White lithium grease in tank

[Tommymac]

A friend who owns a dive shop did a visual on a alum tank he had in rental. The tank was like nothing he had ever seen before and knowing I had a tank tumbler he asked me to take a look. The valve had what appeared to be white paint on it but it was not completely dry. I wiped my finger inside the tank and what was on my finger tip looked like grease. It was slippery and had very little odor and was white/gray in color.

I was baffled too. Yeah I had taken the VIP course years ago, own my own compressor and have been diving and looking in tanks for well over 50 yrs.

I put plastic media in the tank to try and give it a gentle tumble. When I looked inside I was again surprised. The media had stuck to the bottom and sides on the cylinder. The entire interior of the tank was coated with what I think might be lithium grease.

I got a handful of the media out and it clumped together, and confirmed my opinion that it was grease and a lot of it. Water, Dawn soap and time does seem to clean it up; but a slow process.

No other rental tanks had this issue and rental regulators will be checked and cleaned. This was just discovered so were working on it. I am curious if anyone else has ever found anything like this. I can't help but think this was a malicious attempt to cause harm.

 

[-JD-]

Tribolube or Christolube, maybe? Putting enough on to migrate away from the neck/valve threads and oring/groove seems ... let's call it - excessively enthusiastic.

 

[GJC]

If it was a nitrox tank, sounds like the last inspector got overly generous with christolube or tribolube on the threads and a year of tank fills caused it to be sprayed it all over the inside of the tank. Soap and water should fix it. Christolube kind of dries out a little and gets tacky or flaky over time, more so than tribolube.

Were there any disgruntled employee terminations among the service techs in the last year, or any poorly trained/untrained employees doing valve installs?

 

[BoltSnap]

Any signs of salt water intrusion in the tank?

 

[broncobowsher]

Guessing that Cristolube and whoever serviced it was of the mind more is better and did not know that as little as possible is the right answer. The shot at the bottom was probably from too much in the valve and the first fill blew it to the bottom.

Clean the tank. I would go through the valve and make sure that it wasn't "packed"

 

[BoltSnap]

The grease presence on the inside of the Tank is probably from grease stuck in, on, around and inside the valve stem not threads.

 

[rjack321]

Instead of soap you can dissolve grease in a solvent like isopropyl alcohol which can then go down the drain (in modest volumes with lots of water). Then wash once its mostly degreased.

 

[rjack321]

acetone is also useful for degreasing. Dump it into a disposable cup, let the residue evaporate, then throw the cup in the garbage.

wash with detergent and you're good

 

[Tommymac]

I appreciate all the comments. The tank was probably never in salt water, its located in WI. The amount of grease or Christolube is what throws me. The entire tank, bottom, sides all the way around and up near the top of the tank, is all coated with it. And its a rather thick coating. The Christolube I have from Scubapro is a small tube that lasts a very long time and it would in my estimation take about 10 tubes to coat the entire interior of the tank. I haven't heard of problems with employee's but I would not be kept in the loop on that.

I'm going to try and collect some samples of the stuff and then see how much Waldoworld has in alcohol and start trying to clean it out. Will try alcohol first.

 

[kmarks]

Hexanes (mineral spirits) is a really great way to dissolve and wash away grease. It's what I usually use in the lab. Of course, n-hexane is also a neurotoxin, so choose wisely.