Chemistry, home repairs, and models...

Let's see... could you turn metal into gold too ? I'm off buying some more kits ;-)

Erik Wauters, Belgium

"Drew Hill" schreef in bericht news:4119cabc$1@news.702com.net...

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Drew,

If the kits are sealed you should be getting plazticizers outgassing from the wrap - or maybe the plastic itself. I believe the chief chemical here is duodecane. This is a very common chemical that gives plastics their flexibility. Basically 12 carbon atoms with double bonds between them and Hydrogens arranged to use the remaining bonds. It's why the windshields on new cars get hazy when you park in the sun. The stuff comes out of the plastic dash board and deposits on the windshield. One might hypothcize that it deposited on the pipes and protected them from corrosion in localized areas. However, If it actually turned the pipes a more golden brass color - that's gotta be another story.

Val Kraut

Not necessarily... with lighting conditions what they are indoors (imperfect) and memories of previous states being likewise fallible, it may simply be that the protected pipes are not discoloring at all, but appear to have changed color by comparison with nearby pipes that are slowly discoloring. However, I'm not sure I can agree with the notion that the off-gassing duodecane is going to deposit at a rate high enough to actually provide protection. Remember that the car interior has very little air volume and may reach fairly high temperatures when sitting in the sun, which implies fairly high concentrations of the off-gassing product adjacent to the windshield.

BTW, that stuff on the windshields is miserable to remove--I've tried a variety of concoctions to remove it, but it mainly smears around and then shows up as streaks when driving at night. Anybody got a solution?

Mark Schynert

Lots of Windex and paper towels, do it 3-4 times on a cool overcast day. Change the paper towels often.

Try WD-40. The other strong organic solvents - acetone, xylene and Carbon Disulphine - might work but these are kinda of unhealthy to breathe in and very flammable.