Green Agfa and Japanese Grease Dissolver Thread

[Kino]

I just got an early Pigeon 35mm viewfinder camera from Japan and it has a seized helicoid. My usual solvents were not working, even getting the camera red hot with a hair dryer didn't work, but I came across this old thread about Tri-flow lube and thought others might like to see it.

https://www.rangefinderforum.com/classics/forum/messages/20735/14653.html?1256077819

Going to order a tube tonight...

 

[4season]

Good luck! I have an Aga Isolette which I haven’t managed unfreeze yet and have been reluctant to try stronger solvents as I don’t wish to strip off paint too.

 

[AgX]

To my understanding "Tri-Flow" refers to a brand-name, not a specific product of that brand.
In any case I could not open any MSDS-file that tells me the solvents used referred to here.

 

[reddesert]

The Tri-Flow that I think is most common and perhaps was referred to, is a small bottle of lubricant that comes with a straw applicator: https://www.triflowlubricants.com/product/tri-flow-superior-lubricant-drip-bottle/

You can usually find it at bike shops in the US, because it is sometimes used as a bicycle chain lube. If you look carefully, on the website they picture it with some bicycle tools and parts (crank remover and chainring bolts). The MSDS is available on that page and shows it's mostly unnamed oil and solvent with small percentages of PTFE and other stuff. I used it most recently to free up the wheel lug nuts when I had to change a car tire.

 

[AgX]

But then the effect only would be by some mineral oil...

 

[Donald Qualls]

Has anyone tried PB'laster? It's a penetrating oil with a very distinctive smell, in my experience more effective than WD-40 or similar products (which are just extremely light oil in a low-tension carrier, with perfume) that's my go-to at work for seized fasteners. In my experience, it doesn't harm paints, though I try to avoid putting it where I'll need to reuse rubber seals (like most penetrants, it will swell the rubber, which can lock things up even tighter). My shop gets it in spray cans, but I've seen it in non-aerosol packaging as well.

 

[Kino]

I have PB Blaster downstairs and might give that a try by spraying it in a cup and placing a few drops on the threads.

This is a particularly difficult focus mount to get solvents down into. There is a very fine outer thread with a coarse inner threaded sleeve with only a very thin brass bar internally to stabilize the movement between the two. That means there must be almost no friction between the two sleeves and at the moment, it is rock solid...

 

[Kino]

Turns out I have Liquid Wrench penetrating oil spray, (which smells just like PB Blaster by the way) and it has definitely softened the grease after 4 hours, but just enough to turn the first sleeve slightly. Since I will shear-off the thin brass bar if I twist it too hard, I'm going repeatedly apply small amounts and let it soak for a day or two and see if it will dissolve the petrified grease.

This stuff is certainly stinky, so I am sealing the camera body in a zip lock plastic bag for the duration.

 

[ColdEye]

try TSI 321. If I can safely remove saltwater corroded screws with it, then this might help. Pretty cheap too. It doesnt leave a thick gummy mess afterwards.

https://tsi301.com/tsi321moreinfo.htm

 

[Kino]

OK, the Liquid Wrench spray worked after a day of soaking. It also took off some of the internal Japaning (black paint) inside the aperture chamber and the flocking fell out, but I am good with that as it needed to be repainted/replaced anyway.

Got the main sleeve out; now I can soak the entire helicoid to free the inner sleeve.

 

[Donald Qualls]

OK, the Liquid Wrench spray worked after a day of soaking. It also took off some of the internal Japaning (black paint) inside the aperture chamber and the flocking fell out, but I am good with that as it needed to be repainted/replaced anyway.

Got the main sleeve out; now I can soak the entire helicoid to free the inner sleeve.

Hurrah! And now we know something we didn't -- those penetrants that smell strongly of turpentine will eventually work on the rock-hard old grease, at the cost of some lacquer and flocking.

 

[Kino]

I've been thinking about this, and there's no way for me to prove it, but I wonder if this Green Grease was a WWII synthetic formula that was used until petroleum based products became more affordable post-war?

