The Optimized Design and Principal Analysis of a Toe-End Sliding Sleeve

Through hydraulic control principles, numerical simulation and indoor testing, the opening principle of a toe-end sliding sleeve with a time delay mechanism is explained. Conventional toe-end sliding sleeve in shale oil wells have problems with premature opening and a failure to open, which means they cannot ensure the whole-well pressure test process and can cause serious economic losses to the oil and gas industry. In order to solve the above problems, a new type of optimal design for toe-end sliding sleeve with a 30 min delayed opening is proposed. In this paper, based on the principle of hydraulic flow, ABAQUS 2022 numerical simulation software was used to study the influence of different states and the same hydraulic pressure on its internal stress–strain value. A qualitative study of the delayed-opening function was carried out using a pressurized pump unit. In addition, principle tests under different operating parameters were designed to quantitatively analyze the pin shear situation and the delayed opening time of the toe-end sliding sleeve when the tool was fitted with different numbers of pins and when the delay valve was fitted. In addition, the simulation results of the hydraulic fluid’s flow inside the time delay mechanism with different nozzle diameters were compared with the theoretical values, which showed that the hydraulic fluid’s flow rate inside the mechanism increased with the enlargement of the nozzle diameter, and the optimal nozzle diameter was 0.56 mm. The indoor test showed that when the tool was retrofitted with a time delay mechanism, installing six pins was the optimal combination. The field application of the slip-on was able to satisfy an opening time delay of 28.3 with a relative error of only 5.67%. These results complement the research on toe-end sliding sleeve and provide ideas for the optimization of toe-end slipcovers incorporating a time delay mechanism.