Reminder about safety (not firearms related)

[Seanpcola]

Pulled a stupid one last night. Could have been much worse but caught it in time. Posting this to remind everyone to think things through, slow down and be safe.

I absolutely know better than to do what i did but I was tired and doing too many things at once.

Yesterday I pressure washed the front porch on my house. The floor is some type of Asian hardwood, made into one foot squares. It requires oiling about once a year with boiled linseed oil.

So, I wash it, let it dry all day and yesterday evening got some rags, a can of BLO, dropped down on my knees and started applying. Do a section, let it soak, come back and mop up the excess. I worked back to the front door, finished up and carried everything into the kitchen and started cleaning up the mess. I threw the oil soaked rags on top of the garbage can planning to carry them out back when I finished washing my hands and spread them out to dry before chunking them.

Totally got sidetracked and forgot all about them. Went on to bed about 10:00 and crashed hard.

Momma comes homefrom work about 11:30, rushes upstairs, shakes me awake and says something is burning downstairs. As soon as I hit the top of the stairs I smelled it and knew what happened. Flew downstairs, grabbed the garbage can and chunked it into the yard.

One slightly smoked up house smelling of linseed oil, burned plastic,.styrofoam and kitchen garbage. Oh, and one mildly irritated wife.:rant:

Stupid, stupid, stupid. Did I mention stupid?

 

[FrankT]

where is that LIKE button?

 

[gendoc]

glad yall are safe.......sidetrack'n can happen when your multi-task'n....
thanks for the insight...again, we are glad yall are safe !!!!:rockon:

 

[Seanpcola]

Ain't gonna tell my dear old dad about this one. Besides being a chemist and pushing chemical.safety at me all the time he was an amatuer woodworker and threatened to make me eat any staining or oily rags I didn't dispose of properly. He's 84 and I'm pretty sure he can still make that threat happen.

 

[Champ62]

Yep, you are real lucky. Glad all are safe. Give your wife a big hug and get ready to hear about it for years to come.

 

[Seanpcola]

Ahhh, momma ain't that way. If she was she would have plenty of other stupid crap to complain about. Went to Wally World today and replaced the kitchen garbage can cuz "it was the only one she could find the right color".

 

[Snow Bird]

I have read about that my whole life but you are the first person I have known of it happening to. Glad you are safe. Fire Dector????

 

[Welldoya]

What ignited the rags or was it a spontaneous combustion type of thing?

 

[Seanpcola]

Linseed oil is refined and is basically a polymer. It cures through a combination of drying and cross linking, pretty much the same way as epoxy and polyester resin. This creates heat. Problem is that if its in an enclosed area, no ventilation or cooling it exotherms, a fancy term for "the hotter it gets, the faster it cures, the faster it cures the hotter it gets, on and on".

A good example is epoxy. If you mix a quantity of it you better use it pronto and not let it sit in a container. When I mix, say a cupful or more, and the project I'm working on is going to take a while then I'll mix it in a cup, then pour that into a disposable plate. That way it has a large surface area exposed to air where it'll stay cool plus its shallow versus deep in a cup. It lengthens the working time plusnit doesn't light off in the shop.

You guys that aren't familiar with this remember if you ever use 2 part floor epoxy (like garage floor paint). Just mix as much as you can spread in a reasonable time and get it spread quickly. My step son is a commercial painter and they mix 5 or more gallons at a time. When it ready they dump it on the floor fast and get it spread out immediately,,

 

[Seanpcola]

Good point Bird. We have smoke detectors but they didn't go off. It wasn't a heavy smoke, more fumey (is that a word?). I'm gonna check with the mfr as to why they didnt alarm. I have a different style detector in the kitchen that I think doesn't arm unless the security system is on. I left it off since momma was due home. Need to think about that.

 

[Seanpcola]

Anxiously awaiting Rick (shootnstarz) to.see this and call "Dumbass on the play".

 

[JohnAL]

Could be that it was fumes instead of smoke. Are the rags charred? I did this once with fiberglass epoxy. Too much too thick in one place on a 95 degree day. There was never any fire. Hot enough to take the skin off though.

 

[Seanpcola]

It generated open flames. Lots of burned and blackened garbage.

John, I've had a cup of epoxy produce flames on a few occasions. You're right, a hot day only makes it worse.

 

[shootnstarz]

Anxiously awaiting Rick (shootnstarz) to.see this and call "Dumbass on the play".

You don't hold the patent for doing something stupid, like soldering a carb float with a propane torch a bit too close to a gas soaked rag. I am amazed how well those dry chemical extinguishers work.

Rick

 

[Seanpcola]

Well, thank you Rick, figured the ass chewing would come due my using wood finishing products improperly.:sad:

Yep, you can start a fire easier than falling off a log. Funny one was watching a guy machining magnesium and smoking a cigar. Try putting that one out.

 

[donr101395]

We all do stupid stuff from time to time. I almost burned a building down once welding a steel step and didn't realize some had stored a bunch Styrofoam inserts for pelican cases under the steps. Should have checked bit it was late and I was tired.

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk

 

[shootnstarz]

I too have always heard about linseed oil rags spontaneously combusting but you're the first one I know it happened to. I used to do my stocks in it and could always see it smoking/vaporizing when the barrels heated up. Started using teak oil, as the US military switched to from BLO.

Rick

 

[Seanpcola]

It stands to reason that if it could happen I would be the one to.set the bar.

It took a while. I threw those rags in the can around 7:00PM. Momma came in around 11:30 and it was just then starting to really cook. I remember now going to bed and sort of smelling it but I had it all over me by the time I was done, had taken a long shower and I guess I thought it was just lingering in my nose.