 

[Donald Qualls]

It might well have been a vegetable oil based grease. I say that because many vegetable oils will "cure" the way linseed oil does when old style oil paint dries. This isn't (mainly) solvent evaporation as with enamel car paint; rather, this is oxidation induce crosslinking of the molecular chains in the oil -- and it's something that seems tied specifically to linoleic acid, one of the primary fatty acids in linseed oil. This substance doesn't appear in either petroleum or synthetic oils, nor in animal fats -- but it's in almost all vegetable oils at some level.

These oils were used for a lot of things during the scarcity years during and just after the War. Castrol, a well known brand of motor oil, was originally castor oil, and still contained a small percentage of that vegetable oil at least into the 1980s. It wouldn't surprise me in the least if Agfa and one or more Japanese camera makers continued to use vegetable based lubricants well into the 1950s -- any any vegetable oil that works well as a lubricant for metals is likely to contain enough linoleic acid to cure, eventually hardening up like thread locker.

 

[AgX]

I've been thinking about this, and there's no way for me to prove it, but I wonder if this Green Grease was a WWII synthetic formula that was used until petroleum based products became more affordable post-war?

-) To my understanding there was not even a production of synthetic lubricants in Germany in that time.
There would not have been much sense behind it, as first the share of need in volume was negligable compared that of fuel (gasoline), and second as german raw oil was rich on oils apt for the production of lubricants.

-) lubricants based on synthetic oils typically have longer longevity than those based on mineral oils

-) why should Agfa employ postwar lubricants based on synthetic oils which production then would have been more expensive, and with synthetic oil plants all destroyed/dismantled in West-Germany?

I say that because many vegetable oils will "cure" the way linseed oil does when old style oil paint dries. This isn't (mainly) solvent evaporation as with enamel car paint; rather, this is oxidation induce crosslinking of the molecular chains in the oil -- and it's something that seems tied specifically to linoleic acid.

It wouldn't surprise me in the least if Agfa and one or more Japanese camera makers continued to use vegetable based lubricants well into the 1950s -

All lubricant based on hydrocarbon oils tend to oxidize and finally even polymerize.
But yes, the effect is strongest with lineseed. (Of course a effect employed in art, but also anyone who ever used biodegradable lubricant will know that.)

One might argue that in the very first postwar years vegatibile oils were cheaper/more eays to obtain, but Agfa used that green stuff even later.

 

[Kino]

-)
-) why should Agfa employ postwar lubricants based on synthetic oils which production then would have been more expensive, and with synthetic oil plants all destroyed/dismantled in West-Germany?

I was thinking more along the lines of using old surplus lubricants, but maybe that was more of an American phenomenon post-war than other countries...

Also, why is the green grease so similar between Japanese and German cameras? There has to be some link there...

 

[Kino]

Now after about 2 days more or less of soaking in Liquid Wrench, the inner helicoid suddenly broke free. What nasty stuff!

I think Donald's hypothesis about vegetable oil has some validity, as the Liquid Wrench is now very "soapy" and will actually form bubbles across the opening of the sleeve, just like a child's bubble wand. I don't think a petroleum based lubricant would do that...

A quick spray with brake drum cleaner and I should be able repaint the interior with flat black and get ready to reassemble the camera.

 

[Donald Qualls]

the Liquid Wrench is now very "soapy" and will actually form bubbles across the opening of the sleeve

This is just the nature of "grease". When it's petroleum based, grease is an oil with a suspended soap to thicken it so it stays where you put it. Sometimes the soap is vegetable based (napalm takes its name from sodium palmitate, one of the gelling agents), sometimes it's based on animal fat, and occasionally it doesn't even use a sodium hyroxide soap -- lithium grease uses lithium hyroxide based soap for the gelling agent. Cold cream is a fine example of a true grease made from (IIRC) vegetable oil and a vegetable oil soap.

But any grease, broken down with a suitable solvent that can separate the oil from the soap, will yield that "soapy" product.