garage door lubricant

not sure what it was, but it seemed like the right choice at the time.

So is some vinegar. The additives do make a difference, and I do agree that there are too many types of lubricants to even shake a stick at these days, all of which claim to be the best thing ever created. The differences while subtle do exist and for the case of a garage door rollers anything would probably work fine in the end. Other applications could be fussier.

I do keep over a dozen types of oils and greases around for various things. Each have their purpose, for instance the Cameron drill press, scissors and old camera shutters only get Nyoil, which is just fancy pure mineral oil. I never add teflon filled oils to motor bearings, locks get graphite and so forth, super lube for general purpose use blah blah. No doubt everybody has their favorites as well. Bike people get real crazy about chain lubricants.

I am not too sure about that statement. Does that include silicon oil? And how about the oil for use with 410a refrigerant? And then there is the oil with iodine in it. And the transmission oil made with jojoba oil.

Dan

I don't know, but I doubt it. Silicone is a whole other kettle of fish. I was speaking of motor oils.

Again, I was speaking of motor oils.

Yeah. The basic point was that synthetic motor oils, which are derived from petroleum oils -- cracked into components and then re-combined in a controlled way-- are much more lubricious than conventional petroleum oils. Beyond that, the differences between motor oils and machine oils are not commonly understood.

You know that grease is just oil with metallic soaps in it to make it thick and pasty. You may know that the true weight of multi-viscosity oils actually is the lower value: 10W-40 actually is 10-weight oil. The additives that give it the multi-vis property really don't alter the viscosity of the oil. Those additives actually are polymers that swell up when they're heated. What they do is increase the gap between journals and bearings *as if* the oil was thicker. The polymers just swell with heat and keep the gap open.

Most of the additives in motor oil have no effect on the oil's properties for other uses. Anti-foam, rust protection, and anti-acid (anti-corrosion) components do almost nothing until they're activated. The detergents and dispersants only come into play in *closed* lubricating systems, where the oil it recycled through the machine. In a plain-spindle-bearing lathe, which is a "total loss" lubricating system, they have no noticeable affect. In a system that recycles, you can use motor oil as long as you change the oil when it gets dirty. The lubricating effects won't change. The additives won't do any damage. You can have a problem if you've used non-detergent oil in a machine or engine for years and then switch to deterget oil, because the semi-jelled glorp can come off in lumps big enough and hard enough to block oil passages.

All of this came up, and prompted me to call Exxon-Mobil, from a comment by former member Jim Rozen that he had switched his company's South Bend plain-bearing 10L lathe to Mobil 1 motor oil - 0W-20, I think. He said the spindle ran cooler and allowed higher speeds. Like me, he had been lubing it with South Bend spindle oil.

I talked to the E-M VP about it, and she said, first, it's the same oil as their industrial synthetic, aside from the additives, and that those additives make no difference in a total-loss system. She thought

This prompted me to ask about other applications, and she said it was generally the same story: synthetic lubricates much better, and the additives in motor oil won't matter for almost all applications except those that recycle the oil. As for viscosity, make sure it's thin enough to get into the bearing area and thick enough to minimize metal-to-metal contact.

So I stopped driving to my mill supply to stock a few different weights of machine oil. I use synthetics in my cars, and I just save the remains, turning the cans upside-down overnight and then pouring the last bit into my all-purpose pump oil can.

I did buy a can of 0W-20 to use in the spindle of my furnace blower motor. I use the heavier stuff on my garden tools and the joints of my pocket knives. My honing oil is still 10% motor oil and 90% kerosene, as it has been for close to 60 years, and the motor oil for that is whatever is lying around.

I read the Kingston web page to my wife, who grew up cooking on charcoal, and she declared it as "utterly false" (I translated her reply which was a bit more colorful) or, she commented, "those foreigners don't know much about cooking with charcoal" :-)

Makes great chainsaw bar oil. I'm sure you'll tell me how bad I'm polluting now.

"Made from petroleum oil" can mean that the synthetic oil is based on chemicals originally derived from petroleum, such as ethylene and its relatives. Plastics are also "made from petroleum".

How about something like "Garage door lubricant" from AGS in Muskegon Michigan. The tube I have says cat no GLC-1 It is a 34 gram tube and I've had it for at least a decade.

Actually quite a bit is made from natural gas - - - And in South Africa they made it from coal during apartheid when they were embargoed

Right. That was the sneaky point. d8-)

They crack it down, and then re-synthesize it to make "synthetic" motor oil. And the result is worth it.

This comes up from time to time because I once had a boss who was proud of the fact that she used synthetic motor oil in her Benz, thus avoiding the use of petroleum. She was really let down when I explained it to her.

Are you sure they make synthetic motor oil from gas? I know it's a common source of ethylene, but I'm not sure about what molecules they use to assemble Mobil 1.

Garage door lube in a can. Second is spray white lithium. Spray the bearings only, not the tracks and wheels. Spray the axles if they're loose-caught in their holders. Nothing else quiets squeaks.

Tighten all hinge screws properly, too.

Wax between door sections if they creak. Car wax or polymer treatment works well.

Lube the garage door opener rod bearings, too. Tighten all screws.

And blacksmiths traditionally (and still) rub workpieces straight from the fire (sooty, some scale) with linseed oil while just hot enough to gently smoke a bit. The heat accelerates the polymerization and the wiped-down piece is no longer sticky by the time it's cool enough to handle. Makes a nice, somewhat weather resistant black finish.

For wood, a point to note is that "boiled" linseed may contain cobalt dryer. Probably not very much but cobalt is toxic so you may want to avoid it on salad bowls and food prep surfaces.

Surely anyone suggesting linseed as a lubricant is doing it toungue in cheek? Surely? :-o

OOPS, Guess I shouldn't be using it in the waste oil furnace in the shop or to fuel my foundry furnace...

But it does work really well for both...

Which is why a lot of old engine folks use it to preserve their engines. Brush it on and let it dry, apply a couple coats and it keeps them looking good for years.

Right. There are several metal "salts" that have been used in "boiled" linseed, generally not good things for your health. In the old days it was boiled with litharge -- red lead oxide. They're catalysts that promote polymerization of the oil.

One hopes. One never quite depends on it. d8-)

Haven't you noticed how badly misinformed a few posters here are? And they are the most adamant that they are right and everyone else wrong.. A little knowledge...

I've salvaged a motor that had been oiled with salad oil, which is also unsaturated and polymerizes like linseed though not as solidly. Old machine tools sometimes have a coating of hardened oil, maybe lard oil?

-jsw

Hydro-carbon gas is a many slandered substance, but when you talk about "pipe line" gas it is usually mostly Ethane and Methane. In Indonesia they use "gas" to make fertilizer but I'm not sure whether they are using strictly ethane-methane of something richer.

The MSDS reveals nothing useful:

-jsw