Cans of solvent -- pouring, etc

In chem lab, we were taught to take a glass rod, hold it up against the edge of the beaker, and pour. The liquid follows the glass rod instead of clinging to the side of the beaker. It's all due to the magic of surface tension.

Yep ,almost any kind of rod works. As for as mineral spirits, get it at Wal-Mart in the plastic containers. No spills from the plastic container.

That goes to the other half of my question -- I've had plastic containers spring mysterious leaks. For fire safety is a metal cabinet the preferred storage location?

There was a thread about this recently. Pour it the opposite way, with the opening at the far end. This let's it get up to angle where it doesn't do that. It seems very wrong the first time, but it works.

Also sometimes you are pouring and sometimes you are putting it on a rag directly. Don't wait till you run out to get a new can. Do your pouring from the old one and your tipping onto a rag from the new one. That'll bring the level down somewhat before you ever have to pour from it.

-Leuf

When the can is more than about 1/3 full I get better control by holding it with the spout at the top like so:

_________________ _| | _| | | | | | |________________|

And for those jobs requiring very precise pouring, I have this little device called a funnel.