Safety warning welding and brake cleaner. Never mix them!
 

Here is a link describing the serious health dangers involved when using brake clean on or near areas to be welded. This happened to a guy just like us.

Beware and stay safe.

https://www.brewracingframes.com/saf...ces%20phosgene

Wow - crazy story!! Thanks for posting.

I have never understood why most people use Brakeclean as their go to for cleaning oily parts. Its meant for brakes and brake fluid is water based so it will not work as good anyway. CRC Heavy Duty Degreaser works better than carb cleaner for oily parts.
Thanks for posting the warning, I weld a lot.

YES!!! Burning chlorine producing phosgene! Phosgene is a poisonous gas.

Oh come on, toughen up a little!!!

Care to demonstrate? :D

Please add welding galvanized material too

DOT 3 brake fluid is polyethylene glycol based, not water based, if that matters to the discussion.

absolutely not!!!

I remember a big thread about this years ago on this forum. Im no chemist but i think this warning doesn't apply to non-chlorine brake cleaner in the green can

If “brake clean” doesn’t remove grease/oil, why is it commonplace to spray down new rotors with it when doing a brake job?

But yeah…high heat near chlorine? Not good bedfellows.

CRC Brakleen is a stellar product for removing oil and grease. Only the red can, not that useless crap in the green. Worse, they sell a red can at Dollar General with a yellow stripe band at the top, it's worse than the green can.

I've never found an alternate brand of brake cleaner tha takes oil film off like the true CRC product. Especially good at cleaning up after repairing engine oil leaks.

I appreciate the warnings in this thread, it's news to me and I'll be welding in future.

It does remove oil and grease. Just not as good as carb cleaner and certainly not as good as CRC DeGereaser.

Now, while it looks like brake fluid might not be purely water based, glycol.
There is a huge difference what is in your brake system and your engine.
If you put oil in your master cylinder you will basically destroy your brake system. Water, nope. You could flush it out, bleed everything and be OK.
You wash brake parts in hot soapy water and never in a oil based solvent tank.
Carb cleaner is just better at removing oil and grease than BrakeClean.
The sticky dust ect. around your rotors is not oil based.
When I was a kid before Brake Clean was around or popular I seen my dad use a alcohol/water mix with a siphon gun and compressed air to clean around brake drums.
My father was a master heavy equipment mechanic.

They sell non chlorinated brake cleaner. It's all I've used for decades.

Same here.

Brake kleen is definitely a recipe for disaster when welding. I usually wipe down the material I'm welding with acetone before gluing stuff together.

Back in the day, 1,1,1 Trichloroethane was used as a degreaser in various industries, even for cleaning printed circuit boards. Great stuff when used carefully...gone now because of the chlorine content.

A lot of what we now know as hazardous materials were used freely back in the day....chlorine-based stuff, asbestos, etc.

George

I only use Acetone for cleaning before I TIG. It's much safer. Plus, all my brake clean is Non Chlorinated. Ya, Chlorinated did clean a bit better, but the risks are not worth it. Phosgene gas is very similar to Mustard Gas and we all know what that does.

People use brake clean because it removes just about everything with an oil base, leaves no residue and dries very quickly. I've used this to clean clock works before oiling!!