White spirit (AU, UK & Ireland)Primarily in the United Kingdom and Australia. In New Zealand "white spirit" can also refer to

Coleman fuel Coleman fuel, also generically sold as white gas, is a petroleum naphtha product marketed by the Coleman Company. Contents Historically called ''white gas'', it is a liquid petroleum fuel (100% light hydrotreated distillate), composed of cyclohe ...

(

white gas Coleman fuel, also generically sold as white gas, is a petroleum naphtha product marketed by the Coleman Company. Contents Historically called ''white gas'', it is a liquid petroleum fuel (100% light hydrotreated distillate), composed of cycloh ...

). or mineral spirits (US, Canada), also known as mineral turpentine (AU/NZ), turpentine substitute, and petroleum spirits, is a petroleum-derived clear liquid used as a common organic solvent in painting. There are also terms for specific kinds of white spirit, including Stoddard solvent and solvent naphtha (petroleum). White spirit is often used as a

paint thinner A paint thinner is a solvent used to thin oil-based paints. Solvents labeled "paint thinner" are usually mineral spirits having a flash point at about 40 °C (104 °F), the same as some popular brands of charcoal starter. Common solven ...

, or as a component thereof, though paint thinner is a broader category of solvent. Odorless mineral spirits (OMS) have been refined to remove the more toxic aromatic compounds, and are recommended for applications such as oil painting. A mixture of aliphatic,

open-chain In chemistry, an open-chain compound (also spelled as open chain compound) or acyclic compound (Greek prefix "α", ''without'' and "κύκλος", ''cycle'') is a compound with a linear structure, rather than a cyclic one. An open-chain compound h ...

alicyclic In organic chemistry, an alicyclic compound contains one or more all-carbon rings which may be either saturated or unsaturated, but do not have aromatic character. Alicyclic compounds may have one or more aliphatic side chains attached. The ...

C₇ to C₁₂ hydrocarbons, white spirit is insoluble in water and is used as an extraction solvent, as a cleaning solvent, as a degreasing solvent and as a solvent in

aerosols An aerosol is a suspension of fine solid particles or liquid droplets in air or another gas. Aerosols can be natural or anthropogenic. Examples of natural aerosols are fog or mist, dust, forest exudates, and geyser steam. Examples of anthrop ...

paint Paint is any pigmented liquid, liquefiable, or solid mastic composition that, after application to a substrate in a thin layer, converts to a solid film. It is most commonly used to protect, color, or provide texture. Paint can be made in many ...

wood preservatives Wood easily degrades without sufficient preservation. Apart from structural wood preservation measures, there are a number of different chemical preservatives and processes (also known as "timber treatment", "lumber treatment" or "pressure treat ...

lacquer Lacquer is a type of hard and usually shiny coating or finish applied to materials such as wood or metal. It is most often made from resin extracted from trees and waxes and has been in use since antiquity. Asian lacquerware, which may be ca ...

varnish Varnish is a clear transparent hard protective coating or film. It is not a stain. It usually has a yellowish shade from the manufacturing process and materials used, but it may also be pigmented as desired, and is sold commercially in various ...

es, and asphalt products. In western Europe about 60% of the total white spirit consumption is used in paints, lacquers and varnishes. White spirit is the most widely used solvent in the paint industry. In households, white spirit is commonly used to clean paint brushes after use, to clean auto parts and tools, as a

starting fluid Starting fluid is a volatile, flammable liquid which is used to aid the starting of internal combustion engines, especially during cold weather or in engines that are difficult to start using conventional starting procedures. It is typically avail ...

for charcoal grills, to remove adhesive residue from non-porous surfaces, and many other common tasks. The word "mineral" in "mineral spirits" or "mineral turpentine" is meant to distinguish it from distilled spirits (

alcoholic beverage An alcoholic beverage (also called an alcoholic drink, adult beverage, or a drink) is a drink that contains ethanol, a type of alcohol that acts as a drug and is produced by fermentation of grains, fruits, or other sources of sugar. The c ...

s distilled from fermented biological material) or from true turpentine (distilled tree resin).

Types and grades

Three different types and three different grades of white spirit exist. The ''type'' refers to whether the solvent has been subjected to

hydrodesulfurization Hydrodesulfurization (HDS) is a catalytic chemical process widely used to remove sulfur (S) from natural gas and from refined petroleum products, such as gasoline or petrol, jet fuel, kerosene, diesel fuel, and fuel oils. The purpose of remov ...

