What Are the Best Practices for Selecting Rubber Products for Oil Field Equipment?

The best practices for selecting rubber products for oil field equipment include assessing temperature, chemical exposure, industry standards and manufacturer expertise. Getting them right from the start gives you a seal built for the well it's going into, resulting in fewer unplanned pulls and equipment that keeps running through its full service life:

• Check your temperature range against the threshold: Nitrile rubber (NBR) offers good resistance to standard oil and fuel exposure. Under sustained heat, though, its mechanical properties degrade, with compression recovery and elasticity holding up far worse at 257° Fahrenheit than at lower temperatures. That shortens seal service life and drives up maintenance costs. When a well runs hotter or produces sour gas, HNBR and fluorine-based elastomers are preferred for high-pressure sealing due to their resistance to aging and corrosion.
• Match compounds to your chemical exposure: Wells producing hydrogen sulfide and CO2 accelerate rubber degradation, causing measurable breakdown in tensile strength and elongation that standard compounds aren't built to withstand. Map out every substance the compound will contact, including oil, grease, drilling fluids and cleaning agents, and whether that exposure is constant or occasional, since a material built for one substance can fail outright against another.
• Confirm testing against industry standards: ASTM D2000 classifies rubber compounds by heat aging resistance and oil swell resistance, giving you a consistent way to compare materials across suppliers. For wellhead-specific equipment, API 6A is the specification incorporated into federal regulations governing wellhead and Christmas tree equipment.
• Vet the manufacturer's expertise: Packer cups, valve seals and stripper rubbers need to be built to exact equipment specs. Ask whether the supplier has in-house design engineering and ISO-certified quality control, and whether they can turn around custom parts fast enough to keep your operation running. A manufacturer with that depth of capability catches material mismatches before they turn into costly downtime.

Partner With Global Elastomeric Products, Inc. for Oil Field Equipment Rubber Products

Selecting the right compound requires partnering with a manufacturer who can engineer it to your exact specs. Global Elastomeric Products, Inc. has almost 50 years of experience supplying custom-molded rubber products for oil field equipment. Our solutions include packer cups, valve seals, and stripper rubbers built for your well's specific temperature, pressure, and chemical conditions. 

Contact our team for a quote and let our engineers help you select the right material the first time.