Whats everyone using to clean old parts with?

Is that the stuff they call popskull? Hangovers result from fusel oil I read once. I believe it.

 

Buddy with a shop uses mineral spirits in his Safety Kleen sink. Works well and I have borrowed it now and then to clean something really funky dirty.

 

................"heads"......the first 1/2 gallon out of the still, it's poison!

 

"Heads " contain a good amount of methanol. Will make you go blind and do permanent damage. Do not drink.
One of the local alkies found my circle track friends 55 gallon barrel. Got him called off in time bur barely.
Pete

 

I use mineral spirit type solvent (have small cleaning tank) purchased at Menards about $60 for 5 gallons, rust type cleaning, bead/sand blast and threads wire wheel, recut as needed. the spray rust blaster for frozen bolts/nuts works great IMO to get stuff apart. I have found that the spray choke cleaner works good on carb rebuilds also spray brake cleaner is excellent in general. I like many old timers used gasoline for cleaning parts when young, that's how my Dad did it for years, Luckily never blew up either of us. In my 20's realized how dangerous gasoline is when I heard story (from a good friend) of his buddy walking past a grill (open flame) with a gallon gas can 25 feet from fire and blew up in his hands, horrible burns, man survived, horribly scared. One quick DAD story, wondered why the burgers were different at a barbecue at my parent's home, figured out he used gasoline for fire starter.

 

Hm, my dad served on a Diesel boat right after the war, and said a lot of guys who'd served in the war stayed on because it was pretty high livin' compared to where they came from. Three hots and a cot, medical care; vacation.

But, a lot of them were hard core alcoholics. And the torpedos ran on "hot runnin' torpedo juice", which was methanol iirc. They had some problems with that.

 

Back in the 1950's the shop I worked at had a hot tank. They used water and flake sodium hydroxide which is what draino is. It worked great but would make alunimum go away.

 

Charcoal lighter fluid is basically the same as Stoddard Solvent? Cool! Since the solvent is hard (impossible) to get these days, it's good to know about the lighter fluid.

I do use cigarette lighter fluid for cleaning up my carbs and intake manifold, works great, leaves no residue behind.

 

For heavy duty cleaning I'll haul stuff to the local coin operated do-it-yourself car wash. As long as the owner's not around it's a good way to wash off heavy parts with a strong stream of hot, soapy water. For small stuff, I'll used diesel fuel to knock off the heavy layer (next time I'll try charcoal lighter fluid, thanks to Truck64 for the tip), than finish with brake cleaner. For light cleaning I'll just use brake cleaner, sometimes with a stiff brush to aid breaking the grime up. I find brake cleaner super efficient, though a bit costly. I try to buy it on sale, the local Autozone often has 2 for i sales of the aerosol cans. The old formula with cfc's was better, but it still works good. At the shop I worked at we used to buy gallon cans of it and use it in refillable spray cans that we pressurized with shop air.

 

They are very similar afaik. Don't come crying to me if yer hair catches on fire and the goldfish die, etc.

FYI: Coleman fuel is a lot cheaper than Ronsonol or Zippo fluid. Same thing. Be careful, no user serviceable parts inside. Not responsible for accidents. All the usual standard disclaimers apply.