MEMORANDUM

TO: AHMED ASSEM

FROM: DEVON HILLMAN
PETE 311 503
SUBJECT: LAB NO 4 : ANALYSIS OF SEDIMENTARY GRAIN-SIZE
DATE: SEPTEMBER 18, 2013

In this laboratory experiment, our main objective was to examine the impact that grain size has on the
porosity and the permeability of a rock.




On my honor as an Aggie, I have neither given nor received unauthorized aid on this academic work.


[Signature of student]

Attachment(s): Lab report

Title: Lab 4: Analysis of Sedimentary Grain-Sizes

Discussion and Results
For this experiment we examined the impact that grain-size has on different characteristics of a reservoir
rock. Two factors that heavily affect reservoir formations and their hydrocarbon storage is permeability
and porosity. Porosity describes the amount of empty spaces in a material while permeability describes
the ability of a material to allow liquid to pass through it. In the first part of the experiment, we used two
methods to calculate the porosity of various sized bead packs. We first measured the density of water
using a density meter; the density was determined to be .998 g/mL (
w
). Then we filled four beakers up
to the 500mL line with beads. Beaker 1 contained the large beads, beaker 2 contained the medium beads,
beaker 3 contained the small beads, and beaker 4 contained a mix of all three beads. Once the beakers
were filled with the appropriate beads, we measured and recorded their weight (M
1
) which is shown
below in Table 1. Using a graduated cylinder, we filled each beaker with water to the 500 mL mark. We
recorded the amount of water poured into each beaker (V
2
); these values are shown below in Table 1.
Once each of the four beakers was filled with water we then measured and recorded their weight again
(M
2
), these values are shown below in Table 1. In order to find the porosity by using the weight of the
beakers we used the equation, V
1
= (M
2
M
1
)/(
w
) (Eq. 1). Once V
1
and V
2
were determined we then
used the equation, = V/500 (Eq. 2), where is the porosity, V is the volume of the water added to the
beakers (V
1
and V
2
), and the 500 is the level at which we filled the water of each beaker.
V
1
= (M
2
M
1
)/(
w
)...(1)
V
1
= (1046.42 857.03)/(.998) = 189.77mL


1
= V
1
/500 .. (2)

1
= 189.77/500 = .3795 = 37.95%

Table 1: Bead packing measurements and results.
Beads M
1
(g) M
2
(g) V
1
(mL) V
2
(mL)
1
(%)
2
(%)
Small 857.03 1046.42 189.77 190.00 37.95 38.00
Medium 830.5 1024.63 194.52 194.00 38.90 38.80
Large 803.12 1018.49 215.80 217.00 43.16 43.40
Mix 941.08 1098.89 158.13 159.00 31.63 31.8

In the second part of this experiment, we conducted a sieve analysis test in order to estimate the porosity
and permeability of the rock. We first crushed a rock sample in order to reduce it to its constituent
components. Then we weighed a mortar without and then with the crushed rock sample in order to
determine the weight of the rock sample, the weight was 51.2 g. Next, we weighed the nine different
sized empty sieves and recorded those values into Table 2 (M
1
). Once weighed, we then stacked the
sieves with the biggest screen size on top and the smallest screen size on bottom. Since we used nine
different sized sieves, we had to split the stack of sieves up because the Sonic Sifter Separator we used to
sort the crushed rock sample is too small to hold all nine at one time. We used the first five sieves with
the largest size sieve on top first. We poured the crushed rock content into the top sieve and put the stack
of sieves into the Sonic Sifter. Then we set the pulse and sift values to 9, and set the timer to 15 minutes
and turned on the machine. Once the sifter was done with the first round of sieves we measured each of
the sieves and recorded their weight into Table 2 (M
2
). After that, we poured the crushed rock sample
that made it through all of the bigger sieves into the top of the second stack of sieves and repeated the
above process.

Table 2: Sieve analysis measurements and results.
Sieve Size M
1
(g) M
2
(g) M Retained (g) M Passed (g) M Passed (%)
30 .6 42.91 45.29 2.38 48.82 95.35
40 .425 39.38 41.07 1.69 47.13 92.05
50 .3 38.33 40.10 1.77 45.36 88.14
70 .212 36.64 40.29 3.65 41.71 81.46
100 .15 35.48 54.92 19.44 22.27 43.50
140 .106 34.77 51.08 16.31 5.96 11.64
170 .09 32.66 35.33 2.67 3.29 6.37
200 .075 33.83 35.23 1.40 1.89 3.69
325 .045 31.6 33.39 1.79 .10 .20


Figure 1: The diameter of the mesh screens versus the percentage of mass passed.

Conclusion
In summary, I learned from this lab how grain sizes affects porosity and permeability. The bead packing
portion of this experiment taught me that circular shaped grain sizes will allow better porosity than
angular grain sizes. Also, uniform packing of the same sized beads also gives a better porosity than beads
packed together of different sizes. The sieve analysis test taught me how to determine the permeability
and porosity of a rock formation graphically. These skills, like being able to use the Sonic Sift Separator,
are regularly used in the petroleum industry in order to determine characteristics of rock formations.
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
100
0.01 0.1 1
M
a
s
s

P
a
s
s
e
d

(
%
)

Diameter (mm)
Grain-Size Distribution