Another"anybody know what this is"?

I'll bet Grey beard or Craig Miller will know what it is.

No idea but it's pretty good size and sort of Caterpillar yellow.

A blast you send downhole on a wireline to break loose a collar on a well casing?

A blown-up propane tank??

Air tank for air brakes on a truck.. and it blowed up good... can't imagine they missed the bang, or the lack of air pressure after

Considering the rust holes visible, it's hard to believe it held enough pressure to actually explode

Nesikep":3n7xj0ek said:

Air tank for air brakes on a truck.. and it blowed up good... can't imagine they missed the bang, or the lack of air pressure after

Considering the rust holes visible, it's hard to believe it held enough pressure to actually explode

Click to expand...

Can't get nothing by you. It's an air tank from a 130 bbl tank trailer. Driver hears a pop and assumes he had a tire blow out. Call tire man, he gets there and saw skid marks from the trailer tires. Looks around and sees the air tank blown out. I'm just glad I wasn't under it working when it blew out.
That is the first one I have ever seen blow up. Usually just get pin holes and leak.
Anyway, I just thought it was interesting, since it's pretty rare to happen.

I saw a video on youtube of an old air compressor blowing up.. not nice at all... At a shop in town they had a BIG compressor tank blow up when the safety valve and the charge valve managed to fail at the same time.. blew the whole side of the building apart.. total carnage

Txpiney":afdrlwov said:

I'll bet Grey beard or Craig Miller will know what it is.

Click to expand...

I know exactly what it is and one did the same thing on one of the rigs I worked on, but not for the reason most people think. It does happen, but it is rather rare that a tank fails due to failed safety valves or rusted out tank.

Ours was even more rare.
The most common reason they explode like ours is a buildup of heat inside the tank.
Here's how ours happened, and was confirmed by the compressor manufacturer GardnerDenver:
The rig had drilled surface hole, and was nippling up BOPs in the cellar and the drilling program called for dumping the low vis mud from the tanks and build up new higher vis higher weight mud before drilling out. They were almost finished building new mud, water usage was minimal. The electric motor powered compressor was piped to a water well and the valve barely cracked open, just enough for the well to flow a little. It just so happened, that the air usage meant the compressor ran almost constantly, cut on and off rarely and the exchange of hot compressed air in the tank for new outside air was minimum. The pressure never exceeded the set point for the safety valve.
Combustion needs 3 things.
1. Oxygen--readily provided from the air in the tank.
2. An ignition source.
3. Fuel.

The fuel came from the air/oil mix in the compressor tank. All piston type compressors like we were using allow a bit of compressor oil by the piston rings and it has to be bled out of the drain at the bottom of the tank occasionally.

The explosion occurred when the temperature inside the tank reached the ignition point of the compressor oil in the air/oil mixture.
In other words, it became an air oil..thermobaric bomb. The explosion destroyed the tank, the compressor itself, the 350KW generator and it's Cat engine sitting beside the compressor, peeled the 3/16 steel roof off the generator house, demolished the electrical switchboard for both generators, and a small diesel engine operated compressor used to build up air when the rig first moves in so the can start the generators. (had air starters on everything)
Threw shrapnel all over the location but fortunately, almost everone was busy nippling up BOBs.


Write up of a similar compressor explosion:
http://metroforensics.blogspot.com/2016 ... s-and.html