Sciencemadness Discussion Board

Acetone - Rust-Oleum Automotive vs Klean Strip brands

SuperOxide - 27-5-2021 at 10:39

I went to Walmart today to get some acetone. I usually get the Klean strip stuff, which according to the MSDS is 100% acetone. However the Walmart I went to was out of the Klean-Strip stuff. I knew that there was also some Rust-Oleum brand acetone in the automotive department for a few bucks more. It wasn't til I got home and looked at the MSDS that I found it's up to 25% of something else not listed in the MSDS.

Does anyone know what the extra additives may be? Is it worth using? Or should distill it? I may just return it and get the Klean-Strip stuff.
I plan on using this to extract some ASA from Aspirin, not sure if the binders/fillers may be soluble in whatever the additives are.

I broke one of my few rules - Always get the cheap stuff (regarding technical grade chemicals/reagents from OTC sources), since the more expensive products usually are more expensive because they have some additives in them, which it seems as though that's the case for Rust-Oleum acetone as well.

Newton2.0 - 27-5-2021 at 10:43

I guess what I do whenever I have doubts is distill off the acetone until it is reasonably pure and then work backwards, assuming the remainder has a higher BP and didn't get so hot pyrolysis takes place.

That is a pain, for sure.

SuperOxide - 27-5-2021 at 11:33

Quote: Originally posted by Newton2.0  
I guess what I do whenever I have doubts is distill off the acetone until it is reasonably pure and then work backwards, assuming the remainder has a higher BP and didn't get so hot pyrolysis takes place.

That is a pain, for sure.


Yeah, but since I have no idea what the unknown 0-25% is, I think it would be safe to assume that it could boil close to the BP of acetone (or even form an azeotrope). So a fractional distillation would be wise... And that wouldn't be an issue except for the vigreux column I ordered online and arrived yesterday wasn't the product I ordered, not even close :mad: I waited over a week to get the wrong darn piece of glassware... lol.

Sucks, but may just take it back. I wonder what the additives could be that make the acetone more applicable to the automotive industry?

Praxichys - 27-5-2021 at 11:54

Per HAZCOM and 29CFR 1910.1200, the remainder should be water as there are no other hazardous substances declared. That CAS only applies to pure acetone and would be different for a mixture of two flammable liquids, for instance, even if there was a trade secret involved.

I doubt there is much water in it. The 75-100% seems like a spec that allows them to bottle acetone from bulk without worrying about how wet it comes from the bulk supplier.

You can shake some over some NaCl and the water will readily separate.

SuperOxide - 27-5-2021 at 11:59

Quote: Originally posted by Praxichys  
Per HAZCOM and 29CFR 1910.1200, the remainder should be water as there are no other hazardous substances declared. That CAS only applies to pure acetone and would be different for a mixture of two flammable liquids, for instance, even if there was a trade secret involved.

I doubt there is much water in it. The 75-100% seems like a spec that allows them to bottle acetone from bulk without worrying about how wet it comes from the bulk supplier.

You can shake some over some NaCl and the water will readily separate.

Oh, hell, I can just dry it over some anhydrous magnesium sulfate, that should work too. Thanks for the input! Glad I posted this (I honestly hate waiting in the customer service line at Walmart to return stuff, lol).

P.S. That is kinda sketchy that it's $2+ extra and the additive is just water... I asked the guy that was getting it from the locked case why it was more expensive than the Klean-Strip brand acetone, and he literally said "Because it says it's for automotive... everything automotive is somehow more expensive" haha.

[Edited on 27-5-2021 by SuperOxide]

Oxy - 27-5-2021 at 12:21

I wouldn't use it as reagent or extraction solvent if I didn't know what are contaminations and if I can easily purify it before using.
Recently I bought 10 litres of acetone for glass cleaning but the smell of the liquid was terrible. There was definitely acetone there but I was unable to purify it easily by fractional distillation. The cost of labour and resources needed for further process were much more than buying different, pure product.

SuperOxide - 27-5-2021 at 14:32

Quote: Originally posted by Oxy  
I wouldn't use it as reagent or extraction solvent if I didn't know what are contaminations and if I can easily purify it before using.
Recently I bought 10 litres of acetone for glass cleaning but the smell of the liquid was terrible. There was definitely acetone there but I was unable to purify it easily by fractional distillation. The cost of labour and resources needed for further process were much more than buying different, pure product.


Well I did just dry the lot of it with some MgSO4 and didn't notice any odd smells (other than the regular acetone). I may try the ASA extraction on a small scale first though, just to be sure.

RogueRose - 28-5-2021 at 13:28

Well this sucks as I thought I had found a good source for acetone b/c a number of autopart stores have this for $14-18/gallon. I checked like 8 SDS for this rustoleum brand and they all said 75-100% but didnt mention what the other 25% could be. I'm guessing water, and I'm guessing they shoot for 100% but want to cover their asses incase it has absorbed water so if it has, they can say (we only said it was 75-100%).

I then found this:

https://www.rustoleum.com/product-catalog/industrial-brands/...
SDS for the "thinner" (100% acetone)
https://www.rustoleum.com/MSDS/ENGLISH/333402.pdf

Then I looked at like 5-6 other sites and it listed this thinner as 75-100% as well - so WTF is going on. I'd email/call Rustoleum (or tweet??) and see if you can't get an answer.

