flammable air?

[iamlegs]

hey can anyone help me i got this can of compressed air and it has the flammable logo on it should i get some other one or is this normal?

 

didnt know wher to post it so i just posted it here

 

 

 

 

[Lurick]

It's flammable because of the aerosol or some other compound inside used with the compressed air.

[Biomecanoid]

9 minutes ago, iamlegs said:

hey can anyone help me i got this can of compressed air and it has the flammable logo on it should i get some other one or is this normal?

 

didnt know wher to post it so i just posted it here

 

 

 

 

Its normal

[Helpful Tech Witch]

Its compressed, so it can explode/

[Duckson McQuack]

It shouldn't be. Besides nitrogen, the vast majority of the balance is oxygen and argon, neither of which is flammable. If you're talking about the canned stuff, it's the propellant that's flammable.

1,1-difluoroethane is a common one.

[Enderman]

All compressed cans are flammable, it's normal.

[Oshino Shinobu]

It's due to the gas that is used as a propellant. 

 

Most use HFC 152-A which is 1,1-Difluoroethane.

[Helpful Tech Witch]

3 minutes ago, Duckson McQuack said:

It shouldn't be. Besides nitrogen, the vast majority of the balance is oxygen and argon, neither of which is flammable. If you're talking about the canned stuff, it's the propellant that's flammable.

1,1-difluoroethane is a common one.

Also, explosions. 

[dalekphalm]

27 minutes ago, iamlegs said:

hey can anyone help me i got this can of compressed air and it has the flammable logo on it should i get some other one or is this normal?

 

didnt know wher to post it so i just posted it here

The simple answer is that a can of "compressed air" literally isn't air. In fact, generally speaking, none of the chemicals inside a can of compressed air even exist naturally in the atmosphere or in the composition of air.

 

Normally they are filled with either a fluorocarbon, or butane. Butane is obviously super flammable, given that it's the fuel of choice for lighters and small lamps, etc.

 

Outside of that, even chemicals that are normally not very flammable can become incredibly flammable when aerosolized.

[dalekphalm]

22 minutes ago, TheTechWizardThatNeedsHelp said:

Its compressed, so it can explode/

Well yes, but I don't think explosion means what you think it means.

Quote

a violent and destructive shattering or blowing apart of something, as is caused by a bomb.

Explosions do not require flames or fire. So the fact that it's compressed, and it can explode, has literally nothing to do with it being flammable. This is why in Health and Safety systems (such as WHMIS) separates explosion risk from flammable risk as two totally separate things.

 

A compressed gas like Helium can still explode, but poses literally zero risk of fire.

16 minutes ago, Duckson McQuack said:

It shouldn't be. Besides nitrogen, the vast majority of the balance is oxygen and argon, neither of which is flammable. If you're talking about the canned stuff, it's the propellant that's flammable.

1,1-difluoroethane is a common one.

Not sure where you're getting your info from, but he's talking about "compressed air in a can" - not air sucked out of the atmosphere and compressed into a tank (eg: a powered air compressor for a shop, etc).

 

Canned air literally contains no air. No oxygen. No Nitrogen. Not sure about argon, but I've seen no mention of that in any documents I've read, but it's possible.

12 minutes ago, TheTechWizardThatNeedsHelp said:

Also, explosions. 

Yes but irrelevant. A can of Coke can explode, but I don't think Coke is flammable.

[airborne spoon]

On 9/3/2020 at 10:13 AM, dalekphalm said:

A compressed gas like Helium can still explode, but poses literally zero risk of fire...

 

Depends on how much helium is in there and what type of container its in. Exploding birthday balloon=harmless, exploding 500lb steel helium container=quite dangerous while the helium wouldn't catch fire the likely hood of the explosion causing a fire is within reason

[dalekphalm]

3 hours ago, airborne spoon said:

Depends on how much helium is in there and what type of container its in.

No it doesn't - I'm not saying there cannot be secondary files that have other fuel sources - but Helium literally can't burn, as it's a noble gas.

3 hours ago, airborne spoon said:

Exploding birthday balloon=harmless, exploding 500lb steel helium container=quite dangerous while the helium wouldn't catch fire the likely hood of the explosion causing a fire is within reason

Yes, that's precisely my point though. It can pose a risk and the risk depends on the energy of the explosion. But even the most deadly helium explosion would not cause fire unless there was an external fuel source.

[DrMadFellow]

Fun story, I once used compressed air on a projector that had been running hot for like 6 hours. I created a giant flame ball that blew out the projector lamp.

[Lord Vile]

9 hours ago, dalekphalm said:

No it doesn't - I'm not saying there cannot be secondary files that have other fuel sources - but Helium literally can't burn, as it's a noble gas.

Yes, that's precisely my point though. It can pose a risk and the risk depends on the energy of the explosion. But even the most deadly helium explosion would not cause fire unless there was an external fuel source.

Agree the explosion of a helium canister wouldn’t cause a fire, if the metal is hot enough it might set something on fire when it lands but other than that no fire. 

[dalekphalm]

7 hours ago, Lord Vile said:

Agree the explosion of a helium canister wouldn’t cause a fire, if the metal is hot enough it might set something on fire when it lands but other than that no fire. 

For sure. Though whether the metal was hot would really depend on the nature of the explosion - too high pressure causing the container to lose integrity could cause it to heat up enough, depending on the pressure reached. Increasing the pressure by it's nature will cause an increase in temperature in the helium itself.

 

Other outside interference and environmental conditions could come into play too.