Lubricating Potentiometers / Faders / Variable Resistors

[Jwillis]

Deoxit active ingredient is a trade secret . Deoxit Fader lubricator is 5% Deoxit  , 75% PETROLEUM NAPTHA and 20%DIFLUORETHANE used as a propellant. Similar products use silicone lubricants as the active ingredient.   

[analogix]

What kind of lubricant would be suitable for making faders smooth again?
(I've sprayed Deoxit F5 "Fader" and while they now work better electrically the action is very "scratchy" and not smooth at all, as they were before I cleaned them).
Preferrably something generic as i'm not in the U.S. and Deoxit for instance was very hard and expensive for me to obtain.

[CaptDon]

I gave up on all the expensive stuff. Its effect only
lasts for a certain time frame. I have used WD-40
exclusively for around 20 years. Just a tiny bit, then
run the control/fader end to end about a dozen times
and then just a tiny bit more. Lasts for years, flushes
and lubes at the same time. I love the stuff from CAIG
and it works well but is so costly. Back in the days of
mechanical T.V. tuners there were many good cheap
products available WISSSH was one of them and a
product under the Channel Master name called Color-
Lube was good but had a nasty kerosene smell. I swear
it was foaming blue tinted kerosene. The one place I
won't use WD-40 as a cleaner/lube is in the gold finger
cam switches in Tektronix gear. WD-40 is good for the
Tek push-button switches however!!! I have flushed the
gold finger cam switches with Chloro-Kleen, TriChlorethylene
but you have to blow it out with clean air quickly as the
chlorinated solvents will attack certain plastics.

[helius]

(I've sprayed Deoxit F5 "Fader" and while they now work better electrically the action is very "scratchy" and not smooth at all, as they were before I cleaned them).

In another thread, a poster mentioned that the DeOxit cleaner lacks lubrication for sliding contacts. You might need a very light application of a petroleum grease to get that original smooth feeling.

[GLouie]

I think many people spray out the shaft/slide lubrication when trying to clean out the resistance tracks. My understanding is that the smooth turning/sliding feel of the mechanism is done with damping grease, also commonly used in things like camera lens adjusters. You can buy a range of resistance feel to the grease at places like Micro-Tools. I have a tube of Nyogel 767A and it works well on such rings and turntable cue pistons. The damping character does not seem to be consistantly related to the "thickness" of a grease or viscosity from what I can tell. A very thick axle grease has little damping on a little shaft. You can buy very high viscosity (high centistoke rating) silicone fluids at places like hobby stores; I can't say if they would work.

TBH, I haven't tried it on pots as I avoid getting any lube into the mechanism. I would think to get the grease into the right area would require disassembly, a PITA. The more typical problem is an old pot with seized grease.

[cdev]

I bought an old used antenna tuner that contains a roller inductor So I asked some old hams what to use to clean it With the caveat that it was really messed up before, with some regular grease that contained graphite, I was told about something called Genie screw drive garage door lubricant.  It can be bought in 3 small tubes for around $15

It works well with deoxit and the ohmic resistance is very low and it just glides. Have not transmitted using it, so dont know what happens there

It contains lithium grease.

[analogix]

It contains lithium grease.

So lithium grease would be OK to use as a lubricant for faders?
I almost bought a can of CRC "white lithium grease" but held it off because I read something on the can about not to be used with other solvents or something like that -I was worried that it could cause some chemical reaction or other issues if it got in contact with the Deoxit I had already sprayed inside.
But considering this isn't an issue, will it be thick enough to make a fader "glide" like it used to? According to CRC's own video it appears to be quite thin flowing, but then again it might thicken after a while.... anyone tried it with faders/potmeters?

[cdev]

This stuff is not for electrical anything, its for garage doors!

Engineers at a very high end antenna tuner company (I think it was Palstar but I'm not sure) swear by it, I read at the time. Since then I have also used it on my x-y table and Ive also tried it out on my bike. It seems to be a good lubricant.

But an antenna tuner is not the same as an audio fader at all. So as for your application, I have no idea. It may destroy it.

Faders and roller inductors, although quite similar, especially the wire wound ones, are still not the same.

Measured by my bench meter, it was a big improvement. I used just a tiny bit of deoxit red and then the Genie stuff, which is white.

But its been some time, and I have not used it since then, for space reasons. I'm rearranging my desk now so I may have space to give it a shot soon. if anything has changed I'll post an update here.

I think I read this originally on e-ham.  You might want to check there.

It contains lithium grease.

