Grease Near An Oxygen Tank

Grease is oxidised by the oxygen. Very quickly!

and exothermically

Normal everyday grease would be a fire hazard in an oxygen rich environment as PW says....

John.

KENN,

Oklahoma State University has a web page with some good links to information regarding compressed gasses:

https://go.okstate.edu/

Finally, you can also obtain information from US-OSHA's website:

hhttps://www.osha.gov/

I hope this helps.

kenn says thanks JMAN i"ll look into your suggestions

Do you tray what Oxygen does at room temperature? Response:It is only oxidation.

Oxyen does not react otherwise except at very high temperature or spark. Yes oil get rancid when expose to even air. What grease anyway. Oxidation proceed mostly on double bond. Of course some natural grease get rancid as well. The problem would better understood if the type of grease waas specified.

Good luck

That's incorrect.

As the oxidization occurs it creates heat. Enough heat to produce internal combustion.

That is why greasy rags in a garage or industrial environment are required to be disposed of in a can with a lid.

Oxygen increases the risk of spontaneous combustion. Oxy should always be capped or secured. Spares should be isolated from the flammable gas. Compressed gas bottles will take off like a rocket if the valve gets knocked off.

I worked in a plant that had a gas welding area with piped oxygen and acetylene. Grease somehow got into the pressurized O2 line and exploded causing all the regulators and valve tops to pop off the bodies. No one was hurt, fortunately, but the company certainly got religious about keeping O2 systems clean.

And was it Apollo 3 that had 100% O2 atmosphere and killed 3 in the resulting fire? Pure O2 is a very rapid oxidizer, especially when under pressure. Keep it clean.

I would not defend your right to be wrong about oxygen and grease on the oxygen supply fittings on my oxygen supply tank on my plane since wrong means I die.

Hi,

there is a selection of greases that do not contain any hydrocarbons.

The stuff is called PFPE for poly-fluorinated-poly-ether.

The related oils are marketed as FOMBLIN or KRYTOX. (used in pumps that pump oxygen)

The grease (in USA) is marketed as Braycote by Castrol. I am sure that it is suited for your application.

Have success.

RHABE

I'm not to good at this yet but i'm working at it. Thanks for the info I will look into it.

Kenn

My personal take is that Pure Oxygen is one of the most dangerous, non poisonous gases that there is, mostly due to the possible explosive effects....I believe I am right in saying that this gas has caused (well humans "cause" really) some serious accidents.....

But, when you have a bad hangover, sit down and breathe pure oxygen for say 10 minutes (it makes you quite dizzy), most if not all of your hangover is gone.......! Like magic!

You won't need a spark if you put grease on a fitting used for pure oxygen under pressure. The thing will blow up immediatly. That usually knocks the fitting off the end of the cylinder, which then becomes a flaming torpedo. I've seen some video of gas cylinders going through cinder block walls.

This is a good way to end up injured with a lot of property damage.

We have an entire audit and training program related to oxygen and hazards associated with any hydrocarbon-containing gas, liquid, cryogenic solid, etc. Think about the fire triangle: oxygen, fuel, ignition source. In a pure oxygen environment nearly everything becomes a fuel, with things like metal and dirt lighting on fire because of the atmosphere present around them. At that point, all you really need is enough of an ignition source to get it going. All of our oxygen valve stations and compressors are off-limits to people while in service due to the possibility of a spark from a collision, part failure, etc.

For handling, I would always have a dedicated set of gloves, non-sparking tools, and FRCs. Don't use any hydrocarbon containing grease, keep all flammable gases stored away from the O2 system, and rigorously clean all new piping with a specialized cleaner. If you have been handling hydrocarbons earlier and gotten splashed or otherwise exposed, don't touch the oxygen system. You also want to avoid rapid pressurization of piping and systems so probably stay away from ball valves or other devices that can just be thrown wide open.

This assumes that you are handling gaseous O2, when you say tank are you talking about cylinders or a liquid tank?

I believe you are describing a diesel engine (same theory) that's what I was told when I started in the mechanics trade as grease will combust ✴✴

After inhaling all that O2 and getting dizzy, dont try blowing out any grease fires!!

