simple green

[ebb]

Some of you know I'm a Simple Green fan. I've just been to their site - they have dozens, maybe hundreds of products I'll never want to use. The estate where I work uses
www.labsafety.com
for maintenance supplies. Another of those gigantic outfits that send us gigantic mailbox-challenging 2000pg catalogs. Too often. The 3 products I'll briefly describe are not available on the Simple Green site nor would I surmise at your local hardware or WholeFoods. I haven't tried them yet. But it's interesting that they appear here in a lab safety catalog that is, but wasn't always, almost totally committed to environmental cleanup and prevention. It's the Law.

But Simple Green has found a way to be environmentally and user friendly and do it bio-degradable, without solvents, and inexpensively. For a upstart soap company they seem to be highly successful and they aren't a pyramid selling scheme.

>Extreme Simple Green
meets Boeing's specs for aircraft and general cleaning. It has the capacity to "hold grease, oil and soil in solution during cleaning and rinsing". Means the gunk won't get redeposited. Harmless to paints, coatings, plastics and metals. I'm going to assume that it doesn't froth too much and rinses with a few wipes with a sponge.(?) $12.90.

>Simple Green Lime Scale Remover
Nonabrasive, no bleach, no ammonia, no phosphorus. "---won't harm porcelain, ceramic, tile. drains or pipes, including PVC." I'd call to find out if it leaves synthetic rubber caulking and sealant bedding compounds alone. Might be great for the hull and waterline. LPU Yes - Brightsides NO ?? Believe you can find this one in a hardware. $5.90.

>Simple Green d Pro 5 Cleaner/Disinfectant. (There is a weaker d Pro 3 version too.)
Kills Avian Flu and MRSA. Cleans, sanitizes, deodorizes, eliminates mildew, fungi and viruses. Unscented, colorless, biodegradable, EPA registered.
$852 for a 55gal drum. You can check it out for $14.50 in a 32oz spray bottle. I've never considered using anything like this. For a cruiser it may come in handy. Have we redefined biodegradable? ..this one kills little bio baddies, right?? But not selectively, surely.

I saw somewhere that S.G. makes a NO RINSE paint-prep product. This one would have to have a DEWAXER in it. I'd call. And they make a dedicated s.s. cleaner/polisher. Maybe these are at your favorite needless mark-up marine store. Somewhere you have to draw the line on cleaner bottles!

A cleaner that froths and makes bubbles that don't break down is NOT one to use aboard any boat. Here's a question: So the surficants and enzymes
and secret ingredients are biodegrade BUT how biodegradable is the resulting cocktail of Simple Green product / grease / oil / soil / and water that you got after you cleaned your bilge? Is it somehow neutered?

Green sailors please report your findings? 1-800-356-2501 is the LSS Tech Support line.

[tha3rdman]

I don't know about out west but Simple green has been in the east since ans far back as I recall, atleast the late 80's, I rember using it to degrase an old Ferguson TO-20 (farm tractor) that was '92, good stuff but I'm partial to greased lightning.

[ebb]

Simple Green All Purpose has been around for 25 years. It's a California grown product that I believe had its start in Garden Grove. The company spends millions each year defending its claims - some of which you see above in their 'extended line.'

Staph (MRSA) is endemic in US hospitals. The bacteria keep evolving to defeat antibodies the labs invent. That's why I slipped in that card in the above post. It is quite a claim when you think about it, wouldn't you agree?
The writer at Wikipedia points out that staph has 2,600 genes and 2.8 million pairs of DNA in its chromosome! I know there are some people in the East that have far fewer genes than this deadly SOB.

Let's hope Walter Reed has a bottle in every room.
Just think. without even half trying, you can sterilize your fish table with a couple sprinks of d Pro 5
- for practically nothing!

Think it's worth while exploring?.;)
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http://consumer.simplegreen.com/cons_faqs.php
Exhaustive rundown on everything about the products except the patent. (INCLUDING AN ADMISSION OF ANIMAL TESTING
FORCED BY THE US GOV'T.)