I'd suggest looking at Home Depot, Lowes, Ace or True Value. I found 100% acetone in all these places just a few months back, for good prices as well. A couple had 2-3 brands of 100% acetone and I don't think I saw any "substitutes". Many even had real MEK as they had gotten rid of the MEK substitutes (ethyl acetate) for some reason (I was told it was "more toxic" if you can believe that!!

Belowzero - 29-5-2021 at 06:54

Even so called 100% acetone often contains impurities, I always distill store bought acetone.
Most brands so far leave a slightly colored residue.

A good test would be to boil it to dryness to see if it leaves any residue, if the other unkown compound is volatile too it might be worth a try to use it as is.

SuperOxide - 29-5-2021 at 09:27

Quote: Originally posted by Belowzero  
Even so called 100% acetone often contains impurities, I always distill store bought acetone.
Most brands so far leave a slightly colored residue.


I did a quick run of the ASA extraction, and it seems to have gone alright using this acetone (after I dried it over MgSO4 for a bit).



I extracted the ASA using this acetone, then distilled over the acetone and redid the whole thing on another batch. This now makes me realize since I'm distilling the acetone now, I may as well have done it before hand, as now if there is/was anything in the acetone, I just ensured it's in the first batch of ASA. Oh well, maybe the 2nd batch will be more pure than the first? I plan on doing a recryst anyways.

Regardless, it seems to have worked well enough thus far.
Quote: Originally posted by Belowzero  
A good test would be to boil it to dryness to see if it leaves any residue, if the other unkown compound is volatile too it might be worth a try to use it as is.

I actually did that and I didn't see anything. Sometimes when I'm using acetone from fingernail polish remover it'll have some denatonium benzoate left over, which I didn't notice this time.

Additionally, I think if I wash the ASA with ice cold water at the end, then it'll get anything that was in the acetone out just fine.

[Edited on 29-5-2021 by SuperOxide]

BromicAcid - 30-5-2021 at 07:08

Take care distilling acetone to dryness, it can form unintentional peroxides if it had been handled incorrectly.

When I was much younger I distilled a 1 gallon jug of it from the Depot and ended up with several hundred mL of high boiler. It's the one experiment that had left me questioning quality of these things ever since. From that day when I used acetone I bought it from a beauty supply for use on nails.

Texium - 30-5-2021 at 07:21

Quote: Originally posted by Belowzero  
Even so called 100% acetone often contains impurities, I always distill store bought acetone.
Most brands so far leave a slightly colored residue.

A good test would be to boil it to dryness to see if it leaves any residue, if the other unkown compound is volatile too it might be worth a try to use it as is.
Well, KleanStrip acetone is, uh, pretty Klean. It’s never left any residue when boiled/evaporated in my experience.

I got a proton NMR of very similar hardware store acetone but “Crown” brand and it was perfect: https://www.sciencemadness.org/whisper/viewthread.php?tid=10...
No impurities, not even water.

SuperOxide - 30-5-2021 at 08:26

Quote: Originally posted by BromicAcid  
Take care distilling acetone to dryness, it can form unintentional peroxides if it had been handled incorrectly.
Right. For now I'm just distilling the acetone off of the ASA mixture, and I don't take it to dryness. Thanks for the heads up though.
Quote: Originally posted by BromicAcid  
When I was much younger I distilled a 1 gallon jug of it from the Depot and ended up with several hundred mL of high boiler. It's the one experiment that had left me questioning quality of these things ever since. From that day when I used acetone I bought it from a beauty supply for use on nails.
Yeah, I know what you mean. I got a gallon of toluene and processed over 1L of it to get rid of the thiophene contamination, there was a surprising amount in there.

And I do sometimes use nail polish, but I know a lot of it has denatonium benzoate in it (which is odd... do people drink acetone? nuts). So I usually only use it if I know I can wash the product with water later to get rid of that (which I can/do in this case).
Quote: Originally posted by Texium  
Well, KleanStrip acetone is, uh, pretty Klean. It’s never left any residue when boiled/evaporated in my experience.

I got a proton NMR of very similar hardware store acetone but “Crown” brand and it was perfect: https://www.sciencemadness.org/whisper/viewthread.php?tid=10...
No impurities, not even water.

That's pretty handy. Thanks for confirming it's "klean". Every time I go to Walmart lately they don't have the 1L tins of Klean Strip acetone, just the 1 gallon.. Which I may give in and just buy it (kinda low on funds until the new job is confirmed, pinchin' pennies for chemistry).

Texium - 30-5-2021 at 09:03

The gallon is worth it. It’s typically a better deal, and you’ll definitely use it. I went through about 1/year when I was actively doing home chem.

zed - 5-6-2021 at 10:47

Acetone produced by fermentation, may leave behind some oily residues when distilled.

Not the most common route for producing Acetone nowadays.

Though perhaps fermentation has come into vogue again.

[Edited on 5-6-2021 by zed]

[Edited on 5-6-2021 by zed]