Contrary to its image as dirty and primitive, oil drilling today is a cleaner, highly technical and productive process. Deep-hole undersea operations, especially, employ tight-tolerance components made of exotic alloys. To achieve those tolerances and maximize throughput, machine shops that manufacture for the oil-patch industry are increasingly using multitask machine tools that help minimize setups and part handling while boosting metalworking productivity. The ongoing tumult in oil markets and prices stirs uncertainty for shops that serve the oil-patch industry. (See sidebar on page 35.) There is at least one certainty about the industry, though. "The world still runs on oil and gas," said David Williams, chief executive of offshore drilling contractor Noble Corp., in the Houston Chronicle. "The meltdown in the financial sector and the loss of confidence in the equity markets have not changed this fundamental fact."
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