Ed’s Red mixing problem

[Cosmic_Charlie]

Interesting that the best penetrating oil is ATF and acetone. I mixed up a big batch of Ed's Red a while back and it is indeed a great solvent. Think i have a quart of it in a large Hoppes bottle.

[mdi]

I don’t qualify as anti-environment but I try to avoid all environmentally improved formulae. They never work as well as the old stuff. Looking for kerosene now. It’s not a high demand product in our area.

Agree. I worked as a mechanic/electrician for a large city utilities department and they had a whole group that worked at keeping us "environmentally friendly". When I started in '87 we used chlorinated brake clean in 55 gallon barrels. We used 2 qt pneumatic spray cans and it did a very good job of removing grease/oil from construction equipment. Someone decided the brake clean was not environmentally friendly and would kill anyone that came within 20 feet of an open container(sarcasm). All brake clean was collected from 14 shops and disposed of. Replaced with a white liquid that was "safe to use" but did a very poor job, just plain didn't work. Battery acid was collected and put under lock and key. The solvent sinks were cleaned and replaced with a "green" liquid that also was worthless. This group of politically correct environmentally correct activists made 60 mechanics' jobs much harder and waaaay less efficient adding quite a bit of extra time and work, but we were "safe"!

[1hole]

All ATF's are excellent light oils suitable for fine machinery; no Automatic Transmission Fluid (ATF) is "water based." All ATF's are synthetic oils and all should dilute nicely with thin petroleum oils such as Paint Thinner, Acetone, Kerosene, etc. Ed's Red gun oil is an excellent but noncritical mixture of light lubes added to ATF. Put in or leave out any parts of it as you wish.

I've happily used a simple and low cost 50/50 mixture of ATF and Odorless (Mineral Spirits) Paint Thinner (both from Walmart). It makes an excellent slow drying, non-gumming, deep penetrating and surprisingly rust resistant light oil ideal for sewing machines, typewriters, fishing reels, door hinges, electric motors and fire arms for decades. And, without Ed's Acetone, it's harmless to most plastics and gun finishes.

Alcohol/nitro fuels include castor oil as a 2 stroke lube for tiny model motors; castor works great for that purpose. But, as an addition to a homemade gun oil mixture, nitro/castor fuel is expensive, it turns gummy/sticky as it dries, it stinks, it's hard to get off fingers and it doesn't seem to do anything my simpler & much cheeper mixture doesn't do better.

IMHO.

[David2011]

All ATF's are excellent light oils suitable for fine machinery; no Automatic Transmission Fluid (ATF) is "water based." All ATF's are synthetic oils and all should dilute nicely with thin petroleum oils such as Paint Thinner, Acetone, Kerosene, etc. Ed's Red gun oil is an excellent but noncritical mixture of light lubes added to ATF. Put in or leave out any parts of it as you wish.

I've happily used a simple and low cost 50/50 mixture of ATF and Odorless (Mineral Spirits) Paint Thinner (both from Walmart). It makes an excellent slow drying, non-gumming, deep penetrating and surprisingly rust resistant light oil ideal for sewing machines, typewriters, fishing reels, door hinges, electric motors and fire arms for decades. And, without Ed's Acetone, it's harmless to most plastics and gun finishes.

Alcohol/nitro fuels include castor oil as a 2 stroke lube for tiny model motors; castor works great for that purpose. But, as an addition to a homemade gun oil mixture, nitro/castor fuel is expensive, it turns gummy/sticky as it dries, it stinks, it's hard to get off fingers and it doesn't seem to do anything my simpler & much cheeper mixture doesn't do better.

IMHO.

I have proven to myself that all ATFs are not the same. I found a bottle intended for 2006 and earlier vehicles that blended easily with mineral spirits alone and acetone alone. Mixing order didn’t matter.

Mineral spirits is my favorite solvent for most glue/greasy cleaning jobs. I used to keep a bottle on my desk for cleaning old self-adhesive labels from computers. Trying to be considerate of others, I bought the considerably more expensive “odorless” mineral spirits and found the odor to be much stronger than what I had been using.

SOME glow fuel contains castor oil but not all. It smells great when used in glow engines and is superior to synthetics at high temperatures. No idea why anyone would use castor on guns. That wasn’t mentioned as far as I recall.

These are not the “tiny” Cox .049 engines. I have several that are 1.2 cubic inches or larger and weigh 2 pounds or more. Sure, little compared to automotive engines but big enough to use a 1/4” drive socket set on them. They fly airplanes in the 10 to 20 pound range.

[popper]

ATF is a soap that lubricates and cleans. My bottle was the oreillys cheap dextron stuff (probably recycled). Need to get another quart, getting to the bottom of the plastic coke bottle of ed's red.

[1hole]

I have proven to myself that all ATFs are not the same.

