you did a good job of explaining the way the well works.
Thanks.
Only found your channel today, fascinating. 👍👍👍🇬🇧🇺🇸
Awesome enjoy.
Love the popcorn ceiling! Based on that alone, I'd date your house build date between 1974 and 1982.
1959.
@@TheZachLife Somebody did some remodeling in 1975 and sprayed it on the ceiling, trust me on that one! 🙂
@@wapiti3750 Thats likely
@@TheZachLife I subbed, which makes your day no doubt. Retired Okie landman here, so I enjoyed the two vids I watched. You're pretty darned handy when in proximity to a pumpjack. 😁
Thanks for the video Zach. Larry
My grandfather from Electra, Tx had a well like that. My father got like a $20 royalty check maybe once every so many years or at least did .I don't know anymore. But from the stories I can remember they had maybe 2 wells still running from the 50's I was just old enough to remember seeing them in the early 80's .
I went to work for Boots & Coots Special Services (International Well Control) in 95 till they sold out to Halliburton in 2000. Not once did I even mess with a single well. I was contracted working on Union Pacific Property.
Nice job very informative Thanks
great story telling.
Roll that coal Zach! Love your videos. Up here in Canada our oil is like tar when it comes to surface.
Ive heard that. Ive got one lease that make a gear oil like oil but everything else is pretty light.
Just discovered your channel.....always fascinated by pump jacks since little kid (born in Port Arthur).....then played o & g game starting in early 1980's (Ada, Ok)....then sneaked into deals with Houston insiders...via local friend ensconced in River Oaks crowd......first well near Kirbyville...then on to Damon, Alvin, etc., etc.....probably 15 wells over 20 years....mostly SE Tx area. Read many books on geology and oil biz...was hooked bad......with juicy free flowing 'gushers' to inevitable dry holes.....playing the game was my goal.....a wild ride.....love hearing history of wells and details of their quirky production, etc. This well is in interesting location surrounded by trees and brush....but in sweet spot..still making oil after 70 years......thanks for sharing....btw, any interesting prospects in your area?
Thanks for watching. There some shallow drilling but not as much as used to be. Theres not much left around here but junk.
I work in deep water completions but it is really cool to hear how other types of wells work around the world.
When I was in high school I'd help my Uncle with his water well business in West Texas. We pulled windmills and changed leathers and pulled regular water tubing with electric pumps on the bottom. A lot of the equipment looks the same and brings me back to working on a winch truck with him. One time the wind wasn't blowing and I had to climb to the top of the windmill and spin it so we could see if the well worked. Good times. Really enjoying your channel!
Hahaha thanks.
Cool stuff Jack!
Very Interesting. I learned a lot. Thank You.
Great video. Thanks for sharing.
"Smells Ike money...". Lol, I love it!
God bless Texas!
I love seeing the growth of your channel
Thanks.
Wow, Zach...awsome video!! I enjoyed every minute of this. Brings back so many memories of my grandfather and father's wells here in SW Indiana. I remember checking the tanks and hearing the oil splashing and echoing into the tank battery. Oh to only smell that raw crude again, absolutely love it!! On hot summer nights you can smell the gas in the air from the surrounding wells and tank batteries here. Many wells around here in the Illinois Basin still flare off the gas, really neat to see them glow in the night sky. Back in the 70s I loved spending time checking the wells and just taking in the mechanics of it all. Thanks for sharing your excellent knowledge, your passion for your work sure shows in your videos. I still drive around looking at the wells around here and over in White County, Illinois across the Wabash River. There is nothing like the oil fields. I can't get enough of your oil field videos, keep them coming please!! PS LOVE your winch truck.
I'll do it. Thanks.
Grew up in the oilfields in Kansas. I went to work in it right outta high school. I worked on the subsurface pumps for like 3 years repairing them. Tubing and rod pumps. So I get most of your talk about here brother. Lol 👍
I miss the money. I miss the comute. But I miss the boy's and girl's the most.
Recently found your channel. I really find it interesting. Thanks
Awesome, Thanks for watching.
I'm shocked and fascinated at the same time, thanks for sharing this with us!
Working for Lufkin in the late '80s, I drove and operated a 330" wheel bace Autocar gin pole truck.
I sure do learn a lot with each video. Your explanations are terrific and appreciated!!!
Thanks.
God I love your videos I learn so much.
Thanks.
I just found your channel and am enjoying what I see. I was born and raised in the oilfield and you got a good grasp on what's going on with these wells. I am going to watch some of your other videos because they are very interesting. Thanks for sharing Zach!
Awesome hope you enjoy.
@@TheZachLife I have been enjoying !!!!!
BAD ASS truck... Plus the 5.9 cummins! Love it..
Friendly advice from 50 years in the oilpatch? Need to flip your hook on your winchline, should always be open side down. Cable pulling into the closed side of the hook, or you could indeed lose something you'd rather keep.
Like your old hotrod truck. My Dad worked for Sinclair waay back there, I spent a fair amount of time as a kid riding in a Ford winch truck. Used to pilfer salt tablets out the dispenser next to the water can.