This paper is also a good manual imco on common cleaners and solvents in general. I think it is fair to say that the product was invented to solve (dissolve) a cleaning problem -THEN the company became 'green'. EG, because of the relatively benign qualities of All Purpose Simple Green it is used globally to attempt to save wildlife/wild fowl that get caught in oil spills and waste lagoons.

Products mentioned should be skipper tested.
Simple Greens are generally 'foamers'.
Defoamers can be purchased (listed in the paper above), but it's another bottle. What's toxic and what's bio-degradable is a matter of degree and Law. So watch it! (The company is privately owned - that makes it infinitely more environmentally responsible than Dow, duPont, and ProctorGamble!)
The LSS catalog lists a concentrate defoamer available in a gallon container. To make some you'd add about a 1/2 tsp to a 32oz spray bottle of water. The defoamer is supposedly composed of a non-toxic silicone oil called polydimethysiloxane, PDMS, an organic polymer that is used in silly putty and breast implants.

What is your personal ethical response to environmental issues?

There are oil eating bacteria in a bottle available for your bilges. (not Simple Green) BUT can you use the stuff and dump it overboard because it is NON-TOXIC TO MARINE LIFE?

No enzymes are specifically mentioned, so cooking up a batch of Omega 3's in your Ariel's bilge as tha3rdman 'suggests' in the following post:D probably won't happen.

[tha3rdman]

BUT how biodegradable is the resulting cocktail of Simple Green product / grease / oil / soil / and water that you got after you cleaned your bilge? Is it somehow neutered?
.


There are those enzymes (which I have no experience with) that live in the water and feed on the hydrocarbons, that sell them in sponges for the bilge, thier waste is a fatty acid. Maybe SG nutrilizese the oil in the same way.

[ebb]

A too quick 'research' of the oil in bilge problem yields two apparent results:
Everybody assumes there is a problem but nobby knows how to fix it
- and two, there are dozens of lists of safe boating rules from various well-intending organisations that nobody will ever read or heed.
I'm sure I'm not unique in brailling against repiticious lists of do's and don't's. A very real problem like 'oil over troubled waters' is buried in pointless blather.
Can see why official Gov't regulations always include large threatening fines and jail time in bold face. Gets your attention.

Whether we can dump 'neutralized' bilge waste into an estuary is pretty obviously a big NO. I wouldn't do it. There probably are no tests done by a federal agency on any specific product that makes the claims, anyway. What is true for personal sewage is no doubt true for personal bilge effluent. There IS a dragonian regulation on any kind of dumping - even benign dumping, if any could be called that: two stroke oil sheen in your wake, ablative copper killing the bottom life in your marina, stuff like that. Out here, one boater can turn in another boater for sanding his brightwork.....
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Mer-maid's Super Swabby Bilge Cleaner: "Emulsifies oil, grease, diesel fuel and scum. High surfactant formula holds dirt and petroleum products in suspension longer, industrial strength scouring power removes ring around the bilge. Goes where no scrub brush can. Features and Benefits: Concentrated. Biodegradable. High in surfactants. Economical. Emulsifies oil and grease." That's a quote, OK?

Surfactants will break oil into smaller drops that sink to the bottom of the 'water column.' No way can this be good for shellfish and bottom feeders.

BIO-DEGRADABLE DOES NOT MEAN NON-TOXIC.

SURFACTANT DOES NOT MEAN NON-TOXIC.

I would consider BIO-DEGRADABLE a scam word meant to hook you into buying a dangerous product.
The product still poses a containment and disposal problem. The product mixed with your stuff together pose an even more dangerous problem. Agree?

