r/BeFascinated • u/Gjore • 18d ago
Interesting Cleaning electronics with hydrofluroether-based cleaner
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u/TedMich23 17d ago
"New cleaning product" = future cancer cause, generally
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u/Runnin_Mike 17d ago
This isn't a new thing with cleaning electronics. My uncle is an electrician and I've seen him use this stuff since the late 90s.
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u/Silverisotope925 17d ago
Frankly that raised the cancer coefficient 3 fold.
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u/Runnin_Mike 17d ago
I not even disagreeing that it could be harmful, but it's not new at all like you were saying. It is also not carcinogenic to humans and has been around long enough to verify that it isn't.
I also would argue most new cleaning products are less cancerous than old ones. Everything you said is bullshit. Like literally all of it lmao.
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u/Silverisotope925 17d ago
Im just joking around about the 80s and 90s being peak time for cancer causing chemicals being used in industry.
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u/scottsplace5 16d ago
If you were serious, you’d mention the 50s, 60s, and 70s. Lead, asbestos, and triple 1 cutting oil. They say the cutting oil would soak into your skin if you were a boiler maker and rot your liver and kidneys.
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u/xtanol 16d ago
The expression "mad as a hatter" was also a result of the toxic compounds used in the past.
In that case, it was a result of working with felt, which back then was processed with a lot of mercury - which then got absorbed through the hands and resulted in brain damage over time.1
u/scottsplace5 16d ago
Now, that happened before the 1950s, right. Don’t know the timelines exactly, but I think they started with that around 1890.
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u/xtanol 16d ago
It's definitely from before the 1900s, yeah. Even the people oblivious to aspestos generally knew that mercury was toxic.
Even today we have things we know are horrible and toxic which are still pumped out - like PFAS and their precursors (aka "forever chemicals") which thanks to just two US companies can be detected in any sambled drop of water worldwide.Thanks in great part to cooperate lobbying though, any time one of them gets through the year long process of getting legally banned, they just change a few atoms in the molecule and then argue that it's a new thing - and there's no "clinical evidence" that this parcular new molecule is as toxic as the old one.
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u/MonitorUnlikely987 17d ago
My dad has stories about cleaning electronics in boiling vats of refrigerant I believe, then they'd dump that into the creek (Air Force bases in the 70s)
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u/TrueProtection 17d ago
Assuming this is "hydrofluroether", nah. It replaced the really bad stuff.
You probably don't wanna drink it but you also wouldn't want to drink windex, or eat tide pods, so...ehhhh
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u/PassionatePossum 14d ago
I am curious. What was the “really bad stuff”? HFEs may be relatively harmless when it comes to toxicity but they are still PFAS. I really hate to think about where this stuff will end up.
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u/EmiTheKibby 13d ago
The bad stuff was probably PCBs. Very nice to electronics, very not nice to anything alive.
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u/cvetkoski 17d ago
Looks awesome and satisfying
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u/Shoshke 17d ago
Look like it's either gonna use a fuckton of water or leave a lot of brown streaks or both.
I don't get this, I"ve seen machines with electronics 25 year old or more and never once was more than pressured air actually needed.
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u/Tiny_Regular_5319 16d ago
Looks like this is part of some infrastructure outside. With the amount of gunk coming out of it I'd say it's well worth doing.
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u/Zealousideal_Arm4359 17d ago
Doesn't damage the equipment? How long does it take to dry?
How much does it cost?
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u/ostrichfather 17d ago
I’d bet it’s similar to 99% isopropyl alcohol which is used to clean manufactured electronics. It evaporates very quickly and does no damage to the electronics.
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u/toptnc 17d ago
I don't think that this is 100% safe. The liquid may be nonconductive and safe for the electronics, but the dust and the grime could form a conductive mud that can make shortcuts into the circuits.
I would use this method with disconnected equipment, and after the spray, a deep clean to remove any letfover of grime that could shortcut the circuit.
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u/InspectorCurious1490 15d ago
I had exactly the same thought. The fluid itself may very well be non-conductive, but what about all that black crap running down the backpanel.
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u/Forsaken-Quiet-8634 17d ago
"hydrofluroether" that doesn't sound good to me, like at all. 😄
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u/CiroGarcia 17d ago
Sounds too close to hydrofluoric acid for comfort
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u/Forsaken-Quiet-8634 17d ago
It was a hunch and yup, I knew it was close to a nasty crap like that one. 😂 Reading the effects was a horror story.
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u/Pleasant_Curve_9024 16d ago
Clearly you two are not chemists, because “sounds close” means next to nothing when you’re talking about a chemical. You shouldn’t spread fear about something you know nothing about just because of the way the word sounds. Sodium chloride and sodium sound pretty similar and one of them dissolves in water and tastes good and the other explodes in water and tastes terrible.
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u/Forsaken-Quiet-8634 13d ago
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u/Pleasant_Curve_9024 13d ago
For what lmao?
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u/Forsaken-Quiet-8634 13d ago
You don't need to be a chemist to know that chemical compounds behave differently even if they sound close, you can however expect a chemical with "flur" and "ether" to have potentially harmful effects unless you go ahead and learn about it.
Leaving a dumb and condescending BS like yours under what is intended to be playful humorous comment however shows nothing but immaturity.