(removal of sulfur) alone (type 1), solvent extraction (type 2) or hydrogenation (type 3). Each type comprises three grades: low flash grade, regular grade, and high flash grade (''flash'' refers to

flash point The flash point of a material is the "lowest liquid temperature at which, under certain standardized conditions, a liquid gives off vapours in a quantity such as to be capable of forming an ignitable vapour/air mixture". (EN 60079-10-1) The fl ...

). The grade is determined by the

crude oil Petroleum, also known as crude oil, or simply oil, is a naturally occurring yellowish-black liquid mixture of mainly hydrocarbons, and is found in geological formations. The name ''petroleum'' covers both naturally occurring unprocessed crude ...

used as the starting material and the conditions of distillation. In addition there is type 0, which is defined as distillation fraction with no further treatment, consisting predominantly of saturated C₉ to C₁₂ hydrocarbons with a boiling range of . Stoddard solvent is a specific mixture of hydrocarbons, typically over 65% C₁₀ or higher hydrocarbons, developed in 1924 by Atlanta dry cleaner W. J. Stoddard and Lloyd E. Jackson of the

Mellon Institute of Industrial Research The Mellon Institute of Industrial Research is a former research institute in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States, which is now part of Carnegie Mellon University. It was founded in 1913 by Andrew Mellon and Richard B. Mellon as part of the U ...

as a less flammable petroleum-based dry cleaning solvent than the petroleum solvents then in use. Dry cleaners began using the result of their work in 1928 and it soon became the predominant dry cleaning solvent in the United States, until the late 1950s. Turpentine substitute is generally not made to a standard and can have a wider range of components than products marketed as white spirit, which is made to a standard (in the UK, British Standard BS 245, in Germany,

DIN DIN or Din or din may refer to: People and language * Din (name), people with the name * Dīn, an Arabic word with three general senses: judgment, custom, and religion from which the name originates * Dinka language (ISO 639 code: din), spoken by ...

51632). Turpentine substitute can be used for general cleaning but is not recommended for paint thinning as it may adversely affect drying times due to the less volatile components; while it may be used for brush cleaning its heavier components may leave an oily residue.

Chemical numbers

Physical properties

Type 1 white spirit is mainly used in most of Europe and Stoddard solvent is used in the US, both of which correspond to each other.

Use

Degreasing and lubricating

In industry, white spirit is used for cleaning and degreasing machine tools and parts, and in conjunction with

cutting oil Cutting fluid is a type of coolant and lubricant designed specifically for metalworking processes, such as machining and stamping. There are various kinds of cutting fluids, which include oils, oil-water emulsions, pastes, gels, aerosols (mists), ...

as a

thread cutting In manufacturing, threading is the process of creating a screw thread. More screw threads are produced each year than any other machine element. There are many methods of generating threads, including subtractive methods (many kinds of thread cut ...

and

reaming A reamer is a type of rotary cutting tool used in metalworking. Precision reamers are designed to enlarge the size of a previously formed hole by a small amount but with a high degree of accuracy to leave smooth sides. There are also non-precisio ...

lubricant A lubricant (sometimes shortened to lube) is a substance that helps to reduce friction between surfaces in mutual contact, which ultimately reduces the heat generated when the surfaces move. It may also have the function of transmitting forces, t ...

. White spirit is commonly used for cutting fluid in ultraprecision lathes (commonly referred to as

diamond turning Diamond turning is turning using a cutting tool with a diamond tip. It is a process of mechanical machining of precision elements using lathes or derivative machine tools (e.g., turn-mills, rotary transfers) equipped with natural or synthetic d ...

machines). White spirit is used for regripping golf clubs. After the old grip is removed, the white spirit is poured into the new grip and shaken. After the white spirit is poured on, the new underlying tape and the new grip are slid on. After an hour of drying out, the new grip and club are ready to use.

Solvent and paint thinner

White Spirit is a petroleum distillate used as a

and mild solvent. White spirit is an inexpensive petroleum-based replacement for the vegetable-based turpentine. It is commonly used as a paint thinner for oil-based

and cleaning brushes, and as an organic solvent in other applications. Mineral turpentine is chemically very different from turpentine, which mainly consists of pinene, and it has inferior solvent properties. Artists use white spirit as an alternative to turpentine since it is less flammable and less toxic. Because of interactions with pigments in oil paints, artists require a higher grade of white spirit than many industrial users, including the complete absence of residual sulfur. White spirit was formerly an active ingredient in the laundry soap

Fels Naptha Fels-Naptha is an American brand of laundry soap manufactured by Summit Brands. The soap was originally created in 1893 by Fels and Company. It originally included the ingredient naphtha, effective for cleaning laundry and urushiol, an oil co ...

