Powered garden cutting tools: lubrication

We aren't told what the other 20%+ is, but seems that white spirit is the bulk of it. Of course it's possible that white spirit is the solvent for something else not harmful enough to be on the MSDS.

I doubt it's anything magical. Try some other kind of light lubricant, eg bike lubricant spray like GT85? A bike chain and a hedge trimmer aren't doing massively different things. Although perhaps the Bosch lubricant is designed not to be toxic when you get it on plants, or something like that?

Theo

A can of the Bosch spray lasts forever, so why worry?

John

Because you could use something you already have, rather than buy another unnecessary can you have to store forever? Or that you could use a general purpose lubricant other purposes.

On the label I notice there's a picture of an oilcan with BIO written on it. I wonder if that means it's veg oil diluted with white spirit? That would at least be non-toxic to plants. Probably not that simple, but I might try that as a cheap lubricant spray sometime...

Theo

Chainsaw bar lubrication oil is supposed to be organic. Not expensive.

They’re not sewing machines. I just use whatever spray can comes to hand.

Tim

Thanks, all. How about standard 3-in-1 oil in my squeezy plastic bottle?

Frank

Organic, i.e. bio-degradable chainsaw bar oil is good thing, because lots of it gets splattered off the chain -- it's roughly one tank of bar oil per one tank of gas. And this ends up in the woods, garden, tree, ...

However, while this is a good thing if you are forestry worker, it isn't for the occasional user: the stuff gums of, that is, oxidizes because it is an organic and biodegradable oil... Neighbor had chainsaw which used once a year or less, with organic oil. The channels in the bar had gummed up completely after year.

He is an automobile mechanic, and de-gummed the bar by soaking it in organic diesel, i.e. biodiesel. Turns out the biodiesel is pretty rough on many seal materials, and this property makes it good at dissolving gummed-up organics...

Thomas Prufer

Yes, just use it. The eco warriors will tell you that it may kill the leaves. I believe cutting them off from the main bush has a bigger influence on them dying.

It attracts mice and they try to get at it they gnaw through plastic parts.

I did use OSR oil when I was cutting every day but don't now retired,

Mice? I wouldn't have thought of it -- but yes, makes sense! And no way to patch a gnawed tank.

Saw similar with USAnian squirrels: toss a scraped-clean peanut butter jar in the trash bin, and the squirrels would gnaw substantial bits off the bin in an attempt to get to the jar.

The soap I keep near a washbasin in an allotment gets gnawed in winter; mice apparently like the fats and oils even when bound in soap. Or they are very fastidious mice.

I don't bother with the chain oiler and oil tank with the very little I use my chainsaw: I use an oil can, with mineral/motor oil, give the bar & chain a good squirt. Good enough for cut or two. Leaves the tank empty, so no problems with escaping oil if the chainsaw get put on its side or upside down when kicking around waiting for work.

Thomas Prufer

Actually old fashioned fibreglass and resin worked for over 40 year now on one saw tank I smashed. Nowadays I have used carbon fibre tow and epoxy to fix plastic parts together by first lacing the tow through holes drilled in the broken parts.

Two two-stroke engine tanks I recently used were polyethylene or polypropylene blow-mold parts.

I have not any luck gluing those materials, ever. I tried a primer for cyanoacrylate -- that causes some adhesion, but not very well.

Someone told me I could activate the surface of PP/PE, and then it would stick

-- after all, PP and PE foil shopping bags are printed, and the dyes stick! Activation it to pass a torch flame over the surface until just melts, noticeable by getting a sheen, and then gluing within minutes. (Foil bags are activated by a HV corona discharge, it says...)

Thomas Prufer

On 2025-09-11 08:02, Thomas Prufer wrote: ...

Indeed. Used that in building industrial inkjet presses to print on plastic label stock (PP and PE). A few tens of kV and a lovely crackling purple discharge!

nib

I managed to glue a washing machine drum back enough to work with car body filler. The adhesion is weak, so it took a lot to get it to stick well *enough* to work.

The polyolefins are well known for being almost unglueable. Hot glue or plastic welding might be today's options.

Wiki: "Polyolefin surfaces are not effectively joined together by solvent welding because they have excellent chemical resistance and are unaffected by common solvents. They inherently have very low surface energies and don't wet-out well (the process of being covered and filled with resin). They can be adhesively bonded after surface treatment, and by some superglues (cyanoacrylates) and reactive (meth)acrylate glues.[7] They are extremely inert chemically but exhibit decreased strength at lower and higher temperatures.[8] As a result of this, thermal welding is a common bonding technique. "

Looked for a video....

Thomas Prufer