About us

Oil Detective came to life from a conversation with a neighbor of mine who had developed an oil extraction unit. The unit is operated via a wireline that is controlled by a variable frequency drive. The drive was programmed to deploy the extraction unit every 180 minutes to the same depth. The 180 minute time parameter was set at random because that was the time the operator had estimated that is would take for the oil to recover after each extraction.

Upon visiting the site for a demo we discovered that the extraction unit had just gone down 20 minutes prior to our arrival. The operator was anxious to show us how the rig operated, so he said let me send the unit down so that you can see how it functions. He did let us know that the tube would be full of salt water when it came up since the well had not had the required 180 minutes between tests to recover. The operator sent the extraction unit down and when it came up it was filled with 100% crude oil, no water. At this point we decided that we need to develop a sensor capable of detecting the difference between oil, air and salt water, which is the product we have today.