'Bilge Pillows' that absorb oil - that are bagged in ziplocks and taken ashore - are probably the best way to go.
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By the way, when you have left over paint or old paint you want to get rid of and you are too conscious to slip the can into the dumpster, it is perfectrly OK and legal to spread the liquid out on a large tarp (vinyl is good) and let it evaporate. We took care of large quantities of old house paints and solvents that way. If your private waste lagoon is too runny, you add some vermiclite as an absorbant and let that dryout. Roll it up, send it to the landfill, where it will fester for a thousand years. The definition of toxic according to land-based liquid toxic waste collection agencies is this: IF IT CANNOT BE POURED IT IS NOT TOXIC.:)

[ebb]

Here it is a few years later. I had forgot this thread.
Says: "Consentrated All-Purpose Cleaner 'simple green' Non-toxic Biodegradable" on the front label. At the bottom in progressively smaller fonts: CAUTION: IRRITANT. MAY IRRITATE EYES.

Recently used it for the first wash on litlgull's mast. It did an excellent job while not smelling too janitorial. It revealed, almost too well, the work that had to be done to renovate the mast.
Naturally I had to look into the stuff. (Again, as I see from old posts above here.)
In the small block print on the back label there is only ONE ingredient mentioned: "Contains 0.28% elemental phosphorus." [no CAUTION attached. I'm sure that your everyday house wife knows exactly what "elemental phosphorus" is. And what it's doing in her soap.]
Little red flags waving again.
"Always spot test first on hidden area. Do not use on leather, unfinished wood, opals or pearls." What the hell is this stuff?
It sounds like the cautions on an Alumiprep acid etch bottle. And it's made by Sunshine Makers, Inc of Huntington Beach.
Ran out of flags already.

Simple enough. Look it up on the Net. Found the Environmental Working Group www.ewg.org/cleaning/simplegreen* who are focusing on what cleaning products are brought into schools.
Ready for this?
They had it tested and found the main ingredient to be 2-buytoxethenol,** a specifically prohibited chemical in certified green products.
Also present are formaldehyde, acetaldehyde, ethylene glycol, phenol and about 90 other chemicals.
YES.......90 ! ! !

Wouldn't know which of these we can drink with the morning orange juice.
Better keep it away from your teenagers, they might want to sniff this stuff to get greened.:eek:

EWG LISTS ALL THESE CHEMICALS found in simple green, OK?
so you can, when you go to their site, judge for yourself.

The pH scale goes from 0(most acid) to 14, with 7(water) being neutral and 14(most alkaline or 'base'.)
This product pH tests in at 9.5. Don't know how that compares with other popular alkalis we use. Sea water pH is 8.5.

Obviously it would be impossible to market this product as safe if they listed 90 contaminants on its label.
But it is imco fraudulent and unethical to package it as if it was environmentally green.
The proven toxics and possibly toxic chemicals SHOULD be listed on the label. That goes for all domestic 'household' products.
There should be a law that forces them to list total ingredients on their product website. Every product must comply. We, the people, would slowly, soooo slowly, become more aware of the chemicals in our everyday.

>simple green< imco is marketed DISHONESTLY. That alone contaminates this Sunshine Makers' product for me. Red flags tell me that something really IS wrong with this cleaner if it's buried in secrets. NOW, with what I know I can't honestly use this detergent any more. Can I?
To use it puts me in the same position as having to put gasoline in my truck. Another "necessary evil" that diminishes all life in relationship with the environment, my relationship with the planet. Because for convenience I made another goddam compromise, even though I'm positive that no more compromises are available for us. Even at the simplest level.

CAUTION: IRRITANT. MAY IRRITATE BRAIN. . . .it's getting smaller. Yes, really.

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*You'll have to type >simple green< into google search and scroll until the Environmental Working Group website comes up. This seems to be the only way to find the paper. Better be quick about it,
before they get infiltrated by the other side and transmutate into an industry support tank!
** This chemical is on its way to being inducted into the hall of human carcinogens.

[c_amos]

I have never liked simple green. I know I am in the minority, but I have never had much luck with getting it to actually clean anything.

