Coolant
Post by Mike Gugger
In 1999 a study showed the total cost of handling, use and disposal of metal working fluids (coolant) was an eleven times multiplier of the purchase price. Think of it this way – if you purchase $10,000 a year of fluids for your shop, the total cost to use and dispose of that fluid is $110,000!
Given this, do you think you should take a closer look at the use and maintenance of your fluids? I have a couple of suggestions…
First off, don’t allow the coolant sales person to come in and offer, for free usually, to clean out a sump, fill it with his fluid and allow you to compare it to what you are using now. If you cleaned out any sump and filled it with a fresh charge of what you are using now, I am willing to bet the cleaned sump would perform better. So this is not really proving anything.
Secondly, there are ways to determine which fluid is better for use in your shop. Note that this does not mean that there is one fluid that will work for operation in your shop or that one fluid will work in every shop, you need to determine what is best for you. One of the key issues is the quality of the water that you use. Consider this – if you have a 7% solution of fluid in your sumps that means that 93% of what’s in there is water. Hard water in particular can harm your fluid and diminish its effective life escalating that 11x multiplier.
And lastly, does your fluid smell? Maintenance is the key to good fluid life. Do you skim the tramp oil off the top of the fluid in every sump? Do you maintain the recommended concentration for the type of machining you are doing? Do you check the pH of the sump on a regular basis? If you are not doing these things habitually, it is an indication of poor maintenance.
Check out the “Pollution Prevention Guide to Metal Working Fluids.” This is a cradle to grave guide on how to select, use, maintain and dispose of the fluids in your shop. If you are not doing these things, it is costing you money.
MG
