contact cleaner vs. isopropanol 99%

[tempus]

Hey all;

Is  99% isopropanol as good a cleaner for electrical contacts and pots as a contact cleaner like DeOxit? Any advantages/disadvantages to either?

Thanks

[R.G.]

Is  99% isopropanol as good a cleaner for electrical contacts and pots as a contact cleaner like DeOxit?

No, unless your contact-dirt happens to be stuff that 99% IPA directly dissolves. You get a reasonable chance here, as IPA does dissolve many kinds of crud, but unfortunately, not all. The better cleaners usually have more than one solvent, to dissolve more than one kind of crud. Some of the kinds of crud are metal oxides, and impervious to IPA. Many of the specific contact cleaners include some form of oxide dissolver.

Then there's any residual coatings left. 99% IPA leaves nothing; it all evaporates. Many of the special contact cleaners leave a thin layer of low-film-strength oil. The oil film is not strong enough to keep the metal contacts apart, but it is sufficient to retard oxygen getting to the contact surfaces.

Any advantages/disadvantages to either?

Pro: IPA is very cheap.
Pro: IPA does do some cleaning for you. Might be OK.
Pro: IPA doesn't attack most electronic plastics and metals.
Con: IPA has limits and doesn't clean off everything.
Con: 99% IPA cannot exist in a container open to the air. It sucks water out of the air until it gets down to the equilibrium point of about ... um?.... 79% IPA - something like that. Presumably you paid extra for the "99%", so you'll have to work at keeping it dry.
Con: IPA leaves no sealing layer to hold out oxygen or lubricate away fretting.

Deoxit is about the reverse on all items except the sucking water out of the air.

[tempus]

OK thanks RG. While we're on the topic, are there any other contact cleaners that you'd recommend? As good as or better than DeOxit? One of the reasons I'm asking is because I have a little bit of NuTrol left in a can, so it will need to be replaced soon. I'm not sure how it ranks compared to DeOxit, or DeOxit to other cleaners.

[njkmonty]

coming from Australia the "deoxit" brand is practically non visiable. 
Can anyone suggest the right one to purchase for cleaning scratchy amp pots etc .

https://www.cedist.com/search/node/deoxit

when i look online there are so many different types??    what do you lot use??

[Jdansti]

FYI-99% IPA is relatively safe, but can cause skin irritation. I once used some without gloves because after all, it's just IPA. It thoroughly removed the oils and moisture not only from the surface of my skin, but seemed to do so just beneath the skin too. I was left with extremely dry and irritated skin until the next day. It's probably not a problem for minor exposures, but prolonged contact with your skin might be a little unpleasant.

[amptramp]

Some of the contact cleaners contain hexane.  This is a paraffin that is used to make rubber tacky (the active component in fan belt spray), so if you have any rubber parts, beware - this will soften them.  It is also flammable.

The ones I use contain chlorinated hydrocarbons and these tend to do the job.  I am currently using Lloyd's Kleens-It which has tetrachloroethylene and carbon dioxide (propellant).  It may also not be compatible with rubber but it is compatible with most plastics except styrene.  Chlorinated hydrocarbons are generally non-flammable.

Deoxit used to contain oleic acid that would eat away oxidation and provide a clean surface but the latest formulations do not appear to have this.

[blackieNYC]

Do you have " LPS-1 "?
A simple lubricant, plastic safe. Works very well.
Do note, it's tried and tested, and it is not Wd40.  Don't go trying other stuff that isn't specifically recommended.

[anotherjim]

I was going to buy some De-oxit, but in the UK it is too expensive (I think) for the job. I read of people routinely and regularly cleaning all their jacks/plugs etc with De-oxit and can only imagine they get it cheaper than I've seen or have very deep pockets.

Good old Servisol for me. It's been around for ages, still does the job. Or Electrolube if you prefer, of similar provenance.
Tip, if you need some abrasion, cut strips of plain card and soak in the cleaner - rub the card against the contact surface. Electrolube actually sell packs of pre-soaked card strips.