, used to dissolve oils and grease in laundry stains, and as a popular remedy for eliminating the irritant oil urushiol in poison ivy. It was removed as a potential health risk. White spirit has a characteristic unpleasant kerosene-like odor. Chemical manufacturers have developed a low odor version of mineral turpentine which contains less of the highly volatile shorter hydrocarbons. Odorless mineral spirits is white spirit that has been further refined to remove the more toxic aromatic compounds, and is recommended for applications such as oil painting, where humans have close contact with the solvent. In

screen printing Screen printing is a printing technique where a mesh is used to transfer ink (or dye) onto a substrate, except in areas made impermeable to the ink by a blocking stencil. A blade or squeegee is moved across the screen to fill the open mes ...

(also referred to as silk-screening), white spirit is often used to clean and unclog screens after printing with oil-based textile and

plastisol A plastisol is a colloidal dispension of small polymer particles, usually polyvinyl chloride (PVC), in a liquid plasticizer. When heated to around , the plastic particles absorb the plasticizer, causing them to swell and fuse together forming a ...

inks. It is also used to thin inks used in making monoprints. White spirit is often used inside liquid-filled compasses and gauges. White spirits are a major ingredient in some popular automotive fuel/oil additives, such as

Marvel Mystery Oil Marvel Mystery Oil is an automotive product of the American Marvel Oil Company, founded by Burt Pierce in 1923. It is used as a fuel additive, oil additive, corrosion inhibitor, penetrating oil, and transmission leak stopper and seal relubricato ...

, as they are capable of dissolving varnish and sludge buildup.

Portable stoves

Although white spirit is used as an alternative to kerosene in portable stoves , this is not advisable as typical grades of white spirit have a lower flash point than kerosene. It cannot be used as an alternative to

, which is a much more volatile gasoline-like fuel.

Toxicity

White spirit is mainly classed as an irritant. It has a fairly low acute toxicity by inhalation of the vapour, dermal (touching the skin) and oral (ingestion) routes. However, acute exposure can lead to central nervous system depression resulting in lack of coordination and slowed reactions. Exposure to very high concentrations in enclosed spaces can lead to general

narcotic The term narcotic (, from ancient Greek ναρκῶ ''narkō'', "to make numb") originally referred medically to any psychoactive compound with numbing or paralyzing properties. In the United States, it has since become associated with opiates ...

effects (drowsiness, dizziness, nausea, etc.) and can eventually lead to unconsciousness. Oral ingestion presents a high aspiration hazard. Prolonged or repeated skin exposure over a long period of time can result in severe irritant dermatitis, also called contact dermatitis. Continuous exposure to an average white spirit concentration of 240 mg/m³ (40 ppm) for more than 13 years can lead to chronic central nervous system effects. Similar long-term studies have been made in which some of the observed effects included

memory impairment Amnesia is a deficit in memory caused by brain damage or disease,Gazzaniga, M., Ivry, R., & Mangun, G. (2009) Cognitive Neuroscience: The biology of the mind. New York: W.W. Norton & Company. but it can also be caused temporarily by the use ...

, poor concentration, increased irritability etc. White spirit is implicated in the development of chronic toxic encephalopathy (CTE) among house painters. In severe cases CTE may lead to disability and personality changes. These effects in painters were first studied in the 1970s in the Nordic countries. Owing to the volatility and low bioavailability of its constituents, white spirit, although it is moderately toxic to aquatic organisms, is unlikely to present significant hazards to the environment. It should not however, be purposely poured down the sink or freshwater drain. People can be exposed to Stoddard solvent in the workplace by breathing it in, swallowing it, skin contact, and eye contact. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has set the legal limit ( Permissible exposure limit) for Stoddard solvent exposure in the workplace as 500 ppm (2900 mg/m³) over an 8-hour workday. The National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) has set a Recommended exposure limit (REL) of 350 mg/m³ over an 8-hour workday and 1800 mg/m³ over 15 minutes. At levels of 20,000 mg/m³, Stoddard solvent is

immediately dangerous to life and health The term immediately dangerous to life or health (IDLH) is defined by the US National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) as exposure to airborne contaminants that is "likely to cause death or immediate or delayed permanent advers ...

Footnotes

References

{{reflist

External links

ICPS safety sheet White Spirit (Stoddard Solvent)
– World Health Organization
Environmental Health Criteria 187
– World Health Organization

* ttps://www.cdc.gov/niosh/npg/npgd0569.html CDC - NIOSH Pocket Guide to Chemical Hazards Household chemicals Painting materials Hydrocarbon solvents Dry cleaning Commodity chemicals da:Terpentin