Propane tank smell

warrior24

warrior24

Joined
May 3, 2006
Messages
673
How do you get all the propane smell out of a tank? I am in the process of making forge and I want to cut the tank but want to air it out, but it smells really bad. I washed it out with water 3 times. Should I try soap or some other degreser.
 
Propane itself is odorless. There is a stench component added so you will be able to smell a leak. It is usually a sulfur compound called a thiol or mercaptan. They're not very water soluble. You could try a little degreasing soap and a couple more water rinses. It'll dissipate eventually.
 
BTW, there's very, very little of that stuff left in there. The stuff stinks so bad a drop would stink a house up completely.

Edited to add: I just looked it up. They add 1.5 pounds of ethyl mercaptan to 10, 000 gallons of liquid propane. That'd be less than a quart. Stuff stinks bad.
 
Use the same stuff to remove skunk smell from your dog, that's also a mercaptan. 1 Qt 3% hydrogen peroxide, 1/4 Cup baking soda,1 teaspoon liquid soap .Let soak for at least 10-15 min [that's for your dog] more for a propane tank.
 
That'll definitely work better chemically, Robert! Oxidize the mercaptan and try and destroy it instead of just trying to wash it away. Good thinking!
 
thanks I was thinking some along those lines but I was thinking how you neutralize ferric chloride and to neutralize that acid.
 
Could you just find a length of a piece of 10" pipe? Most any scrap metal yard should have it and then you don't have to worry about cutting the tank. The pipe will last longer, too.

Craig
 
Why not just burn it out? Knowing nothing of the chemistry involved, I would think that stuffing the thing full of newspaper and lighting them on fire would burn any residue in the tank out. The stuff must be able to burn if its in propane....
 
warrior24 said:
How do you get all the propane smell out of a tank? I am in the process of making forge and I want to cut the tank but want to air it out, but it smells really bad. I washed it out with water 3 times. Should I try soap or some other degreser.
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Be a warrior and cut the bottle. Once that is done just wipe out the oil with a rag and rinse with Listerine.
 
In a chemistry lab we used plenty of bleach before disposing of thiols. It takes the smell down right away. 1/2 ml of t-butyl-thiol got rinsed down the sink minus the bleach. The smell came up through the toilets in other buildings. In about an hour guys from the gas company and the fire department were sniffing around for the "gas leak".
 
Richard338 said:
In a chemistry lab we used plenty of bleach before disposing of thiols. It takes the smell down right away. 1/2 ml of t-butyl-thiol got rinsed down the sink minus the bleach. The smell came up through the toilets in other buildings. In about an hour guys from the gas company and the fire department were sniffing around for the "gas leak".
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Now THAT'S funny....

-d
 
Good bleach story:

The idiot PhD two bays down from me was destroying something with bleach in his hood. He added the reactant too fast and apparently gave off a cloud of hypochlorous acid. It went up the hood outlet and got picked up by the air handler and dumped back in my office, where I got gassed. Caused some lung damage.

I never recommend bleach to people who don't know what they're doing. Next thing you know they're "neutralizing" it with ammonia.
 
Yeah I am gonna try the baking soda thing, but the stuff stinks so bad I gaged while rinsing out the tank. I will be a Warrior and just cut the tank. Is the smell toxic because it smells so bad that it makes me wonder just how toxic it is.
 
warrior24 said:
Yeah I am gonna try the baking soda thing, but the stuff stinks so bad I gaged while rinsing out the tank. I will be a Warrior and just cut the tank. Is the smell toxic because it smells so bad that it makes me wonder just how toxic it is.
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It's not good for you, but there isn't much there. Wear a cartridge respirator with "organic vapor" cartridges if it's enough to gag you. If you're going to make knives, you need a good respirator anyway.
 
Richard , that reminds me of a friend who had a company that designed labels. They were doing a detergent bottle and asked for some bottles , which were sent FULL. They didn't want to fool around with full bottles so they dumped them down the drain !! They were on the 45 th floor ,a restaurent was on the ground floor. Detergent foam came out of the drains in large amounts on the first few floors of the building !!!
 
I sure am glad that they invented mercaptan............ what a relief.... One of my earlier jobs was to eat lots of beans and "poot" into those gas bottles in order for folks to be able to smell a leak.

I ate a lot of beans back in those days and pooted into lots of gas bottles.........:D

Now I just poot when I want to............ Folks say......"Do you smell gas?"........:D
 
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