White Sprit
White Spirit is a petroleum distillate used as a paint thinner and mild solvent.
White spirit is an inexpensive petroleum-based replacement for the vegetable-based turpentine. It is commonly used as a paint thinner for oil-based paint and cleaning brushes, and as an organic solvent in other applications. Mineral turpentine is chemically very different from turpentine, which mainly consists of pinene, and it has inferior solvent properties. [failed verification] Artists use white spirit as an alternative to turpentine since it is less flammable and less toxic. Because of interactions with pigments in oil paints, artists require a higher grade of white spirit than many industrial users, including the complete absence of residual sulfur
White spirit was formerly an active ingredient in the laundry soap Fels Naptha, used to dissolve oils and grease in laundry stains, and as a popular remedy for eliminating the irritant oil urushiol in poison ivy. It was removed as a potential health risk.
In 1828 Friedrich Wöhler discovered that urea can be produced from inorganic starting materials, which was an important conceptual milestone in chemistry. This showed for the first time that a substance previously known only as a byproduct of life could be synthesized in the laboratory without biological starting materials, thereby contradicting the widely held doctrine of vitalism, which stated that only living organisms could produce the chemicals of life.
White spirit has a characteristic unpleasant kerosene-like odor. Chemical manufacturers have developed a low odor version of mineral turpentine which contains less of the highly volatile shorter hydrocarbons.
Odorless mineral spirits is white spirit that has been further refined to remove the more toxic aromatic compounds, and is recommended for applications such as oil painting, where humans have close contact with the solvent.In screen printing (also referred to as silk-screening), white spirit is often used to clean and unclog screens after printing with oil-based textile and plastisol inks. It is also used to thin inks used
in making monoprints.
White spirit is often used inside liquid-filled compasses and gauges.
White spirits are a major ingredient in some popular automotive fuel/oil additives, such as Marvel Mystery Oil, as they are capable of dissolving varnish and sludge buildup.