Not all ATFs are "the same" but the differences seem to be in their automotive use. I don't believe those differences matter a bit when we thin it and then use it for a light gun/reel oil.

SOME glow fuel contains castor oil but not all. ... No idea why anyone would use castor on guns. That wasn’t mentioned as far as I recall.

Someone mentioned (expensive) model "nitro" fuels as an additive to home mix gun oil; its only helpful ingredient as a gun lube is castor oil.

These are not the “tiny” Cox .049 engines.

"Tiny" .049s? I once had several Babe Bees plus one Cox .020 and a friend had a Cox .010; those were marvelous little devices! The really small motors weren't much good for anything but they were fun to play with! Most of my nitro motors were Fox .35 and .40; loved 'em all, especially those screaming ball-bearing Combat Specials!

Largest little motor I ever had was a McCoy .60; never learned to love it. That was in finger cranking days and the .60 was big enough to be painfully HARD on the fingers when it back-fired! (Which was often.)

Sadly, the hobby of making and flying model aircraft is nearly as dead as home shop gunsmithing is today.

As a group, modern kids have missed a LOT of practical learning and loads of clean fun in exchange for developing well muscled thumbs while mentally existing in the nebulous fog of the web.

[hoodat]

It seems to me that Coleman fuel should be one of the ingredients in Ed's. No science involved in my opinion, I just like the stuff. jd

[1hole]

It seems to me that Coleman fuel should be one of the ingredients in Ed's. No science involved in my opinion, I just like the stuff. jd

Well, as I understand it, Coleman fuel is simply "white" gasoline devoid of any additives for use in autos. That means it's highly volatile but it should work as well as any other petroleum solvent mixed with ATF and used as a gun oil.

[gwpercle]

Walmart was out of ATF. UNBELIEVABLE! I found some older style ATF and as you said, it solved the problem and blended perfectly.

David2011 , So you proved that ...The Synthetic ATF ... is the problem ...
And the Conventional ATF does indeed mix with the other 3 ingredients ... ...That's Awesome !
Now , At least one other person believes me !

Gary

[David2011]

Not all ATFs are "the same" but the differences seem to be in their automotive use. I don't believe those differences matter a bit when we thin it and then use it for a light gun/reel oil.



Someone mentioned (expensive) model "nitro" fuels as an additive to home mix gun oil; its only helpful ingredient as a gun lube is castor oil.





"Tiny" .049s? I once had several Babe Bees plus one Cox .020 and a friend had a Cox .010; those were marvelous little devices! The really small motors weren't much good for anything but they were fun to play with! Most of my nitro motors were Fox .35 and .40; loved 'em all, especially those screaming ball-bearing Combat Specials!

Largest little motor I ever had was a McCoy .60; never learned to love it. That was in finger cranking days and the .60 was big enough to be painfully HARD on the fingers when it back-fired! (Which was often.)

Sadly, the hobby of making and flying model aircraft is nearly as dead as home shop gunsmithing is today.

As a group, modern kids have missed a LOT of practical learning and loads of clean fun in exchange for developing well muscled thumbs while mentally existing in the nebulous fog of the web.

Problem is, the first ATF I tried would not thin with acetone. It looked like cooking oil and water. Used straight, any ATF should be a good gun lube. I’ve known lots of people that lubed high end competition guns with ATF but those guns are cleaned after every match. The low viscosity keeps the slide moving fast.

Can’t imagine lubing a gun with glow fuel. It becomes corrosive over time. The methanol is hygroscopic and the nitromethane will rust steel. I mentioned the .049 because more people would be likely to know what they are. I have an .020 and yes, it is much smaller. I live in an area that’s an RC Mecca. There’s still a huge amount of activity and lots of building. One group of guys are building a 17 foot span B-17. It has almost 200,000 simulated rivets. This area has been known for decades for the truly giant RC airplanes. There is also an influx of the fully factory built electric powered foam planes but I prefer to fly what I build.

It seems to me that Coleman fuel should be one of the ingredients in Ed's. No science involved in my opinion, I just like the stuff. jd

That sounds like a really good idea to use as a solvent. I think the main ingredient in Coleman fuel is naphtha.

David2011 , So you proved that ...The Synthetic ATF ... is the problem ...
And the Conventional ATF does indeed mix with the other 3 ingredients ... ...That's Awesome !
Now , At least one other person believes me !

Gary

Yes, there is no doubt in my mind that some ATFs are immiscible with mineral spirits and acetone. Over the course of this attempt I also learned that for freeing up the engines a mix of acetone and mineral spirits alone works very well. It’s also good for degreasing the small machine screws.

[jonp]

Im using Valvoline Universal synthetic in all my vehicles. It seems to blend fine in both Ed's with no acetone which i leave out (K/atf/mineral spirits) and in 50/50 with acetone for penetrating fluid