Dan Thomas
Touchdown! Greaser!
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Dan Thomas
Oleic acid is an 18 carbon carboxylic acid- I don't suppose you'd believe me if I told you it acted as a wax. The only reason it's soluble at all is because of the ammonia.
http://www.flitz.com/images/document/MSDS_Flitz Polish_PASTE.pdf
Isn't oleic acid what gives Crayola crayons their classic odor? And we give them to children to play with! Acid!
Vinegar is acetic acid. 5%. We put it on our food. Phosphoric acid is found in cola drinks; we drink that, too, though it's known to cause health issues if too much is consumed.
I really can't figure out who is having so much trouble with Aeroshell 15W50 in Lycomings. Certainly the Aviation Consumer guys have never mentioned it. We sure never did, and flight school airplanes get abused much. The corrosion I have seen was in engines that were flown infrequently and on short flights (including in my own A-65, and that was before I ever used 15W50m in it). Under such conditions blowby water isn't boiled off and it has lots of time to form acids in the case, and those are the acids that eat the engine. The hydrogen and oxygen from water molecules react with sulfur, chlorine and nitrogen compounds in the oil to form sulfuric, hydrochloric and nitric acids, as I understand it. The dissimilar metals of the engine are a catalyst or offer electrolytic stimulation of some sort to the formation of nasty compounds.
Dan