"non poisonous gases"

Sorry, Oxygen is poisonous at high enough concentrations. That is why deep sea divers use mixed air (substitute helium etc for some of the oxygen)

http://stinet.dtic.mil/oai/oai?verb=getRecord&metadataPrefix=html&identifier=AD0755472

http://www.nitrox-network.com/medizin_en.html

http://www.divingheritage.com/modernairsupplykern.htm

The reason deepsea divers mix helium is because oxygen tends to start boiling from the pressure changes when surfacing.

Too much oxygen can be intoxicating which is why jet pilots have to control their breathing while flying.

To much oxygen can make materials that aren't ordinarily flamable burn.

Our normal air mixture is about 16% to 22%. If it was any richer then that we'd have fires everywhere all the time. 22% is still pushing it for being on the rich end.

read the links...

All gases will boil on decompression

It is not the oxygen that is intoxicating but the nitrogen. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nitrogen_narcosis

When diving, every 33 feet we add 1 atmosphere of gas. Even though the mixture percentage is the same, the volume has increased. The mixed gasses displaces the oxygen to reduce the volume of oxygen which has proven to be poisonous.

You are right. The pressure of the inhaled air has to match the water pressure at the depth where the diver is. THAT makes the quantity of oxigen to be higher than necessary. I have participated, as subject, to some simulated diving sessions (in the pressurized tank). At 50 m of water I was singing and telling jokes and being as drunk as a skunk. The use of substitutes is for nitrogen that, at higher pressure, is no more diluted in the blood. When the subject comes sudenly to the normal pressure, the bubbles made by nitrogen may produce paralysis or even death. Helium is the substitute for nitrogen. At 50 m of water the concentration is no more 21% oxigen an the rest nitrogen but a much more reduced percentage of oxigen.

Summing up my and other peoples fears and knowledge in a few words to KENN:-

JUST DON'T !!

if you do,

YOU WON'T BE SHORTLY AFTERWARDS....

Terrible English, but believe me, this stuff is lethal.....only fully trained people should work on it and you needing to come onto CR4 to ask us is a real worry!!!!

I agree with Andy, stay away from it if possible.

I would worry more about someone not knowing and never asking the question when they were wondering.

The fact of the matter is, this is not a stupid question.

Not everyone works around or has had exposure to these kinds of things.

Then a person who has been limited in that respect has greasy rags to deal with and has heard something but isn't sure.

Finds himself with their house on fire because they didn't ask somebody.

Safety is no Joke, and a question dealing with safety, in never a stupid question.

thank you kenn

My impression is that this is a work situation......

thank you all for your information and support, still kinda new at this. but appreciate

all the good advice Kenn

It is always a go idead to keep a fuel source like grease away from any strong oxidizing agent (this is always a rapid , strong exothermic reaction). However, don't misconceive that pure oxygen is any more dangerous than any other strong oxidizing agent, like hydrogen peroxide. Handling is the key here, anything flammable will burn more readily in an enriched oxygen environment. Note however, pressurized tanks of oxygen are umbiquitous in our society. You will find them in every mechanics shop, welding shop, medical office, etc.. And, in all these places fuel is also ubiquitous, e.g. rags, cotton, plastics, oils, gasoline, etc.. You just need to take proper care and pay attention when handling oxygen in such environments.

It is not quite clear what you were implying here when you wrote:-

However, don't misconceive that pure oxygen is any more dangerous than any other strong oxidizing agent, like hydrogen peroxide.

Could you clear this up and please state what percentage of HP you were referring to in this statement, because a 3% solution is one thing, but a 95% is another!!!!!!

Assuming the latter, this is a very unstable mixture and I do feel that your comparison is not valid......to my mind 95% HP is even more dangerous than O....

There are rules and procedures to follow, and anyone who has to ask us about Oxygen storage on CR4 knows maybe enough to be dangerous.....

HP has also killed a lot of professionals over the years too.....in spite of the fact that very few places use it, not like Oxygen.....

