Any chemists here?

[tcreeley]

Muriatic acid is often what they sell to strip the rust off gas tanks. Works well. I always just rinsed it onto the ground and that was it. Muriatic acid is also used to clean bricks - get the extra cement discoloration off.

 

[pburchett]

Check your pm.

 

[crazyal]

My father would buy the stuff by the gallon to clean the cement patios and brick walkways around his house. Like clockwork in the spring he would do it. I guess it was a trick he learned as a kid. I've used it once to clean some ledge before making a shelf out of cement to support a post for a deck.

 

[MossRoad]

We occasionally use it to adjust PH in our pool. Not too often, but once or twice a year.

My father used to use it in his fossil collecting activities.

 

[Tractor Seabee]

Forget the chemistry, get rid of it and anything contaminated by it. Hot water and garden lime is the best neutralizer. It is biodegradeble in the soil.

Back in the old days we used a lot of stuff you would not think of using or cannot even buy anymore. Muriatic acid (HCL) is hard to find in the retail market due to its corrosive actions if spilled. A gallon of it spilled in a hardware store can ruin mega dollars of other stock. One of its more common uses was cleaning masonry work from mortar residue. Phosphoric acid is normally used for brick cleaning today except for heavily mortar contaminated surfaces where HCL is the final answer. The common Phosphoric Acid compound for cleaning is good ole TSP.

I grew up in the sheet metal trade and we used HCL to prepare galvanized sheets and flux for soldering it. It was stocked in glass gallons jugs with rubber stoppers. Best thing we had then and later the brand name fluxes all had HCL base. HCL with zinc dissolved in it till foaming stopped was used as a flux for soldering SS, copper, tin, and lead.

I experienced the effect of breathing the vapors when using that stuff, not pleasant, luckily there seem to be no lasting effects. Who knows how many lives were shortened in the old days with some of the stuff we did unknowingly. I worked inside large tanks soldering seams with that stuff filling the air. Ventilation was not thought necessary and cumbersome to set up back then.

If you use any of these type cleaning agents from the past get rid of them as soon as done, don't save it for when you might need it again. Even today a lot of folks wink at and ignore NIOSH and OSHA rules designed to protect them from harm. Some seem silly but there is reasoning behind them.

Ron

 

[bigdeano]

HCL is easy to find here. Ace Hardware, Lowes and Home Depot have it. The shelf at Ace Hardware is all rusty. I've used it a lot outdoors for derusting heavily rusted steel. A chemical mask, rubber gloves and goggles are mandatory, as well as having water close by. It's best to use another method for casual use if you can.

 

[kebo]

This isn't directly related to the OP's predicament, but I thought it was interesting enough to link. In 2005 there was a train wreck in Graniteville, SC in which a tanker car carrying 13,0000 gallons of chlorine was punctured and leaked about 9000 gallons of it's contents. When chlorine mixes with water, I believe it forms HLC (I am not a chemist though). The release formed a massive cloud of chlorine which, for weeks and months later on, caused a LOT of corrosion of anything made of metal that was in the area of the escaping gas. I think I recall that there was some sort of manufacturing plant directly in the path and they had to replace almost everything in it, but then the replacement equipment started corroding too. I think they eventually had to shut that plant down.

Anyway, this is a long read, but interesting if you like anything about railroads, as I do. My company designs and manufactures RR equipment like switches and crossing guards, and lots of other RR equipment. This particular accident was caused by a brakeman who failed to reline a mainline switch so traffic could use the mainline in either direction. It was lined to an industrial siding that had a parked train on it, and when the next train came through, it was switched to the siding and ran into the parked train. It's all in the NTSB report, all 59 pages of it. The most interesting and pertinent sections are the Emergency Response (page 11), and the Hazardous Materials section (page 27).


https://www.ntsb.gov/investigations/AccidentReports/Reports/RAR0504.pdf

 

[Tractor Seabee]

As a non-chemist I have always been fascinated by the processes by which a lot of industrial products made from the sources to the finished product and how things are combined to make other products. A worked for years repairing refrigeration machinery for these industries as many processes require cooling to control the heat from chemical reactions or other parts of the process. We had to learn enough of the processes to be able to work in the plants safely.

Chlorine is an interesting element that is combined with many other elements both naturally and processes. Its is an Base (alkali) with PH of 13-14 but combined with hydrogen it is an Acid with a PH of 3. The common industrial process to produce chlorine is to break common salt down by electrolysis into CL Hydrogen and soda ash. The H is burned off and the soda ash (alkali) is a solution drained off the bottom of the retort. There is all the stuff you use in your swimming pools and spas.

Compounds of CL are mostly highly corrosive either as a Base or an Acid. When working in a chlorine plant for a week I went through $500 worth of clothes that my employer readily reimbursed and charged the customer.

Even us working stiffs have to get into chemistry and other esoteric science subjects. We know enough to be dangerous.

Heh guys and gals, bait and tax my memory one more time to keep me young.

Ron

 

[MossRoad]

As a non-chemist I have always been fascinated by the processes by which a lot of industrial products made from the sources to the finished product and how things are combined to make other products. A worked for years repairing refrigeration machinery for these industries as many processes require cooling to control the heat from chemical reactions or other parts of the process. We had to learn enough of the processes to be able to work in the plants safely.

Chlorine is an interesting element that is combined with many other elements both naturally and processes. Its is an Base (alkali) with PH of 13-14 but combined with hydrogen it is an Acid with a PH of 3. The common industrial process to produce chlorine is to break common salt down by electrolysis into CL Hydrogen and soda ash. The H is burned off and the soda ash (alkali) is a solution drained off the bottom of the retort. There is all the stuff you use in your swimming pools and spas.

Compounds of CL are mostly highly corrosive either as a Base or an Acid. When working in a chlorine plant for a week I went through $500 worth of clothes that my employer readily reimbursed and charged the customer.

Even us working stiffs have to get into chemistry and other esoteric science subjects. We know enough to be dangerous.

Heh guys and gals, bait and tax my memory one more time to keep me young.

Ron

We have a salt water swimming pool with a salt water chlorine generator in the filter return line. It uses electrolysis to convert the salt into sodium hypochlorite. That sanitizes the pool water. When it breaks down, instead of evaporating like chlorine tends to do, it returns to its salt form. Salt can't evaporate. So I rarely have to add more salt throughout the year (unless the pool gets diluted with excessive rains). I have to use muriatic acid to lower the PH once or twice per year, but that's about it.

Reading what I have in this forum, I think I'll find a different place to store my acid jug. :thumbsup:

 

[MinnesotaEric]

This is the most not-tractor, not-welding, not-leaky-roof-yet-interesting-thread on the forum. I have no clue, but I'm soaking it all in.