PROPYLENE GLYCOL

Kirk Keyes said:

Ron - I'm sure that's an "LD50" for lethal dose in 50% of the population. So only 50% of the 50kg rat-people would die from drinking 2 1/2 pints of propylene glycol.

It's not quite as toxic as you make it sound!

Kirk

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Kirk, LD50 is indeed correct. My bad. Sorry. But then I think Gerald's posts make it even more deadly.

PE

Photo Engineer said:

Kirk, LD50 is indeed correct. My bad. Sorry. But then I think Gerald's posts make it even more deadly.

PE

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Well, I have to say in all honesty that injection of propylene glycol has never been one of the options in my darkroom procedures. Though I did nick myself slighly with a syringe once after using it to transfer a small amount of acetone from one container to another.


Sandy

sanking said:

Well, I have to say in all honesty that injection of propylene glycol has never been one of the options in my darkroom procedures. Though I did nick myself slighly with a syringe once after using it to transfer a small amount of acetone from one container to another.


Sandy

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Sandy, a friend at EK once had a bizarre accident.

He had filled a pipette with solution in the dark and laid it in a rack. Then he turned to do some work over the sink and began to turn back to get the pipette.

It was sticking out with the rear end against the wall and he ran most of 1/2 of the pipette into his arm from the elbow to the forearm before he screamed and turned. His turn broke the pipette off in his arm and he had to go to EK medical to have it removed.

Fortunately, there was no damage done except for some bits of glass in his elbow, and the solution (IIRC) was totally nontoxic, not that he got any amount into him. The fluid pressure in his arm would have prevented much solution from entering his body from what I understand. The biggest concern was infection.

My point is that really strange accidents do happen. Well, all accidents are 'strange'. After all, that is what accident means, I guess.

PE

Photo Engineer said:

he ran most of 1/2 of the pipette into his arm from the elbow to the forearm before he screamed and turned. His turn broke the pipette off in his arm

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Owwww! That's gotta hurt! I hope that was a pasteur pipette, and not a 100 ml volumetric or even worse, a big serological pipette.

Not so freaky, but it freaked me out for a while - I stabbed myself (missed the vial) with semivolatile surrogate (2-Fluorophenol, Phenol-d6, 2,4,6-Tribromophenol, 2-Fluorobiphenyl, Nitrobenzene-d5, p-Terphenyl-d14) at about 100 mg/L concentration. Not only toxic/carcinogenic, but note the deuterated compounds, so it's slightly radiocative...

I don't think I actucally injected any in, and I squeezed the puncture like mad to make it bleed, but it freaked me out for a bit. It's been about 15 years, and I keep checking the spot - no odd spots growing there yet...

Kirk

My understanding when I first substituted propylene for ethylene was that dogs love the sweet taste of the ethylene but are not attracted by the propylene. I have a bunch of dogs around as well as a bunch of kids. I can explain to the kids that nothing in my darkroom except the water straight out of the faucet is good and much of it is bad. Dogs are not so easy to reason with. If I should happen to drop a jug and spill a gallon between the car and the house, it's nice to know none of my pets would be atracted to the spill for a taste thrill. Cats turn up their noses at most things I offer them. They won't even eat the dog food except as a last resort. Dogs have a theory that they can eta anything and their insides will sort out the good from the bad.
A man was visiting the zoo and saw a monkey who, whwnever someone gave him a peanut, would put it under his tail before eating it. He asked the keeper what that was about. He was told that once someone gave him a hazel nut in the shell and the monkey had suc a hard time passing it that now he measures everything to see if it will fit. Sorry, was that off topic?
As for solvents for photo chemicals, the solvent is not likely to make anything I put in it safe to drink that was not safe before. Most non-photographers I have in my household say "UUGH" when I open the darkroom door. I say that sometimes myself.
Propylene glycol is safe enough that it appears in the table of contents of a good many patent preparations, including some prepared foods, but in very small quantities. Usually one would have to eat at least a whole package of whatever it is before coming close to the lethal dose. Contrast PC-Glycol with HC110 and calculate which of them one would have to drink the most of to leave this mortal coil. I'm not recommending either, just pointing out that photographic processing can be dangerous in many directions. Just walking around in the dark can be hazardous, as I am learning in my old age.

Kirk Keyes said:

Owwww! That's gotta hurt! I hope that was a pasteur pipette, and not a 100 ml volumetric or even worse, a big serological pipette.

Not so freaky, but it freaked me out for a while - I stabbed myself (missed the vial) with semivolatile surrogate (2-Fluorophenol, Phenol-d6, 2,4,6-Tribromophenol, 2-Fluorobiphenyl, Nitrobenzene-d5, p-Terphenyl-d14) at about 100 mg/L concentration. Not only toxic/carcinogenic, but note the deuterated compounds, so it's slightly radiocative...

I don't think I actucally injected any in, and I squeezed the puncture like mad to make it bleed, but it freaked me out for a bit. It's been about 15 years, and I keep checking the spot - no odd spots growing there yet...

Kirk

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IIRC, it was a small 10 ml pipette. He said it did smart a bit!

When a small duplicate head grows out of your arm, start to worry, but if it starts to talk to you, really worry!

A graduate student was killed while I was doing my thesis work. It was at another school in the city. Apparently, he was injected with a GC syringe filled with about 0.1 ml of a newly synthesized chemical in a bizarre accident while backing through a door with a tray of samples. Another student got him in the back and the force of their collision injected the small sample right into his back.

Another student was effectively lobotomized by inhaling a large dose of dimethyl sulfate in a freak accident. The reaction was instantaneous. He methylated much of his frontal lobes and the last I heard, he remained in a coma.

BTW, these are not rumors, our thesis director reported them to us during some lectures on lab safety. Back then, we didn't use rubber gloves much, nor did we use respirators except when using really nasty stuff such as phosgene and cyanide. We had a cylinder of phosgene rupture at our school and it made the evening news on KDKA-TV in Pittsburgh. I got to watch our department chairman being interviewed. The building was surrounded on one side by a huge cloud of HCl vapor as the phosgene hydrolyzed. Neither one would be pleasant, but I can say that phosgene smells very nice. Like fresh cut grass.

Well, enough off-topic.

Be careful out there. Chemistry of any kind is dangerous if you are careless.

PE

When I was in college my quantitative analysis instructor had worked as a chemist for many years. He was discussing lab safety and admitted that he had once pipetted hot 50% potassium hydroxide into his mouth and on another occasion potassium cyanide solution.

Photo Engineer said:

When a small duplicate head grows out of your arm, start to worry, but if it starts to talk to you, really worry!

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Interesting stories, guys.

When the head starts talking, I'll name him (assuming it's a him) "Zaphod".

Kirk Keyes said:

Interesting stories, guys.

When the head starts talking, I'll name him (assuming it's a him) "Zaphod".

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Kirk, thanks for all the fish.

PE

It would make more sense to dissolve the inorganic compounds in water and keep aside as a Solution B rather than go to great lengths to get them into (PG) solution. Then add the appropriate volume when diluting the PG solution to working strength developer.