SAMARA, Volga Region, March 12 (AVN) - The local Progress plant, a part of the SCKB Progress space centre, has started production of risers for assembly of deep drilling rigs at the order if the US Noble Drilling Services Inc., the plant's director-general, Alexander Kirilin, said on Monday.
The test bench of the risers is undergoing strength tests, Kirilin told the Military News Agency.
The contract will allow Progress to provide work for its idling shop that was built for production of Energia booster rockets. The shop caused RUR10m (USD348,680) of damages a year to the plant.
According to Kirilin, the USD6m contract on riser supplies was signed in late 2000. The term of its implementation is 1.5 years. Application of space technologies will enable operators to use Samara risers at record depths of over 1.5km.
The plant's production volume has halved in the past few years due to sharp reduction of the defence order, the director said. However Progress is hoping to compensate for it by boosting the share of conversion products to 50 percent of the output in the next few years.