Author Topic: Killing yourself with solvents (Alcohols and Hydrocarbons I have loved)  (Read 5303 times)

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Offline jogri

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In the mid 80s I moved to a small company and with a real can-do attitude got a 5 gal drum of the same stuff to clean the few boards we built.  After about 5 years, that drum became a problem to the company so I just took it home and put it in the garage.  Great for cleaning car and bike parts and getting grease off clothes.  One day I went out to get a splash of it to clean up a spot and found that it had all evaporated through a small crack in the flexible pull-out spout.  The garage was not air tight and I never smelt it and I have two normal (??) kids so I think I'm OK...  I also grew up in the age of leaded gasoline and surrounded by tobacco usage so it would be hard to say what caused what anyway.

It probably didn't affect you much as solvents that contain halogens (like chlorine or fluorine) are much denser than air-> it will form a layer of gas on your garage floor and just flow out under the garage door or through vent holes at the bottom. As long as you don't live under your garage you are fine. Btw, if you want something that can degrease parts and isn't as toxic try MEK and ethyl acetate (the acetate sucks at removing grease in bulk but is great for getting the last 5% off).
 

Offline helius

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Ethyl lactate can also be used as a less-toxic degreaser.
And then there's alkylbenzene sulfonate, which some of you may remember as DuPont No. 7 Car Wash. There are a lot of choices for aqueous cleaning, but this works pretty well on plastics and painted parts.
 

Offline TerraHertz

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In Australia there is (was?) a solvent sold in hardware stores called "White Spirits." It's a clear liquid somewhat like mineral turps, but smelled quite different. I recall the contents were just listed as 'hydrocarbons' or something like that. I don't have any of it any more so can't check a label.

It was very good for general cleaning of grimy dust, like when restoring old 2nd hand electronics equipment cases. I used to use it frequently, holding a soaked pad of tissue in bare fingers as a wipe.

End result when doing this a lot over a few months - pretty bad peripheral neural damage. It seemed to be diffusing up along nerves in hands, arms, up to the shoulders. A gradually progressing ache going up the nerves, and numbness of fingers.
After I realized what was happening and stopped using White Spirits as a solvent, the symptoms took nearly a year to get better.

Whether it's still available I don't know. Probably just the name is enough to make SJW types have a fit.

Does anyone know what 'White Spirits' actually consisted of?
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Offline coppercone2

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In Australia there is (was?) a solvent sold in hardware stores called "White Spirits." It's a clear liquid somewhat like mineral turps, but smelled quite different. I recall the contents were just listed as 'hydrocarbons' or something like that. I don't have any of it any more so can't check a label.

It was very good for general cleaning of grimy dust, like when restoring old 2nd hand electronics equipment cases. I used to use it frequently, holding a soaked pad of tissue in bare fingers as a wipe.

End result when doing this a lot over a few months - pretty bad peripheral neural damage. It seemed to be diffusing up along nerves in hands, arms, up to the shoulders. A gradually progressing ache going up the nerves, and numbness of fingers.
After I realized what was happening and stopped using White Spirits as a solvent, the symptoms took nearly a year to get better.

Whether it's still available I don't know. Probably just the name is enough to make SJW types have a fit.

Does anyone know what 'White Spirits' actually consisted of?

a boiling point fraction of crude oil probably

Quote
1.1  Properties of white spirit

         White spirit is a clear colourless solvent with very low water
    solubility and a characteristic odour (odour threshold: 0.5-5 mg/m3).
    The most common variety of white spirit is a mixture of saturated
    aliphatic and alicyclic C7-C12 hydrocarbons with a content of 15-20%
    (by weight) of aromatic C7-C12 hydrocarbons and a boiling range of
    130-230°C.  The C9-C11 hydrocarbons (aliphatics, alicyclics and
    aromatics) are most abundant, constituting > 80% (by weight) of the
    total.  This ordinary white spirit is designated  white spirit, type
     1, regular grade, as three different types and three different
    grades exist.  The type refers to whether the solvent has been
    subjected to hydrodesulfurization (removal of sulfur) alone (type 1),
    solvent extraction (type 2) or hydrogenation (type 3).  The
    hydrodesulfurized type contains less than 25% aromatic hydrocarbons,
    the solvent-extracted less than 5%, and the hydrogenated less than 1%.
    Each type comprises three different grades: low flash grade (flash
    point: 21-30°C; initial boiling point: 130-144°C), regular grade
    (flash point: 31-54°C; initial boiling point: 145-174°C), and high
    flash grade (flash point: > 55°C; initial boiling point:
    175-200°C).  The grade is determined by the crude oil used as the
    starting material and the conditions of distillation.  Type 0 white
    spirit is defined as a distillation fraction with no further
    treatment, consisting predominantly of saturated C9-C12 hydrocarbons
    with a boiling range of 140-220°C.  The low flash grade possesses the
    highest vapour pressure of approximately 1.4 kPa (10.5 mmHg) at 20°C.

