Recycling IPA

[JeffB]

...and my cleanup station is near the gas furnace, so I only use it in the spring / summer when I can use it with the basement door open for ventilation (the door is also next to the printer area)

More or less the same for me John...  My 3D printing setup is right next to the furnace.  I only use denatured alcohol in the warmer months when the furnace is never running (we have a separate hot water heater). 

For safety...  I don't do much cleaning with IPA while the furnace is running in colder months (I'll generally do most cleaning when the furnace is off, especially later at night when the heat is set much lower and the furnace rarely cycles).

I've also gotten in the habit of turning on the ventilation system I use for the laser cutter, which is adjacent to my 3D printing station, both during printing and for cleaning.

Not sure if that makes a difference, but I feel better about it...

Jeff

[peteski]

You guys suspect that denatured alcohol evaporates faster and produces more fumes than IPA, and worry about possible fire hazard?

[JeffB]

You guys suspect that denatured alcohol evaporates faster and produces more fumes than IPA, and worry about possible fire hazard?

I think we went around about this previously...  I believe (without researching it again) that both IPA and DA have roughly the same flash point and flammability. 

It's more a psychological issue...  DA smells a lot more (IMO), so more paranoia about the fumes, fires, etc.

In my case, I share space with my youngest son's "gaming command center" (it's off in a cubby on the other side of the workshop).  He started complaining about the smell of DA (and the resin) last year, so I started being more cautious about when I printed stuff, the conditions present and trying to mitigate the effects of doing so.

Jeff

 

[nkalanaga]

Peteski:  IPA is usually only alcohol and water.  Denatured alcohol may have other stuff as well, depending on the denaturing method, and one doesn't always know what it is.  Some would work just as well as IPA for a particular job, another brand might not.

Then there's rubbing alcohol, another matter entirely.  We used IPA (as "isopropanol anhydrous") for cleaning tape drives and checker reader/sorter read heads for decades.  Once, in the early 80s, we ran out, and an operator bought rubbing alcohol as a substitute.  It was a lot of work to get the hand lotion, or whatever it was, off the read heads! 

[GGNInNScale]

I buy gallon bottles of 99% IPA.  I pour the used stuff through a coffee filter into another closable container.  Then, I use the old IPA in the model cleaner, adding fresh to make up.  Works well.

[Peachymike]

Have you tried methyl hydrate? A gallon is about $13 cad in Home Depot, probably cheaper in the US. No odour like ipa and imho it works better than ipa.

[EJN]

IPA is only supposed to be used once.