It is pretty impressive what can be accomplished with white vinegar and dawn dish washing liquid...

Thanks again for your detective work Ebb.

[ebb]

I'm convinced that no more compromises are available for us. Somehow this got repeat from above.

[ebb]

jumpin jehosaphat, Craig,
- may have to research and get forensics on that....:D

DAWN, Ultra Dawn Liquid Diswashing Detergent. Main ingredient: ETHANOL
Surfactants are "biodegradable" Surfactants sheet water. Need surfacants in detergents for cleaning clothes.
Only caution of note: "Do Not Mix (DAWN) With ChlorineBleach As Hazardous Fumes May Result" (in ALL caps).
Surfactants, color, perfumes and other ingredients not identified.
pH is 9, which makes it alkaline.

WHITE VINEGAR (from wheat or corn) is edible. However, it is made as a chemical. AppleCiderVinergar ACV is a food.
WV is made by fermentation of ETHANOL with acetic acid bacteria. Usually sold in a mild 'pickling' strength of 5 to 8% acidity. pH 2.4
Among its attributes is cleaning of mold, a deordorizer for pet urine, a 'solvent' for cleaning up epoxy (even partially cured).
It'll polish your bronze frames and winches. Soothes sunburn, it's antimicrobial, a natural deordorant and hair conditioner.
Also a digestive, settles the stomach. Does a great job of descaling the electric water boiler/coffee maker. Crumpled newsprint and vinegar
cleans windows. The list goes on. BUT, imco, it's not meant to be in your stomach.
[Imco, apple cider vinegar is a friendly food. Most famous is Bragg brand. It is a better digestive depending on your stomach's complaint: a tablespoon in a little water will sweeten the gut. (Sometimes a 1/2tsp of baking soda (alkali) will do it as well.)
ACV, honey and oliveoil is gourmet vegetable dressing. ACV and honey is remedy for sore throat.]
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CRUISER FORUMS
Cruisers talk about staph infections !!!! Probably comes from using bay water to bathe in.
Anti-biotics and extreme chemicals to cure, maybe.
Starts as a smallish rash or pimple progressing to boil. 10% dilute solution of BLEACH kills it.
Nobody is a doctor here. I have yet had to use bleach for this purpose. I will not have bleach on the boat.
Imco chlorine bleach is as dangerous as MEK. Will have Hydrogen Peroxide aboard. And Colloidal Silver Water for skin problems.
Not to talk about it now: an off shore medicine cabenet might also include: oregano oil and thyme oil to control viruses.
Will clear up most skin complaints, but should be cut with almond or olive oil.

Salt water causes rash. Once dry salt on skin it cannot be rubbed off. Dry off saltwater with a towel.
Rinse everything in sweet water. You do it for the boat, do it for yourself.

Detergents clean better but are harsher than soap. Detergents strip oil from the skin better than soap.
Barsoaps come up on the cruiser forums: KIRK'S ORIGINAL COCO CASTILE SOAP - DR. BRONNER'S - TeaTreeOil Castile Soap (brand?)
Castile soaps lather in salt water. Dr. Bronner's liquid castile soaps are the best known. Used Dr.B's liquid castile for years and stopped when I found some other liquid 'shower gels' that didn't dry out the skin as much.
Imco soaps in general take a lot of water to rinse. Prell shampoos in salt water. As does Johnson's Baby Shampoo.
Lemon Joy is said to be an alternative to Dawn. But detergents in plastic bottles should be considered concentrated and have to be diluted before personal use.
Cruisers leaving the States should imco visit these forums to collect current ideas and info on soaps, detergents and HEALTH!
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HYDROGEN PEROXIDE
H2O2 May be an alternative to chlorine bleach for clothes washing. I never use bleach.
Hydrogen peroxide is not toxic in the 3% solution that you get at the drug store.
It can be used in your vegetable cleaning water to disinfect questionable sources.