         A USA variety of type 1 is called Stoddard solvent and is a
    petroleum distillate defined according to its boiling range of
    149-204°C and the absence of rancid or objectionable odours.

http://www.inchem.org/documents/ehc/ehc/ehc187.htm#SectionNumber:1.1
« Last Edit: May 18, 2020, 01:02:27 am by coppercone2 »
 

Offline ChristofferB

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I've always been a fan of heptanes as a solvent for all that is tacky and oily. Here, it's sold under the name of "purified gasoline" for stain removal, etc.

I don't think it's "just" heptanes, probably a low-aromatics hydrocarbon fraction around the boiling point of the heptanes. Works great for oils/fats/waxes and other sticky residue.

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Offline mc172

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I don't know if this is even meant for here but I wish they would stop scenting flux cleaner, why does everything need to smell like fake oranges when I want to clean up some flux? Drives me nuts.
 

Offline SilverSolder

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I don't know if this is even meant for here but I wish they would stop scenting flux cleaner, why does everything need to smell like fake oranges when I want to clean up some flux? Drives me nuts.

Orange oil is actually an excellent cleaner/degreaser - the smell may be real!
 

Offline amyk

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I don't know if this is even meant for here but I wish they would stop scenting flux cleaner, why does everything need to smell like fake oranges when I want to clean up some flux? Drives me nuts.

Orange oil is actually an excellent cleaner/degreaser - the smell may be real!
More precisely, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Limonene


 
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Offline TerraHertz

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I don't know if this is even meant for here but I wish they would stop scenting flux cleaner, why does everything need to smell like fake oranges when I want to clean up some flux? Drives me nuts.

This. One of my current gripes is the common household cleaner "Ajax spray n' wipe" that I use for many things. Used to be non-scented. But for years now it's only been available in supermarkets in various obnoxiously over-scented forms. Lemon, 'Ocean Fresh Fragrance', etc. It pisses me off greatly.

Keep meaning to contact the company and ask if I can buy it in bulk drums, without any added scent. Being pretty sure the answer would "no", is about 50% of why I haven't tried. (The other 50% relates to laziness.)
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Offline helius

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In Australia there is (was?) a solvent sold in hardware stores called "White Spirits."
...
It was very good for general cleaning of grimy dust, like when restoring old 2nd hand electronics equipment cases. I used to use it frequently, holding a soaked pad of tissue in bare fingers as a wipe.

End result when doing this a lot over a few months - pretty bad peripheral neural damage.

Probably a significant percent of n-hexane. See comments here, and here is a news article.
It was very widely used until the 1990s. Even worse stuff, like n-propyl bromide, was in flux removers after that!

Even when using relatively non-toxic hydrocarbon solvents like heptane (paint thinner, odorless mineral spirit), absorption into the skin causes inebriation and lethargy comparable to taking several alcoholic drinks. Solvent intoxication is a major unrecognized cause of car accidents.
 

Offline SilverSolder

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[...]
End result when doing this a lot over a few months [White Spirits on hands] - pretty bad peripheral neural damage.
[...]


I have gotten a lot better with using latex or vinyl gloves whenever I touch any chemical.   Even IPA,  but also when working on the car etc.
 

Offline ChristofferB

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Gloves are not a foolproof substitute for not getting solvents on you in the first place.

I've had good quality disposable nitrile gloves go completely chewing gum and failing just from acetone exposure. The penetration tests required to slap the little 'chemicals' symbol on the box is only a handful (I think as little as 3?) of substances that needs to be tested for penetrating time.

Minimizing exposure - even through gloves - is pretty critical.

Funnily enough, when gloves dissolve (or are penetrated) by solvents they gets cold. This happens both with acetone and dichloromethane - which by the way is another great cleaning solvent I wouldn't want to use at home or without a fume hood in general.
--Christoffer //IG:Chromatogiraffery
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Offline KL27x

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High evaporation rate = cold to your skin. Volatile solvents are like super-sweat.
 

Offline SilverSolder

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Some nice heavy duty fuel gloves will protect you for a while...   but they make precision work very difficult!
 

Offline ChristofferB

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It's not the evaporation, it gets significantly colder faster than that.
--Christoffer //IG:Chromatogiraffery
Check out my scientific instruments diy (GC, HPLC, NMR, etc) Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCZ8l6SdZuRuoSdze1dIpzAQ
 

Offline jogri

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Some nice heavy duty fuel gloves will protect you for a while...   but they make precision work very difficult!

Depending on the chemical they could only last 4 hours before they stop protecting you... And i wouldn't recommend leather gloves when handling chemicals for the simple reason that they tend to get soaked with the chemical-> You have permanent contact between the chemical and your sweaty fingers->ideal absorbtion into your body.

