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PaperclipPerfector  8mo ago (text post)   26582 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of September 4, 2023

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This is somewhat tangential to the culture war, but WD-40 will soon be banned in Canada, despite what the headline of the linked article says.

At issue is a 2021 piece of legislation that comes into force on January 1, 2024. It limits the amount of Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) in many products, setting the limit for "multi-purpose lubricants that are not solid or semi-solid" to 25% (Listed in Schedule 1, Item 26(i)). Needless to say, this is much lower than the 65% VOC concentration listed on WD-40's MSDS pages (website link) for the classic product.

WD-40 Company responded to talk of the ban by evoking the spectre of Fake News, and didn't mention how they would comply with the regulations. I've sent them a message asking if the MSDS info will be valid into 2024 (because I don't trust journalists, particularly when they can't find the "VOC" entry in a table and don't understand that "low vapor pressure" means less volatile.), and I strongly suspect that it will be reformulated by replacing at least 40.1% of WD-40's composition with substantially different chemicals. EDIT: They've answered, and it will be reformulated.

This ties into the same issues as @some's top-level comment on food names: I don't think that breaded tofu is "Chicken" (or even "Chikn"), and I don't think that a >40% new lubricant is "WD-40".

See also: PYREX vs. pyrex

I dug into this a little more. You linked to the WD-40 Canada website, but when I get the SDS off the USA website, it looks like they already changed the American formulation to 24.1% VOC. The term they use is "50-state VOC compliant," (thanks California).

So yeah, they'll probably just start shipping to Canada the same product already in circulation in America. Presumably if there was a big difference in performance you would have heard about it by now.

Presumably if there was a big difference in performance you would have heard about it by now.

By my understanding, the volatility of its organic compounds is a core feature that distinguishes WD-40 from normal spray lubricants. It dissolves gunk, penetrates through cracks/threads, and spreads over surfaces because of the relatively small molecules (which are also volatile).

Also, where are you getting your news from, that you would expect to hear about things in a tiny niche like this??

Also, where are you getting your news from, that you would expect to hear about things in a tiny niche like this??

He still believes we live in a world where when something is an issue, people start talking about it, which kicks off some sort of a chain reaction, rather then getting throttled to hell.

This is antagonistic. You've had 6 previous warnings for bad behavior. And two of those were just last month for this exact kind of low effort antagonistic posting:

https://www.themotte.org/post/621/culture-war-roundup-for-the-week/128997?context=8#context https://www.themotte.org/post/640/culture-war-roundup-for-the-week/132787?context=8#context

3-day ban.

Man, I'm starting to wish for an AI-powered "are you sure you want to post this" feature they have on twitter, because half the time there's no telling what will set you guys off.

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