denatured alcohol

[Randall J Cox]

I was given some denatured alcohol, and was wondering if it has any use in wood work finishing? Never used it before. Any users? if so, what do you use it for? Tx Randy Cox

[Kendall Scheier]

I was given some denatured alcohol, and was wondering if it has any use in wood work finishing? Never used it before. Any users? if so, what do you use it for? Tx Randy Cox

solvent/thinner for shellac

[Mel Fulks]

Denatured alcohol sometimes has water it . Never buy any with a loose top on the can . Seen a lot of them , don’t know if that’s how
the distiller did the tops ,or if people messed with them in the store. Some old timers will only use the drinkable alcohol , expensive!

[Stan Calow]

I use it to wet the surface of a piece of wood to see what it will look like with a finish. But primarily to mix shellac flakes.

[John TenEyck]

Thinner/solvent for shellac. Quick way to highlight wood grain that evaporates fast and does not leave any residue. Cleaning off pencil marks on raw wood. Cleaning windows. All kinds of uses.

Just don't drink it.

John

[Randall J Cox]

ok, thnks all. Good info. Randy

[roger wiegand]

Unless you buy very expensive absolute ethanol, store it in a desiccator, and use it in a sealed dry air box, all alcohol has water in it. For ethanol it equilibrates with the humidity in the air at 95.63% ethanol and 4.37% water. It doesn't go higher than the 4.4% unless someone deliberately adds water. You can read all about azeotropic mixtures if you want to know more, it's lost in the sands of time for me! No way you ever want to pay for 100% ethanol to use as shellac solvent, it's about 10X the price. 95% Alcohol works perfectly as a shellac solvent and for almost every other use I know.

When I'm dissolving expensive shellac flakes I spring for the Mohawk shellac reducer. It's a consistent product that works well, without the mystery of whatever comes in the "fuel" cans from the Borg-- I use the latter for rinsing brushes and spray guns.

[Steven Cooper2]

I use denatured alcohol as a general purpose solvent for cleaning up all sorts of stuff. Permanent marker, License plate stickers, spilled epoxy or other goo, (but if it doesn't work mineral spirits)

It's a great general purpose solvent. Probably not as bad as acetone, but who knows with the methanol.

[Mel Fulks]

The only purpose for denatured (poisonous) alcohol is to keep people from drinking it. That way in can be sold at a lower cost . But
I’ve heard of it being imbibed anyway. Hey…what can ya’ do ? I’ve worked with old timers who only use the drinkable stuff when
disolving shellac flakes.

[Prashun Patel]

All these are great suggestions.

Don't be tempted to drink it.

Use gloves.

If using it in shellac, test a small batch first to make sure there's not excessive water in it. In practice, it's rarely an issue for me.