Water based muds present a problem that oil based systems do not: gilsonite is a hydrocarbon, and hydrocarbons are not soluble in water. Adding untreated gilsonite to a WBM gives you a suspended solid, not a functioning additive. The answer is sulfonation — a chemical treatment that makes the material water dispersible while keeping the […]
Gilsonite is used as a fluid loss control additive, or FLC, in oil based mud. Its high softening point — 160 °C and above — delivers over 50% fluid loss reduction compared with other additives, and it survives conditions where most mud additives do not. In synthetic based muds it can cut cost by up to […]
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