Torsional stick-slip vibrations decrease the performance, reliability and fail-safety of drilling systems used for the exploration and harvesting of oil, gas, min- erals and geo-thermal energy. Current industrial controllers regularly fail to eliminate stick-slip vibrations, especially when multiple torsional flexibility modes in the drill- string dynamics play a role in the onset of stick-slip vibrations. This chapter presents the experimental validation of novel robust output-feedback controllers designed to eliminate stick-slip vibrations in the presence of multiple dominant torsional flexibility modes. For this purpose, a representative experimental test setup is designed, using a model of a real-life drilling rig as a basis. The model of the dynamics of the experimental setup can be cast in Lure-type form with set-valued nonlinearities representing an (uncertain) model for the complex bit-rock interaction and the interaction between the drill-string and the borehole. The proposed controller design strategy is based on skewed-m-DK-iteration and aims at optimizing the robustness with respect to uncertainty in the non-smooth bit-rock interaction. Moreover, a closed-loop stability analysis for the non-smooth drill-string model is provided. Experimental results confirm that stick-slip vibrations are indeed eliminated using the designed controller in realistic drilling scenarios in which state-of-practice controllers have failed to achieve the same.

This paper proposes feedback control strategies for the mitigation of torsional stick-slip oscillations in drilling systems using drag bits. Herein, we employ a model for the coupled axial-torsional drill-string dynamics in combination with a rate-independent bit-rock interaction law including both cutting and frictional effects. Using a singular perturbation and averaging approach, we show that the dynamics of this model generate an apparent velocity-weakening effect in the torque-on-bit, explaining the onset of torsional stick-slip vibrations. Based on this dynamic analysis, the (decoupled) torsional dynamics can be described by a delay-differential equation with a state-dependent delay. Using this model, we propose both state-and output-feedback control strategies for the mitigation of torsional stick-slip oscillations, where the latter strategy uses surface measurements only. The effectiveness of the proposed approaches is shown in a simulation study.