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Hank
Tinkerer
Username: Hank
Post Number: 28
Registered: 07-2011
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 29, 2012 - 07:14 am: | 
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Hello friends,
So I kind of have an email relationship with a old Leica camera technician. He sometimes answers my questions and sometimes he does not. I was explaining to him in a recent email that I had cleaned some parts to a Leica M3 using lighter fluid. His response was ...... "I have always found it odd that people new to camera repair use lighter fluid to clean camera parts" ....... so of course I asked him what he likes to use .... and he refused to answer. I guess its job security for him to not give up all his secrets. So my question to you all is what do you think this old Leica technician is using to clean the crud and dried grease off of camera parts? Maybe he just uses a good de-greaser. Any thoughts? |
Nick_merritt
Tinkerer
Username: Nick_merritt
Post Number: 23
Registered: 06-2008
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 29, 2012 - 11:34 am: |
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Denatured alcohol or electronics contact cleaner are also good. I think you can use the citrus-based solvents also. But nothing wrong with lighter fluid (naphtha). |
Hank
Tinkerer
Username: Hank
Post Number: 29
Registered: 07-2011
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 29, 2012 - 01:07 pm: |
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See - I love using lighter fluid. It cleans great and dries so nice. I always thought it to be the perfect solution for the job. Im annoyed that my "Email Mentor" finds it odd that we use it. |
Brcamera
Tinkerer
Username: Brcamera
Post Number: 158
Registered: 08-2010
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 29, 2012 - 04:15 pm: |
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I do not use lighter fluid (Naptha)as a cleaner but I realize that a lot of folks on this forum do use it for degreasing. And it does seem to work well. But I think that beginners to this avocation should realize that Naptha vapor and fluid is extremely flammable and a health hazard. In a commercial camera repair shop it could be a problem as some states regulate the amount of this type of fluid you can have in your business and special storage and labeling requirements might be needed in addition to requirements for commercial insurance(had this issue in a camera repair business some years ago). Naptha can be a good solvent for home use as long as you respect the health and safety issues involved with its use. |
Rick_oleson
Tinkerer
Username: Rick_oleson
Post Number: 1185
Registered: 07-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 29, 2012 - 06:48 pm: |
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I use lighter fluid almost exclusively. It's a much more effective degreasing solvent than alcohol, somewhat more effective than acetone, and unlike acetone, trichlor and many other solvents, it is safe around plastics. It is also a pure solvent (a liquid paraffin in the octane/nonane range of molecular weight), not a blend, so I don't have to wonder what all is in it and what those minor components are going to do to my camera. It leaves no residue (if you have a residue after using it, it means you aren't finished). It is no more toxic than other solvents that are useful for this purpose. Yes, it is flammable, that's why we call it cigarette lighter fluid, but non-flammable solvents are bad around plastics. I would never use a citrus, acid- or water-based solvent in a camera, but if you feel so inclined, let me know how that works for you.
I have never heard a camera repairman suggest that there is anything wrong with lighter fluid, or for that matter, suggest anything that works better. |
Br1078lum
Tinkerer
Username: Br1078lum
Post Number: 241
Registered: 11-2010
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 29, 2012 - 07:38 pm: |
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Rick, I was in a camera shop one day when the owner came out of the back with a nice looking Kiev 66 he'd just got off eBay. He asked me to smell it, and give my thoughts as to what the former owner used to clean it with.
I told him the former owner must have worked in a jet aircraft facility, because it definitely reeked of kerosene. You could see something pooling up on the bottom of the inside too. He had to do a complete teardown just to clean up the mess.
I use Ronsonal for the insides of the camera, and alchohol to clean the outsides. Sometimes a little bit of Windex or Lysol All Purpose on the outside if it's really gross, like the white film some pleathers can develope if closed up in an ERC for long periods in the damp.
PF |
Rick_oleson
Tinkerer
Username: Rick_oleson
Post Number: 1186
Registered: 07-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, March 01, 2012 - 04:16 am: |
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i've encountered some extreme cases: i have a black nikon F that was apparently in a varnish factory for many years, it had coated the outside of the camera, motor & lens. That luckily cleaned up with "Goof Off" (a xylene/toluene blend). I cleaned up a Pentacon barn find by disassembling it and giving the individual parts an Alka Seltzer bath (I violated my no-water-base rule in that case, but it wasn't an assembled camera). Sometimes you just gotta do what you gotta do. |
Glenn
Tinkerer
Username: Glenn
Post Number: 977
Registered: 07-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, March 01, 2012 - 08:43 am: |
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A small, plastic spouted, squeeze can of lighter fluid is probably the safest way, human health and component damage wise, that anybody could use for cleaning parts/assemblies in small scale camera repairs. As usual Rick posts all the relevant chemical knowledge required.
As for Hank's original post and reported comment via email. I find it very odd that a so called 'professional' repair technician finds it odd that people use lighter fluid. Being an industrial chemist by training, the spouted can of lighter fluid has long been a member of my solvent shelf - even when I could obtain winchesters of various other pure solvents very easily - lighter fluid will clean off/dissolve most of the crud we find in delicate mechanical assemblies. Best of all I can get it at any time from the local corner shop - even in the changed shopping styles of today. |
Hank
Tinkerer
Username: Hank
Post Number: 30
Registered: 07-2011
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Thursday, March 01, 2012 - 09:45 am: |
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Yeah ... Like I said ... Im with you all - lighter fluid works so well, that it I never have even considered searching for a substitute. The Leica Technician I am referring to was trained by Leica as a young man and worked for Leitz his whole life.... 40+ years. He has given me some great nuggets of wisdom for working on Leicas ... but sometimes he gets a stuck up attitude .... He has shared with me that when he was being trained as a boy at Leitz that he and the other apprentices had to wait on the Master Trainers "hand & foot" ... they had to make the lunch for the master and shine their shoes, clean up the masters work area. Basically he said that "you are the property of the Master while an apprentice" ... keep in mind this is old school German stuff. He said it was close to being a slave. So maybe that is why he doesn't come off the old secrets easily. Or maybe he just likes to make me think Im way off still. Maybe I should go to his house and make him some lunch and then he will tell me what he uses. HAHA |
Hobbes
Tinkerer
Username: Hobbes
Post Number: 25
Registered: 02-2009
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, March 02, 2012 - 08:29 am: |
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What about using Coleman camp fuel (white gasoline) as a solvent. I have heard that some use it with success instead of naptha?
Rob |
Rick_oleson
Tinkerer
Username: Rick_oleson
Post Number: 1187
Registered: 07-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, March 02, 2012 - 03:51 pm: |
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Coleman camp fuel IS naphtha. If you need a big can, that's another way to buy it. |
