Removed Dingotone finish - like result - any advice on leaving without new finish.

[McCreed]

Methylated Spirits in Australia IS what you in the US call Denatured Alcohol.

I am not a chemist, and it seems I have managed to confuse myself (not hard to do these days) but I was correct the first time when I said Ethanol.

This is Methylated Spirits which we use here, and the run-of-the mill 95% stuff you get at supermarkets and hardware stores:



It clearly states 95% v/v Ethanol

[Rabbit]

Methylated Spirits in Australia IS what you in the US call Denatured Alcohol.

I am not a chemist, and it seems I have managed to confuse myself (not hard to do these days) but I was correct the first time when I said Ethanol.

This is Methylated Spirits which we use here, and the run-of-the mill 95% stuff you get at supermarkets and hardware stores:



It clearly states 95% v/v Ethanol

Well, I *am* chemist, and in a laboratory metho in Australia is called denatured alcohol.The stuff you get from Bunnings will be 95% ethanol, some methanol, some water and some other trace amounts of crap to make it even more undrinkable than the methanol makes it... although I suspect for the purposes of using it to solubilise shellac it probably doesn't makes much difference. Unless you get desiccated denatured or absolute ethanol (that's 100% and *very* expensive) there will always be some water in the mix. lab or industrial grade (like the pic> will not have the extra impurities they add to metho, just etrhanol and methanol. by 100% methylated spirits that does *not* mean 100% ethanol, or it would not *be* methylated spirits :P. But yeh... the industrial stuff is probably better than the domestic stuff .

[McCreed]

Well, I *am* chemist, and in a laboratory metho in Australia is called denatured alcohol.The stuff you get from Bunnings will be 95% ethanol, some methanol, some water and some other trace amounts of crap to make it even more undrinkable than the methanol makes it... although I suspect for the purposes of using it to solubilise shellac it probably doesn't makes much difference. Unless you get desiccated denatured or absolute ethanol (that's 100% and *very* expensive) there will always be some water in the mix. lab or industrial grade (like the pic> will not have the extra impurities they add to metho, just etrhanol and methanol. by 100% methylated spirits that does *not* mean 100% ethanol, or it would not *be* methylated spirits :P. But yeh... the industrial stuff is probably better than the domestic stuff .

From what is obviously my tenuous understanding of this, it is the percentage of water content that makes the difference.
This is why shellac flake that has been improperly stored and subjected to moisture, will have difficulty fully dissolving.

[Rabbit]

From what is obviously my tenuous understanding of this, it is the percentage of water content that makes the difference.
This is why shellac flake that has been improperly stored and subjected to moisture, will have difficulty fully dissolving.

Ah, in that case yeh, the industrial stuff would have less water. The alternative is 100% Isopropanol. Fairly easy to get, it's used for cleaning, amongst other things. Even the industrial metho will have some water... but it's kinda bound to the ethanol.. unless you go through a costly process which would make it un-economical, the ethanol in the used in the industrial stuff will still have some water (rather than 100% ethanol they probably used 96%, so the mix is 95% of 96%)