Talk:Turpentine

Questions

1. What is "mineral" turpentine?
2. What are the consequences of turpentine poisoning?

This is from http://www.mst.dk/udgiv/publications/2005/87-7614-644-8/html/kap06_eng.htm

Used as extraction liquid, cleaning liquid, degreasing product and as solvent in a number of product types, including paint.

1. Mineral turpentine is a complex mixture of substances defined as: ”Low-boiling unspecified naphtha – A colourless, refined raw oil distillate free of rancid or repellent odours, with a boiling point interval of approximately from 149°C to 204°C”.

Mineral turpentine is thus a mixture of branched and equal-chained paraffins, naphthans and alkyl aromatic carbonhydrids.

As it is a complex mixture it is not possible to state an exact molecular weight or an unambiguous molecular structure.

Mineral turpentine (stoddard solvent) is a clear liquid with a characteristic odour.

1. Mineral turpentine shows acute, narcotic effects on the central nervous system {12}. Inhalation of vapours leads to headache, dizziness, intoxication and seisures. At very high concentrations there may be fainting and death {1}.

Symptoms after inhalation includes effects on the central nervous system from slight discomfort such as dizziness and headache to reduced performance in neuro-phsycological tests. In serious cases, chronic brain damage has been diagnosed {1}.

-- FirstPrinciples 13:28, Dec 16, 2004 (UTC)

1. "mineral" turpentine would be turpentine substitute - I'll set up some redirects.
2. Not too sure, but it is easy enough to find Hazchem data for turpentine, such as half way down this link or [1]. Most search results will be for mineral turpentine, so check that you are looking at the right data sheet.

The general summary would seem to be: inhaled in large quantities - can cause inflamation of the throat and lungs and is likely to cause dizziness, drowsiness and nausea. If swallowed - its likely to also cause vomiting and diarrhoea and can get coughed into the lungs, in which it is likely to cause severe lung damage leading to pulmonary edema. -- Solipsist 14:48, 16 Dec 2004 (UTC)

1. How to safely dispose of turpentine?

Bold on redirects

Hi MPF - I just noticed your un-bolding on turpentine. Its actually in the Wiki manual of style that alternative names for an article should be in bold. I think there is a better reference somewhere, specifically relating to en-bolding words from REDIRECT links (but I can't find it just now). I put the bolds in after creating a bunch of redirects this afternoon, following a comment on the talk page. On the other hand, I'm conflicted, as I would also agree that it gives these less common names undue emphasis. -- Solipsist 20:30, 16 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Hi Solipsist - my feeling is make them bold if there's just one or two major alternative names, but when there's several similar ones as in this case (and all derivatives of the main name), then making them all bold clutters things up a bit too much. - MPF 21:10, 16 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I'm tempted to agree. Its a combination of this being a fairly short article, and some of the redirects being obscure or old fashioned - this can't be too uncommon, but lets ignore the Manual of Style for most of the terms in this case. Perhaps 'turps' should still be in bold, although that one is also trouble in that most current uses of the name 'turps' is a careless reference to turpentine substitute. Perhaps there should be a disambing page for 'turps' on its own. I set up the original redirect for 'turps', but now feel it might be misleading to make it a straight redirect to turpentine. -- Solipsist 21:26, 16 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Good idea on making turps a disambig page, as most times it will mean the substitute. I've also just converted paint thinner from a redirect here to a redirect to the substitute, as all the pages linking to it were fairly clearly referring to the substitute - MPF 21:34, 16 Dec 2004 (UTC)

OK done. -- Solipsist 22:48, 16 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Chemical Structure

Does anybody know of the chemical structure of turpentine? I could not find it on google at all. As it is C10H16 it dosen't follow the standard hydrocarbon naming format.. but my best guess would be cyclodecayne. Chemical Structure: (using E to signify a triple bond)

            |
    C E C - C 
  /         | \
-C-           -C-
 |             |
-C-           -C-
  \ |   |   | /
    C - C - C
    |   |   | 

Grade 11 chemistry at it's finest ;) Could someone with a better chem background help? --142.177.87.18 04:11, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

Grade 3 grammar at ITS (not it's) finest. 140.147.236.194 (talk) 13:10, 20 October 2009 (UTC)Stephen Kosciesza

Ok, on second glance I found the following possibilities:

5-Isopropyl-2-methylcyclohexa-1,3-diene

6,6-Dimethyl-2-methylenebicyclo[3.1.1]heptane

1-Isopropyl-4-methylcyclohexa-1,3-diene

1-Methyl-4-(1-methylethyl)-benzene

2,6,6-Trimethylbicyclo[3.1.1]hept-2-ene

(1R)-2,6,6-Trimethylbicyclo[3.1.1]hept-2-ene

(1R)-6,6-Dimethyl-2-methylenebicyclo[3.1.1]heptane

(1S)-2,6,6-Trimethylbicyclo[3.1.1]hept-2-ene

(1S)-6,6-Dimethyl-2-methylenebicyclo[3.1.1]heptane

(R)-1-Methyl-4-(1-methylethenyl)-cyclohexene

(S)-1-Methyl-4-(1-methylethenyl)-cyclohexene

5-Isopropyl-2-methylbicyclo[3.1.0]hex-2-ene

1,7,7-Trimethylbicyclo[2.2.1]hept-2-ene

But which one is it? --142.177.87.18 04:27, 6 February 2006 (UTC)