Having seen WD-40 rot certain kinds of insulation, I wouldn't let it near anything important. The lube it leaves is also sticky and attracts more crud.

Probably a good solvent is going to attack something you don't want dissolving.

I have a can of contact cleaning solvent (some industrial brand I don't remember) that turns black ABS plastic white. Is it attacking only the pigment?

Hear about the guy who invented a universal solvent but couldn't find anything to keep it in?

[Mark Hammer]

I don't know if it is now part of inventory outside of Canada (where it comes from), but the latest flyer from Active Tech ( http://www.active123.com/# ) shows that they now carry Stabilant 22A (diluted).  Not cheap at all ($44.80Cdn in the flyer for 15ml), but truly remarkable stuff.  Several pro repair benches have indicated that their preferred "one-two punch" is to clean with DeOxit and then enhance with Stabilant.  My Stabilant supply is rapidly running out (I gave too much away to friends as gifts), but what I like to do is apply it to any new pots coming in that I expect to have high use, since it remains viscous and as such can compensate somewhat for the more abrasive wipers on cheaper/smaller pots.  At least some of what people try to clean out in noisy pots is residue scraped off the resistive strip by poorer-quality wipers.  So if one can make those wipers less abrasive, so much the better.

[R.G.]

Yep.

Let me add a very clear warning. WD40 is for rusty gate hinges, not electronics, and even on the rusty gate hinges, a good automotive penetrating oil is better.   

[tempus]

I don't know where the idea that WD40 is contact cleaner came from, but I would never even consider using it for that purpose. I heard somewhere that the WD in WD40 is short for "water displacer". It's the type of thing you spray on lawnmower or hedge trimmer blades to help prevent rust.

[Mark Hammer]

When I went in for a second angioplasty in 2000, as they wheeled me into the surgical suite, I saw a can of WD40 sitting on the counter, with the thin red spray tube protruding.  Angioplasties themselves involve the insertion of a long thin tube into major blood vessels, so that another even thinner tube can be snaked along inside it to the point/s where blockages are located.  So, seeing the can with its own thin tube sitting there, my first (drugged) thought was "WD40.  Is there anything it can't fix?". 

[Jdansti]

I know people spray WD-40 on their joints and swear it helps their arthritis. I think it affects their brain!

[Kingmafw]

I can recommend Tuner 600 from Kontakt Chemie. In the USA also known under the brand CRC Industries.

http://www.kontaktchemie.com/KOC/KOCproductdetail.csp?product=TUNER%20600

Especially for potentiometers and other sensitive electronic surfaces.

List of ingredients:
pentane   
hydrocarbons,C6,isoalkanes,< 5% n-hexane   
carbon dioxide

[amptramp]

I can recommend Tuner 600 from Kontakt Chemie. In the USA also known under the brand CRC Industries.

http://www.kontaktchemie.com/KOC/KOCproductdetail.csp?product=TUNER%20600

Especially for potentiometers and other sensitive electronic surfaces.

List of ingredients:
pentane   
hydrocarbons,C6,isoalkanes,< 5% n-hexane   
carbon dioxide

The pentane, hexane and hydrocarbons are all flammable and may not be suitable for some plastics or any isoprene (normal) rubber (but it would work with neoprene).

[blackieNYC]

After some binding agents that were used in a beloved cleaner-slash-lubricant were made illegal, the collective wisdom in my studio-tech circles back in the day was that lubricant was was the most important and never cleaner alone for pots and switches. You didn't want to expose those contacts, and the lube acts as RG states above. And as I recall, if we were using a cleaner and a lubricant, we were careful to allow the cleaner to evaporate before lubing.  The lube was called "Mistoil" (no longer around) which we sprayed into a dripper bottle with a needle thin schnozzle (still do) and the cleaner was an aerosol that I don't remember.
My last can of the illegal stuff I used very sparingly, knowing no one could get it anymore. Just little quick blasts. And thusly I used up all the propellent much faster than the cleaner and ended up with a very full but very useless can of the good stuff.  So don't do that.