Ge|atinousFury

Ok, today I made the trip to Home Depot and purchased a spray bottle and a 1 liter bottle of denatured alcohol. I have a couple of quick questions about this cleaning method before I jump into it:

1. Just this one liter was about $4.00. Can I dilute this with water to make it last a bit longer, or should I keep it straight?

2. What should I NOT spray with this? Any part of the engine, outside of battery box, etc.??

ElPolloDiablo

My Feedback: (2)

definitly DO NOT put water in it, that would defeat the whole point of denatured alchohol(having 0 water so things dont rust because of it)

The only thing you shouldnt spray is the radio gear, although it should hurt that actually, just dont soak your reciever in it. Probably would want to plug the carb up so you dont get it washing stuff into the engine either.

waverave

My Feedback: (3)

Like he said...dont add water. Alcohol will work good to get off loose dirt but it won't really help to get off grease and fuel, etc. Simply get one more spray bottle and nice big bottle of concentrated simple green for the grease. Between the two of them you can clean the whole truck.

Aterlatus

Erm, denatured alcohol already has about 15% water doesn't it?

Along with 80% of so Ethanol and 5% Methanol?

Meh, I still wouldn't dilute it. Meths on the rocks doesn't cut it quite the same :P

You can afford to be quite stingy with how much you use though, especially when you're using a spray bottle.

dirtsavage

Make sure you remove your wheels first. If you spray the alcohal on the wheels it will strip the chrome plating off. It happened to my buddy last week. No one warned him about that. I first spray the truck down with Simple Green to cut thru the oil and grease. Let it sit for about 2 minutes. Then spray off with Alcohal really well to help evaporate the Simple Green and wash off the remaining dirt.

Remember!! REMOVE THE WHEELS FIRST!!![sm=cool.gif]

new72Savage

Alsolutely agree with

1) dont add water
2) denatured alcohol with strip chrome plate off plastic

and i just want to add..

3) remove ur body, alcohol will ruin any external stickers (cloud them and make them lift off...cuts through soft adhesives...any others u might use in other places like foam stickie pads etc)

scale only 4 me

My Feedback: (158)

Home Depot also sells an air spray nossle that mixes fliud with compressed air
They cost about $15 and that alcohol will last alot longer

It works great

badboy2

My Feedback: (13)

my lhd (local home depot) doesnt have that nozzle is that for compressors ur talkin about or its something like an atomizer..they dont carry that too ....i have a regular sprayer we use on plants but u can turn it for different settings..im still lookin for one tho..cuz the one from http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/cta...unction=Search
is 9.99+10bux shipping ithink the part number is 1102

normanski

Hi all,

If I remember my Chemistry lessons correctly, you cannot get 100% alcohol! The best you can do is 96%. But you should not add extra water to it just the same.

As for spraying Alcohol, you are going to make the thing may be 100 times more flammable than it already is! I trust none of you are smokers. Take extreme cautions if you are going to do that.

Normanski

normanski

Oh Bearings! Don't spray bearings or you would have to regrease them afterward.

Normanski

caseyddr

My Feedback: (13)

normanski, if your cleaning that much of your car, your probably blowing them out anyways as for %, i coulda swore my DA i bought from walmart was 90% alcohol... have to check. As for it breaking up grease and dirt, it does that great for me :O don't know what dirtsavage has

Pkvillager

I spray my truck down with WD40 and the rinse it with DA, it does the trick nicely.

scale only 4 me

My Feedback: (158)

That unit sprays 100% liquid,, the one I'm talking about hooks up to an air compresser and mixes in the fluid,, acts like a mini presure washer,, I'll se if I can find a picture

dirtsavage

__________________________________________________ ____________________
I use DA (Denatured Alcohal). I hope thats what that means, from Lowes hardware. I'm not sure what percent alcohal it is. Got to go home and check. But its strong enough to strip chrome plating on plastic. You can buy it for $10 a gallon. Works great to strip oil and grease. But if you want something that is not so harsh on metals and still cuts thru oil and grease try Simple Green. It's bio-degradable. Not harmful to metals. Then do a quick spray of Alcohal over Simple Green to help it evaporate.

Good luck!

badboy2

My Feedback: (13)

u can pump air into it so it spits out pressured liquid like the nitrocleaner we buy in lhs

badboy2

My Feedback: (13)

scaleonly the one u r talkin about must have an air compressor right?do they come in small sizes like a handy one?

scale only 4 me

My Feedback: (158)

Yes you need a compressor,,, when you're done cleaning with the acohol, then you have a spray nossle you can dry the car with too

frambo

scale_only_4_me-RCU - that is a cool setup! Thanks for the tip. It will be a great item for cleaning the trucks!