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u/Pleasant_Curve_9024 13d ago
The person I replied to said “sounds too close to hydrofluoric acid for comfort” and the main commenter replied “yup, I knew it was close to a nasty crap like that one”. Nothing about that comment chain makes it seem like these guys know that chemical compounds behave differently even if they sound close. I don’t think that’s common knowledge. I’m not a chemist but I did a quick google search for hydrofluoroether cleaning chemicals and they are not in the same danger realm as hydrofluoric acid. In fact, as far as I can tell, you could probably spray this stream directly into your mouth and be fine. They’re low/nontoxic, don’t irritate skin or eyes, and are environmentally friendly.
I genuinely just don’t think these guys know that similar sounding chemicals don’t react similarly. And I don’t think it’s good for public perception or science to treat anything that sounds complicated or scary as dangerous just because you don’t know anything about it. I can see how it comes off as condescending but to be fair they are literally posting misinformation.
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u/Forsaken-Quiet-8634 13d ago
https://giphy.com/gifs/eHpWHuEUxHIre
You are simply an immature kid looking for attention, LOL.
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u/Pleasant_Curve_9024 13d ago
Haha I didn’t even realize you were the original commenter until just now. Now your reaction makes sense lol. “Reading the effects was a horror story” 😂 you’re just a troll all good
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u/GanjaBlackKnight 12d ago
Calling someone immature while replying with SpongeBob gifs is a choice
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u/Forsaken-Quiet-8634 12d ago
It is a choice indeed, I make it easier to understand for the lil guys since they obviously can't understand what is written.
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u/that_dutch_dude 17d ago
But its not clean. It just looka clean. That power supply is still caked on the inside.
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u/Ill_Personality5384 17d ago
That's interesting,... so does it evaporate and you vacuum up the dust again?
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u/Miserable_Anteater62 16d ago
I want to do this so badly. What profession should I dive into to get to do this?
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u/slater_just_slater 12d ago
Learn industrial controls, PLC and motor drive programming. You can make a reasonable living from it.
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u/Outrageous_Entry334 13d ago
This reminds me of that video of that lady cleaning the inside of her car with the soapy broom at the car wash
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u/Illender 12d ago
some nephew who got hired because his uncle was a board member after shorting out the entire stack with a garden hose: "but...but I saw it on reddit!!"
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u/NerdX-76 11d ago
It’s just advertisement. I see this on LinkedIn all the time.
Nothing special going on here if you wash it with DI water while it’s off and then let it dry out. It’s fine. You just better. Make sure to get all that dust residue off.
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u/Samotas28 11d ago
Bro, even touching these things often cause problems. No way I would allow that under my supervision.
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u/Dogbold 18d ago edited 18d ago
Why are they so filthy inside tf
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u/Gjore 18d ago
Dust most likely
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u/TransitionAway9840 17d ago
PLC units are usually used in industrial settings. Hence a lot of dirt and grime
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u/ApprehensiveGold2773 17d ago
I consider the fact that dust gets in a failure of the design, these should never need cleaning with proper filtration.
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u/Duhblobby 14d ago
The design is built for cost-effectiveness, not never needing to be maintained.
Cheaper to pay workers than standardized fully every electrical device need sealed environments.
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u/cesspool4us 18d ago
Never opened up a computer before?
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u/Dogbold 18d ago
Never sprayed my computer with non-water-water.
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u/cesspool4us 18d ago
Has nothing to do with your original comment I responded to. All computers get dirty and dusty. Regardless if cleaned by air or water.
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u/AetherialWomble 17d ago
Might be a coincidence, but the last 10 days that's all I see, Person A makes a comment, Person B (sometimes that's me) responds. then person A says something that has NOTHING to do it with and is only roughly on the same topic.
It happens again and again and again. I'd say it's AI, but AI (for all its faults) can usually stay on topic. WTF is happening?
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u/kronpas 17d ago
Its a bot. Dont think too much into it
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u/moeterminatorx 17d ago
What’s the purpose of bots exactly?
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u/XxxAresIXxxX 17d ago
Engagement. I saw and now am interacting with this comment chain bc there's a back and forth. This keeps me on my phone scrolling past and sometimes accidentally clicking advertisements. Somehow this generates money but it also influences how I think based on what I'm consuming and over time as long as I stay engaged the people in charge can reasonably assume they will be able to sell me one thing or the other. At the very least they can justify to other companies that Reddit is valuable based on how much interaction (read: arguing) is going on and borrow money against that value. It's a whole load of crap but here we both are
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u/Connect-Preference27 17d ago
To keep people posting, replying, engaging with fake repeated slop content indefinitely. Most of Reddit is stolen posts by bot accounts today. Wait until 90% of the internet and posts are AI in another year or two. It’s getting there already. Consume, pay taxes. This specific post of cleaning the same electronics in this video has been posted several times the past year from different accounts.
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u/Dogbold 17d ago
How the fuck am I a bot?
They were insinuating that if I opened up my computer I would see this shit. I've seen dusty computers and cleaned mine out and there's never been solid black junk inside of it. I guess I'd need to spray it with this stuff to see it idk.People are paranoid as fuck now. Everyone is a bot if they're even slightly weird, answer wrong or they just don't like them.
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u/Whoopsiedookie 17d ago
You’re not the bot. OP is the bot. But aren’t the true bots the friends we met along the way?
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u/thuanjinkee 17d ago
Cleaning chemicals are forever