• Terpentine is actually a mixture of different hydrocarbons including pinene, terpinene and other terpenes. The actual constituents can vary depending on the source, method of manufacture, etc. The chemical formula given in the article in basically an average of the combined constituents, not the chemical formula for a single organic compound. If you look at Dictionary of chemical formulas/Merge/C10, there are a number of chemicals with the formula C10H16 and many of those are found in terpentine. Edgar181 12:44, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

Drinking turpentine

On the recent addition on a news story about drinking turpentine to try and induce an abortion - it seems more likely that this has been slightly misreported and probably involved drinking turpentine substitute, so perhaps should be moved to that article. -- Solipsist 06:34, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

• I removed the addition. The article makes no claim that drinking turpentine can be lethal and I don't see the point in listing all the things that turpentine isn't used for. The article NFPA 704 says that turpentine would cause irritation with only minor residual injury. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Phoenix Hacker (talk • contribs) 04:46, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

Boiling point vs. flash point

Admittedly, I don't know much about chemistry, but are the boiling point and flash point of this substance reversed? How can the flash point be so much lower (or lower at all, for that matter) than the boiling point? Buck Mulligan 05:04, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

The articles on Flash point, Boiling point and Vapour pressure give pretty good explanations for this. I don't know much about chemistry either, but I think it is normal for the flash point to occur at a temperature lower than the boiling point. To reach the flash point of a combustable liquid you just need a reasonable concentration of vapour above the surface of the liquid, just enough for combustion to start. All(?) liquids evaporate at temperatures below their boiling point, as explained in the Vapour pressure article. You can see this if you fill a bath of hot water. The bath water will probably be around 30°C, well below its boiling point at 100°C , but you will still see plenty of steam rising from the hot bath. -- Solipsist 14:07, 11 January 2007 (UTC)

Other kinds of turpentine

I know very little chemistry, but I am reading an encyclopedia article (Maxwell, Jeanine M. "Turpentine." World Book Online Reference Center. 2007. 27 June 2007) [[2]] which says that 30% of turpentine is distilled from resin, but that 70% of turpentine is sulfate turpentine, which is a by-product of paper production. This Wiki article seems to be saying that all turpentine is gum turpentine -- distilled from resin. Please understand that I am truly ignorant, and I ask because I wonder if the World Book article's information is possibly out-of-date? Is gum turpentine now the most common form produced? NaySay 14:40, 27 June 2007 (UTC)

I think this issue was already discussed. I'll see if I can find it for you.SamanthaG (talk) 20:52, 25 September 2008 (UTC)

Dubious

Our hazard section claims that turpentine burns the skin. This is nonsense. Along with many artists and anyone who has ever done shop class at school, I have frequently had it all over my hands with no irritation at all. In fact it was formerly widely used as burn treatment, and still a component in many approved medicines intended to be applied to the skin. Googling for MSDSs, I see that some claim that prolonged contact may cause dermatitis. Taking into account the tendency of MSDSs to be extremely cautious (to avoid getting sued), this is obviously a very long march short of "burns the skin." In our comments about vapour, we might also note that the OSHA time-weighted PEL is 560 ppm, which is not particularly severe for a volatile organic solvent (e.g. PEL for gasoline is 300 ppm.) -- 202.63.39.58 (talk) 01:26, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

- I changed this from "burns" to "irritates" for the time being. In common parlance burning is something that involves heat and oxidation. If turpentine causes a "burning sensation" or causes "chemical burns" then that could be addressed specifically. cheers -Fletch - January 4th 2009 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.200.179.234 (talk) 07:26, 5 January 2009 (UTC)

History Question

When did people first distill turpentine? How long has it been in use? Artemis-Arethusa (talk) 13:45, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

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VOC laws

EPA requires limiting Volatile Organic Compounds so most paint is no longer solvent based, or emulsified in water as the solvent. Industry commonly uses powder coating (the paint is in solid form) to avoid VOC issue and because less paint is wasted. Shjacks45 (talk) 09:56, 4 July 2019 (UTC)

More Physical properties needed

This article needs something like the Physical properties table in White spirit to compare the various versions- gum (from different trees), wood, and sulfate, to compare with the petroleum substitutes. Maybe a table containing everything, and used in both articles?71.230.16.111 (talk) 05:19, 26 June 2023 (UTC)