So lithium grease would be OK to use as a lubricant for faders?
I almost bought a can of CRC "white lithium grease" but held it off because I read something on the can about not to be used with other solvents or something like that -I was worried that it could cause some chemical reaction or other issues if it got in contact with the Deoxit I had already sprayed inside.
But considering this isn't an issue, will it be thick enough to make a fader "glide" like it used to? According to CRC's own video it appears to be quite thin flowing, but then again it might thicken after a while.... anyone tried it with faders/potmeters?

[analogix]

This stuff is not for electrical anything, its for garage doors!

That might be true, but as long as it lubricates (and doesn't dissolve the materials which cause friction) I believe it should be fine. Then again, maybe what you're saying that it can destroy faders/potmeters if it gets in contact with the actual carbon tracks?
Another question that arises is if that type of lubricant I almost bought is thick enough for this purpose....

[analogix]

I think many people spray out the shaft/slide lubrication when trying to clean out the resistance tracks.

Yes! I think this is exactly what I've experienced when inserting the Deoxit F5 Fader plastic straw into the faders. The high pressure probably "flushes out" not only dust and debris but also the lubrication which I did NOT intend to remove.

My understanding is that the smooth turning/sliding feel of the mechanism is done with damping grease, also commonly used in things like camera lens adjusters. You can buy a range of resistance feel to the grease at places like Micro-Tools. I have a tube of Nyogel 767A and it works well on such rings and turntable cue pistons. The damping character does not seem to be consistantly related to the "thickness" of a grease or viscosity from what I can tell. A very thick axle grease has little damping on a little shaft. You can buy very high viscosity (high centistoke rating) silicone fluids at places like hobby stores; I can't say if they would work.

I'm not familiar with Micro-tools and haven't come across Nyogel where I'm at. I did find some info about damping greases like that online, but they seem to target the industry and not something you can easily get as a private individual.
Do you have any specific brand names/types of silicone fluids that can be bought at hobby stores?

It appears Deoxit has a product called F100L Fader Grease syringe which is probably applicable for this sort of thing, but it's not available in my area so I have no idea. Has anyone reading used it?
https://caig.com/product/deoxit-fadergrease-dfg-213-8g/

[wizard69]

Nye Lubricants: https://www.nyelubricants.com/sensors is a high end manufacture of lubricants.   We use a few of their products at work, not exactly electronics related, but extremely useful materials when working at the limits of modern technology.

I think many people spray out the shaft/slide lubrication when trying to clean out the resistance tracks.

Yes! I think this is exactly what I've experienced when inserting the Deoxit F5 Fader plastic straw into the faders. The high pressure probably "flushes out" not only dust and debris but also the lubrication which I did NOT intend to remove.

Yes this can be a huge problem, especially on rotary controls, because you basically dry out the bearings and allow for corrosion.   Any control clenaing needs to followed up with lubrication.

My understanding is that the smooth turning/sliding feel of the mechanism is done with damping grease, also commonly used in things like camera lens adjusters. You can buy a range of resistance feel to the grease at places like Micro-Tools. I have a tube of Nyogel 767A and it works well on such rings and turntable cue pistons.

Nye actually has a number of lubricants that they suggest for this issue, that is controls lubrication.    We actually use Rheolube on instrument grade bearings and high precision lead screws.    Note that the "Rheo" in that product name apparently doesn't imply Rheostats as the spec the lube family for a number of uses.   When first using Rheolube I actually thought that it was a lube designed for Rheostats but that is not the case.

The damping character does not seem to be consistantly related to the "thickness" of a grease or viscosity from what I can tell. A very thick axle grease has little damping on a little shaft. You can buy very high viscosity (high centistoke rating) silicone fluids at places like hobby stores; I can't say if they would work.

I'm not familiar with Micro-tools and haven't come across Nyogel where I'm at. I did find some info about damping greases like that online, but they seem to target the industry and not something you can easily get as a private individual.
Do you have any specific brand names/types of silicone fluids that can be bought at hobby stores?

It appears Deoxit has a product called F100L Fader Grease syringe which is probably applicable for this sort of thing, but it's not available in my area so I have no idea. Has anyone reading used it?
https://caig.com/product/deoxit-fadergrease-dfg-213-8g/

One other thing here, there is a lot to be said for the practice of disassembly because it allows for visual inspection of the elements and can inform one if it is even worth while to move forward.    If that can't be done over on Youtube, Mr Carlson's Lab has a pretty good video describing his method for cleaning pots.    It is one of many so I'm not about to go looking for a link at this time.

As for Fader grease I've never tried it so can't comment.    However you probably could get a lot more for you dollar buying a tube of Rheolube or similar grease from a distributor.   I believe that the grease can be had in 8 oz tubes.