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Simple Green; was: Belly Cleaning

Posted: Sun Dec 15, 2002 7:35 pm
by danMichael
'
> Another data point: I also use Simple Green for cleaning the plane
> without any adverse affects; I keep a spray bottle in the plane. My
> A & P shop uses a diluted mixture with a little soap for washing
> planes that come in for service.
>
> :djm
> :NC81323
>
> On Sunday, December 15, 2002, at 11:47 AM, Cy Galley wrote:
>
>> The warning is from the airforce that did an "accelerated" test by
>> hanging unpainted aluminum in a vat of heated to 100 degrees of
>> Simple Green for 168 hours. After all that, the sample was scrubbed
>> clean with a nylon bristle brush. Found mild corrosion by weighing.
>>
>> http://www.avweb.com/other/usaf0020b1.pdf is a copy of the report.
>>
>> If you look at the report, there are several serious flaws. One was
>> they used tap water to dilute to less than the specified dilution.
>> The table is misleading as they weight the test coupon in grams but
>> reported the loss due to corrosion and abrasion in milligrams.
>> Incidentally they did not scrub before they weighed the samples.
>>
>> If you don't dilute and scrub the hell out of your plane, don't rinse
>> and place your plane in an oven at 100 degrees while it is immersed
>> in liquid simple green then you will have problems if the aluminum is
>> unpainted. Give me a break.
>>
>> I'll bet that if you immersed aluminum in 100 degree heated tap water
>> for a week, then scrubbed to "clean" it; your sample would show
>> weight loss also.
>>
>> One reason aluminum fairs so well in the non-corrosive department is
>> the bare metal is never exposed to the elements. There is always a
>> layer of corrosion (aluminum oxide) on the surface that once formed,
>> protects it from further oxidation. This thin film fortunately
>> reforms when damaged. That is why a polished prop or plane must
>> continually be re-polished.
>>
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: Bob Webster
>> To: fairchildclub@yahoogroups.com
>> Sent: Sunday, December 15, 2002 10:46 AM
>> Subject: [fairchildclub] Belly Cleaning
>>
>>
>> Simple green is also supposedly corrosive to aluminum. Source:
>> Either Aviation Consumer or Light Plane Maintenance.
>>
>> Bob
>
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