Power Steering Fluid Spill

[marcnew]

A power steering hose broke on my car leaving a large puddle of PS fluid on the garage floor. Does anyone know of a product that I can throw on the spill to absorb the fluid?

[Doug Miller]

Kitty litter is the best stuff on earth for that, and oil or transmission fluid spills too. I keep a bag on hand in the garage for just that reason.

You can go to an auto parts store and buy a bag of "Oil Dri" but guess what it is? Hint: the manufacturer of Cat's Pride brand cat litter is, you guessed it, the OilDri Corporation. Generic kitty litter from the grocery store is a *lot* cheaper.

[Doug Kanter]

Soak up as much as possible with cat litter - the cheapest kind you can find. Pour it on, walk on it, wait a day, sweep, and repeat. Some fluid's probably soaked into the floor already, but using the litter, you can at least soak up whatever might get on shoes and be tracked into the house.

Next, a tip from my mechanic, who's got the cleanest floor I've ever seen in an auto shop: Get yourself some Tide laundry powder and a stiff scrub brush that you won't ever use for anything else but cleaning oil spills. Mix Tide with water to make a thick paste. Brush it on, wait a few minutes, rinse off. Obviously, this would be easier to hose off if it were outside on the driveway, but do the best you can. You might have to soak up some of the mess with newspapers.

[tinacci336]

The wax stripper that commercial janitors use will also do a good clean . Just spray it on let it set a few minutes and then wipe up.Get it at a janitol supply or Sam's. Hint: alcohol(methyl) is the greatest of solvents of grease. All cleaners use it as their base. It has a thousand uses around a place if you just dilute it to suit your job.

[dnoyeB]

Thats funny as I would expect the kitty litter to contain perfumes that oildry does not. But I guess one has less competition. They do bear an uncanny resemblance and I always thought so, but never bothered to check.

I'll whip out this next time the fellas are over fixing something. Make me look smarter :)

[Doug Kanter]

Alcohol is amazing. Last, I wanted to clean a tile in my shower before mounting a plastic hook with double-sided tape. (By the way, 3M makes these hooks, and unlike others whose stupid tape comes loose in a week, these work). Anyway, I wiped down the tile with rubbing alcohol. Guess what? You know those CLR commercials where one wipe takes away 300 years worth of rust and soap film, and you say "Yeah right...nothing works like that". The alcohol removed the soap film in one and a half wipes, squeaky clean. I immediately wondered why the hell anyone buys expensive bath cleaners (Lysol, etc) for $2.50 a pint when you can buy a gallon of alcohol at a paint store so cheaply.

[Doug Miller]

Some kitty litters are perfumed, some aren't. It's just a matter of marketing.

[George E. Cawthon]

Kitty litter, treat it like any other oil spill. If you are quick about it blot up and then use Simple Green on it. (assume you have an unpainted floor, Simple Green might affect the paint if you do have a painted floor, but then you shouldn't have any problem wiping it up if you have a painted floor.)

[mm]

Sure it's cheaper, but do cats take pride in it?

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