The Cable Tool Rig
Odessa, Ector County, Texas
Marker Inscription
Equipment that replaced the spring pole drilling method used in America's earlier oil fields. The Cable Tool Rig used a bit suspended on a steel drilling cable. The bit is dropped in the hole and the impact breaks up the formation. The broken pieces are removed by a bail. This method made possible the deeper penetration so necessary in the southwest. The Cable Tool Rig was introduced in Texas in 1866. (some use of Cable Tools had been made around 1840 in the north.) Texas gave the southwestern oil industry the first lease, the first oil pipe line, the first wooden and iron storage tanks, the first iron drums for transporting crude oil and first use of the augur principle later employed in rotary rigs. The Cable Tool Rig brought in the first important wells of the permian basin. This Rig was reconstructed from parts of several Rig was reconstructed from parts of several rigs actually used at big lake, Regan county, where the No. 1 Santa Rita blew in during may 1923 as the first well in the first major oil field in the permian basin. To the cable tool rig and the men who used it goes credit for the great development in the permian basin.
Erected by Texas Historical Commission
The Story
The cable tool rig, which dropped a heavy bit on a steel cable to pound its way downward, replaced the older spring-pole method and let drillers reach the deep formations of the Southwest. Introduced in Texas in 1866, it brought in the first great wells of the Permian Basin, including reconstruction from rigs used at the legendary Santa Rita No. 1, which blew in near Big Lake in May 1923. Texas pioneered much of the surrounding industry, from the first oil lease to the first pipeline and storage tanks.
Why it matters
The tools and crews of the cable tool era opened the Permian Basin, one of the richest oil provinces on earth and a cornerstone of America's twentieth-century energy economy.
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Related events
- · Santa Rita No. 1 (1923)
Themes & tags
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