The german GESTIS database is a really nice source of information if you want to know what gloves to wear for which chemical, and it is even available in english: http://gestis-en.itrust.de/nxt/gateway.dll/gestis_en/000000.xml?f=templates$fn=default.htm$vid=gestiseng:sdbeng$3.0
Just go to "safe handling"->"personal protection". I would highly recommend using that side when working with new solvents as most gloves are good against a few different solvents, but provide little to no protection against others. (And some chemicals like fuming nitric acid shouldn't be handled with [nitrile] gloves at all)
 
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Offline KL27x

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Yep. There's practically no synthetic material that has good resistance to all solvents. It's reassuring that chemistry grad students are surprised when nitrile gloves are attacked by acetone and don't know why low boiling point and high vapor pressure liquids feel cold when they get spread on your skin and exposed to air.  :-DD

(Phase change from liquid to gas requires energy; this is sucking the heat right out of your skin.)

;;;
And don't worry, Christoff, everyone on the forum knows I am a bit off, at times, when it comes to social interaction. Some are sure I'm just full of myself.

One of the biggest recurring problems I find in our education and understanding of our own knowledge is... You take 100 intelligent and highly educated people who aren't accountants, and not a single one will believe he understands the tax codes of their country/state/city. These 100 highly intelligent and educated people who aren't biologists, and not a single one will think they know how mitochondria work and replicate. But you take 100 highly educated people of any field, and 99 of them believe they understand physics. They think Newton and Boyle etc. just wrote all that stuff down so you can calculate stuff. But that the main gist is obvious and intuitive, and they get it. But 98 of them are wrong. They carry incorrect connections/assumption in their mind, which they formed at a time when their view was limited, and which worked well enough to get them this far. At a certain age, those bad connections will never be fixed.

Not necessarily talking about you, and I'm sorry, Christoff. You can post mean response w/e, and I don't care. Will not respond. I deserve it for being a twat.
« Last Edit: May 19, 2020, 12:30:34 am by KL27x »
 

Offline ChristofferB

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I should clarify, what I mean is some solvents gets 'colder than they should' by evaporation, the absorbtion or dissolution of nitrile (haven't tried with other gloves) is likely endothermic.

Another point about solvent safety is that a mildly toxic solvent that's readily absorbed through skin can 'trojan' more toxic chemicals into your body. This is especially a problem when cleaning unknown nastiness and gunk. It's especially bad with DMSO and DMF i believe.

--Christoffer //IG:Chromatogiraffery
Check out my scientific instruments diy (GC, HPLC, NMR, etc) Channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCZ8l6SdZuRuoSdze1dIpzAQ
 
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Offline KL27x

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Quote
I should clarify, what I mean is some solvents gets 'colder than they should' by evaporation, the absorbtion or dissolution of nitrile (haven't tried with other gloves) is likely endothermic.
I'm the idiot.
You are clearly more mature than I am (I make no claim otherwise), and you probably have some previous experience dealing with my kind. Thank you for that.
 

Offline amyk

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(And some chemicals like fuming nitric acid shouldn't be handled with [nitrile] gloves at all)
The choice between getting some painful burns, or some even more painful burns from the glove catching fire... :o
 

Offline helius

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I've tried using both MEK (methyl ethyl ketone) and DCM (dichloromethane) for solvent welding. MEK is great, relatively slow evaporation, gets absorbed well, easy to place parts. DCM is awful, it evaporates far too quickly, smells like cancer, and so thin that it's hard to brush it on the desired area. I know both of these solvents are recommended for welding ABS, styrene, etc, so what's the deal?
 

Offline KL27x

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If you want to weld ABS or styrene, acetone works really well. Acetone is thin and evaporates fast, but you can thicken it by dissolving some ABS or styrene bits in it. Maybe make them with a drill or a saw. This is the only solvent welding I have done that actually is completely practical. Even welding plexiglass to ABS this way, no signs of brittleness or cracks, some 10 years later. I tried to take some bits off, 10 years later (some unique parts I had welded onto something I was scrapping), and that wasn't happening even with a hammer.
 
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Offline duckduck

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I don't know if this is even meant for here but I wish they would stop scenting flux cleaner, why does everything need to smell like fake oranges when I want to clean up some flux? Drives me nuts.

This. One of my current gripes is the common household cleaner "Ajax spray n' wipe" that I use for many things. Used to be non-scented. But for years now it's only been available in supermarkets in various obnoxiously over-scented forms. Lemon, 'Ocean Fresh Fragrance', etc. It pisses me off greatly.

Keep meaning to contact the company and ask if I can buy it in bulk drums, without any added scent. Being pretty sure the answer would "no", is about 50% of why I haven't tried. (The other 50% relates to laziness.)

One reason for the proliferation of "this slightly changed version" and "that slightly different version" of consumer products is Walmart. Walmart (at least they used to) requires that their suppliers reduce the price on each SKU annually. Well, suppliers caught on quick and would make minor changes to their products ("New 16.5 oz size!") that required a new SKU.

Edit:

You could always just make your own. This probably wouldn't be practical because the ingredients would be too expensive in the amounts that you would ever use, but fun to think about.

Edit edit:

Looks like the Klean Strip brand denatured alcohol available at a popular chain of home improvement stores in the USnA still has a mother truckload of Methyl Alcohol (see attached piece of the Safety Data Sheet), as well as a little MIBK.
« Last Edit: May 19, 2020, 08:10:52 pm by duckduck »
 


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