I was only thinking of regular grease, because some one cautioned me. I have some small oxy tanks for emergencys. All of the information was very enlightening

For my HAZMAT course, we had a demonstration of an oxidiser near a fuel source. The petri dish had a 3 foot flame shooting out of it even without an ignition source. What they have all said is true: Even storage of an oxidizer in the vicinity of a fuel is dangerous.

That's true. You're not supposed to store oxygen any closer then 25 feet of a fuel source like acetyene. If they are closer there has to be a partition between them that won't allow gases to pass through. Oxygen will hang close to the ground when in a concentrated form unless displaced by something else like CO2. Halon absorbs oxygen.

We had a house fire several years ago. fortuenately the fire did not reach the area where I had stored my supply of medical oxygen bottles. When I told the firemen tthat there were oxygen bottles in the house they were not very excited. Things could have gotten real exciting.

That's because oxygen can get things burning that wouldn't ordinarily burn. Things like aluminum in which they would have no way of putting out once it got started.

Reminds me of:-

" When all about you are cool, but you are panicking, maybe the others did not understand the situation fully!"

A full Oxygen cylinder weighing in at about 20KG, has a similar effect in a fire to about 4KG of dynamite, a fire fighting office told me about 20 odd years ago, when I asked. Her house would not have had one brick left on another if it had exploded......

(My mother had Oxygen in her house for breathing and used to "flood" her bedroom to make it easier to sleep!!!! How she never took a quick trip to heaven nobody knows....)

A few years back our fire department had diesel generators mounted on the top of the trucks. In a compartment below and to the side of the generator, we stored medical supplies, including o2. Daily check of the equipment included opening o2 bottle to check the regulator. One day the crew was finished with the check out and was closing the roll up door when the contents of the compartment suddenly burst into flames. Almost like a slow motion explosion. The only thing we ever found, was the fumes from the diesel generator drifted down and into the compartment vent. Weather there was a spark from the roll up door or not we don't know. The door is aluminum, but there are steel rivets and brackets. it could have been a spark from the compartment switch. All we could find to do was to have all of that type truck move the medical equipment to the back of the truck.

When the Blue Angels, or Thunderbird flight teams are at a show, they use liquid oxygen. Both teams store the canisters on dirt rather than on the asphalt. I was told that if it dripped on asphalt the asphalt would burst into flames.

Be Careful.

Everything you wrote sounds absolutely "Spot On" for me......Thanks.

thanks

thank you

thanks

Make a small wood and gas fire..... add a little O2.... Burn baby burn!

You can have a bin full of steel shavings from a lathe, add oxygen and throw in a battery and you have "Burn baby Burn."

regarding the med supply compartment fire noted above, I'd be willing to bet the spark is due to static electricity from rubber rollers etc. Humans do not feel the ESD discharge until it reaches about 500V or so, but in a pure oxygen atmosphere, even a spark from 10V or less is more than enough to start the combustion process in the presence of hydrocarbons.

Silicone grease like Dow 111 is approved for oxygen system use as well.

I can't tell you how many times I've heard about people on medical oxygen burning to death because they could not give up smoking and their clothes were saturated with pure O2 when they lit up (literally).

shade tree mechanics using oxygen from a cutting torch as an air supply has caused a whole host of fires as well.

You just don't screw around with oxygen, it WILL kill you if you do.

Excellent question and posts! I can only add that I have seen a minor example myself. I have worked in 3 places that had LOX storage tanks ranging from 1 to 1000 tons. The most dangerous has been the smallest. Not that there is anything inherently dangerous about the small tanks, just a matter of inadequate training (and therefore respect of the dangers involved) in a smaller industry.

An operator was tightening the flange bolts on a leaky pressure regulator, and had his other hand resting on the flange gap. His hands were greasy from working on other things through the day, and BOOM! He was lucky. A black streak across the palm, and had to go change his shorts, but no permenant damage.

The operator quit doing mechanics work, the electrician quit smoking in the ozone generator room, and a small industry was much more open to saftey sugestions.

The "devil is in the details", watch out for the small things.

Thanks for all the great ideas kenn