Trial Purpose:
Update on testing to find a non VOC cleaner
Date Run:
06/27/1996Experiment Procedure:
The purpose of this trial is to determine a chemical replacement for current usage of Diversey Jettacin cleaner. For a successful chemistry to be chosen it must meet three requirements:
1) Must be able to remove various cutting oils, greases and pine-tar preservative better than Jettacin.
2) Must have no VOC content or close to no VOC content.
3) Must be able to be rinsed easily to allow painting after drying.
From the three requirements listed above ten different aqueous chemistries were chosen. The effectiveness in removing three different heavy greases will be used as criteria to determine poor-performing chemistries. Greases #1 and #2 are a light and a dark grease obtained from a previous client. Grease #3 is a Heavy-Duty Lithium Grease from Lubrimatic Inc.
Cleaning was performed in a simple immersion test for 10 minutes at 120 F with a 5% cleaning solution for all chemistries. After cleaning the coupons were rinsed in room temperature tap water for ten seconds and then allowed to air dry. Cleanliness was based on visual effectiveness of each cleaner. Each chemistry was graded on a scale of 1 to 10 with 1 being the most effective and 10 being the least effective. The results obtained are shown in Table 1.
SUBSTRATE MATERIAL: Steel
CONTAMINANTS: Various heavy greases, cutting fluids and pine-tar like preservative
CONTAMINATING PROCESS USED: Applied with Styrofoam swab and allowed to set for 4 hours
Trial Results:
| Company name | Contaminant Name | Basic Components |
| Citgo Petroleum Inc. | Cutting Oil NC 140 | Refined Petroleum Oil, Highly Sulfurized Hydrocarbon Polymer, Chlorinated Alpha Olefin, Sulfurized Fatty compound. |
| Citgo Petroleum Inc. | Sliderrite 220 | Refined Petroleum Oils, Sulfurized Fatty Compounds, High Molecular Weight Isobutylene. |
| Hubbard Hall Inc. | Metal Guard 420 | Stoddard Solvent, Barium Compound, Dipropylene Glycol Monomethyl Ether, Propylene Glycol Monomethyl Ether. |
| Cooks Industrial Lubricants | Cut 20 | Petroleum Based Oils, Sulfurized Fatty Oil Esters, Sulfurized 1-Decene. |
| Cooks Industrial Lubricants | Albavis 20 | Petroleum based oils. |
| Cooks Industrial Lubricants | Grease #1 | |
| Cooks Industrial Lubricants | Grease #2 | |
| Lubrimatic Inc. | Heavy weight Lithium Grease | |
| Pine-tar preservative |
For each contaminant, 3 coupons were cleaned in the Miele for 5 minutes at 140 F and at a pressure of 13 psi. All cleaning chemistries were diluted to 4% by volume. After cleaning the coupons were rinsed with room temperature tap water and then allowed to dry under UV heat lamps. Cleanliness was determined by using a gravimetric analysis. The panels were weighed before and after contamination, and after cleaning. The results of the gravimetric analysis are shown in Table 3 and Figure 1.
A final test was performed to check for any paint adhesion problems that may occur due to cleaner residue left by the Ardrox 6333 and the Polyspray 790 XS. For each chemistry, four steel parts obtained from the client were contaminated with pine-tar preservative and cleaned in the Miele pressure wash unit. Cleaning was for 4 minutes at 140 F and at 13 psi with a 4% cleaning solution.
After cleaning, the parts were allowed to dry first, and then two parts were rinsed in ambient tap water for 10 seconds and the other two were left unrinsed. Once the parts were completely dry, they were painted with Armstrong white touch-up paint. The paint was allowed to cure, and then the parts were immersed in room temperature water for two days to see if any peeling or cracking of the paint occurred. Results from this test were also positive. All four rinsed samples showed no signs of cracking or peeling. Some cracking occurred on the unrinsed samples as expected, but it appeared that unrinsed residue for the Polyspray 790 XS reduces paint adhesion to a lesser extent than the Ardrox 6333 does. Table 3: Cleaning Efficiencies of Polyspray XS, Ardrox 6333 and Jettacin on various contaminants.
| Table 3: Cleaning Efficiencies of Polyspray XS, Ardrox 6333 and Jettacin on various contaminants. | ||||||
| Polyspray 790 XS | Ardrox 6333 | Diversity Jettacin | ||||
| Contaminants | Avg. | Std | Avg. | Std | Avg. | Std |
| Cutting Oil 140 | 96.36 | 1.53 | 98 | 1.28 | 94.8 | 4.27 |
| Sliderite 220 | 91.14 | 4.23 | 83.59 | 6.91 | 73.62 | 1.87 |
| Cut 20 | 91.84 | 5.07 | 85.41 | 6.24 | 78.94 | 9.31 |
| Albavis 20 | 91.74 | 5.56 | 88.52 | 6.26 | 75.76 | 9.79 |
| Rust Guard 420 | 98.53 | 0.84 | 99.68 | 1.11 | 64.74 | 8.25 |
| Grease #1 | 85.05 | 2.88 | 86.03 | 10.85 | 3.11 | 2.01 |
| Grease #2 | 44.48 | 25.94 | 95.31 | 7.18 | 2.61 | 0.79 |
| Heavy Duty Lithium Grease | 29.09 | 17.8 | 17.03 | 4.67 | 0.17 | 0.13 |
| Pine-Tar Preservative | 100.06 | 0.14 | 95.49 | 1.29 | 24.84 | 2.49 |
It appears that both the Polyspray 790XS and the Ardrox 6333 would be a vast improvement over the Diversey Jettacin. Both chemistries passed all three requirements for a successful replacement:
Success Rating:
Results successful using TACT (time, agitation, concentration, and temperature, as well as rinsing and drying) and/or other cleaning chemistries examined.Conclusion:
I have just finished a round of tests to find an effective no-VOC replacement for Diversey Jettacin. After testing ten different aqueous cleaners, I have found two that should work well for you. One chemistry is U.S. Polychemical Polyspray 790 XS while the other is Ardrox, Inc. Ardrox 6333. Both chemistries outperformed Jettacin on a number of greases, oils and the pine-tar preservative that you sent to me (the enclosed test sheet contains detailed information about the testing and results).
From a performance perspective both the Polyspray 790 XS and the Ardrox 6333 seem almost equal. From a regulatory standpoint, the Polyspray 790 XS contains no VOC's as opposed to 10 g/l of VOC's in the Ardrox 6333. Because of this, I think you would be better off going with the Polyspray 790 XS. Below are contact names and numbers for both U.S. Polychemical and Ardrox, Inc.
1) Both chemistries obtained higher cleaning efficiencies than Jettacin on all nine contaminants tested (see Figure 1). The Polyspray 790XS was more effective on the cutting oils and the pine tar preservative than the Ardrox 6333, whereas the Ardrox 6333 appeared to be slightly more effective on the heavy greases.
2) The Polyspray 790 XS has no VOC content whereas the Adrox 6333 contains 10 grams of VOC per liter of concentrate (approximately 1% by weight).
3) Both chemistries appear to be fairly easy to rinse. If insufficient rinsing occurs, it seems that the Polyspray 790 XS is not as detrimental to paint adhesion as the Ardrox 6333 is.
