khareema,

You wrote:

"...From what I have been told, the problem is part drilling and part lab. The situation is that the deep drills were designed and built specifically for the ROF. Once in service they realized that since the material being drilled is so much denser ( and heavier) at these greater depths, the drills do not have the capacity to lift it out of the hole…”

I have no problems with the part of your statement that the deep drills were designed and built specifically for the ROF, as it presumably means only hat all large components can be broken down for ease of transportation and field assembly.

However – with all due respect - what I find difficult to believe that these machines were not designed and built for satisfactory performance and capacity at the rated depth, what ever is the density of the material encountered.Perhaps your source can enlighten us further in that regard.

About the Labs: Let’s hope that we shall give them a lot of problems with higher density samples in the future, I am sure they will perform well.

Best regards,

durban1