Resurrecting a Blue Barrel

[LanceR]

Very nice, Mike


I'll be emptying the barrel with the Oxyclean in it tomorrow or the next day and will report back with whatever the result is. I also had the thought that washing it with liquid dish washing detergent might be worth trying (if needed).

At any rate, since I got all 8 barrels for $80 once I/we get the best process figured out I'll have some pretty inexpensive barrels. And I'll pass some on to the oldest son and his scout troop.

Best regards to all,


Lance

 

[Guest]

I'll be emptying the barrel with the Oxyclean in it tomorrow or the next day and will report back with whatever the result is. I also had the thought that washing it with liquid dish washing detergent might be worth trying (if needed).

Lance, I tried a scrubbing with Dawn first. Then various vinegar & Dawn “Magic Mix” scrubbing, and eventually week-long etc soakings and etc.

Empty that Oxyclean barrel and let us know. Southcove has a plate of now week old brownies riding on this.

This experiment better conclude quickly....I bet a half plate of my wife's legendary chocolate brownies* on whether Mike's concoction (and patience) or LanceR oxy solution....would kill the STANK in these darn barrels.

FWIW the week long soak in baking soda/vinegar mix eliminated most of the stank, enough to make it a suitable food storage barrel.

Until I set again set it out in the hot sun for a few hours with the lid off. That seemed to revitalize the stank to hold-my-nose levels. Back in the cool shady shop the stench returned to barely smellable.

So, one of my next stink removal techniques will be to put the barrel outside, lid off, propped up with the sun shining inside (have to move it a few times throughout the day to best keep the sun angle inside the barrel). If the plastic is still outgassing stank it may eventually all escape from the plastic with some sunlight, UV and heat.

Before that, if it worked, I’ll try your Oxyclean. Or Foxyotter’s K.O.E, and maybe let the solution-filled barrel sit for 2 weeks this time. I’m in no rush; I really like my 45L barrel for longer trips, and the smaller Cur-tech drums for shorter outings (two 10L’s).

Also, BTW, FWIW, TLDR, I have not added or decanted pitchers of water to check the volume of that barrel. It seems larger, if perhaps narrower, than the 30L’s I have seen.

This is a “standard” 30L on the right

PC300275 by Mike McCrea, on Flickr

Same 60L, 45L and the new “30L”

P6180013 by Mike McCrea, on Flickr

Any volume guesses? I’m thinking more than 30L; maybe 35 or 40? If so, who knew there were blue barrels in so many different volumes? Still a little tall for an ankle biter foot rest ottoman, but better than the 60 or 45L in comfy fly-less feet elevation.

 

[LanceR]

Mike, the Oxyclean barrel had almost no smell when drained, rinsed and dried but after putting it in the hot sun for a while the smell strengthened. It was less than an untreated one but stronger than I'd like.

The week long soak may not have been much better than a one day soak. I checked online as to how long Oxyclean solution is effective and it seems that the oxygenation effect only lasts for 6 hours. I have another idea to try today or tomorrow and I'll report back afterwards.

Best regards to all,


Lance

 

[Foxyotter]

Mike your cleaning solution should be to your place tomorrow. USPS tracking# 9500110864020171386660

Not sure how the Vinegar (acetic acid) and baking soda (sodium bicarbonate) would be helpful. Either the acid or the base might be helpful but not together. It would create a simple acid base reaction resulting in carbonic acid and sodium acetate which would quickly break down into water and carbon dioxide. Hence the bubbles. Basically after a few minutes you have mostly water sitting in the barrel. That can be an explosive and dangerous game if your acid and or base is stronger and especially bad if chlorine is involved such as acetic acid and hypochlorite (bleach) resulting in chlorine gas.

 

[Guest]

Mike your cleaning solution should be to your place tomorrow.

Thanks, that is very generous of you. I have hopes that the K.O.E. will do the trick. Any recommendations for use? Fill the barrel with water and KOE solution and let it sit/how long? Scrub the barrel with KOE solution?

Not sure how the Vinegar (acetic acid) and baking soda (sodium bicarbonate) would be helpful. Either the acid or the base might be helpful but not together. It would create a simple acid base reaction resulting in carbonic acid and sodium acetate which would quickly break down into water and carbon dioxide.

The vinegar and baking soda solution was one suggestion from Googling “How to remove odor from plastic containers”, along with just vinegar, just baking soda, rubbing with lemon, using activated charcoal, coffee grounds, vanilla extract, sunlight and etc.

I’ll keep y’all posted as the experiment continues.

 

[Glenn MacGrady]

Another thread more entertaining than Netflix, and a job that would be harder to do during the winter solstice.

I suspect it once contained urea or fertilizer or some foul pee-u chemical; my oatmeal, grits and tortilla shells ain’t going in that stank.

I am saving that as a last resort, probably using Krylon Fusion

Yes, I too, prefer the stank of petroleum paint saturating my oatmeal, grits and tortilla shells.

If it's chemically bonded, the way to get rid of the stank is to remove a 1/8 inch layer of plastic from the inside of the barrel with a crooked knife or a Cooper internal barrel sander.

 

[Odyssey]

Krylon Fusion has stoopid high VOCs. I don't recommend it without appropriate mask wear. There are negligible VOCs odour sealer paints specifically designed for food safe areas; processing plants, walk-in freezers and refrigerators... It will set you back another 50 bucks thereabouts. Depends on how stubborn-determined you are to not slap a toilet seat on this tub and call it done.
10 bucks is a good price for a used barrel from what I've seen, and I'm sure you can solve this stink problem. Sounds like the plastic has become impregnated with nasty chemical properties. 20 minutes with a sanding pad?, followed by the soapy baking soda soak?
Best of luck with this.

 

[Foxyotter]

It is not nearly as generous has you have been with all of your posts, and experiments. It is the least I can do to show a little appreciation.

I don't have any special directions except that it is a 1/4 ounce per gallon. Mix up a gallon scrub the inside shake around, rinse and give smell test. I figure if it easily works on cat pee it should pretty much take care of anything foul and organic. Trust me I tried all sorts of stuff and some worked for my sense of smell but this works for my cats sense of smell. Good luck.

 

[Guest]

Yes, I too, prefer the stank of petroleum paint saturating my oatmeal, grits and tortilla shells.

If it's chemically bonded, the way to get rid of the stank is to remove a 1/8 inch layer of plastic from the inside of the barrel with a crooked knife or a Cooper internal barrel sander.

Glenn, if last-resort spray painted inside with Krylon Fusion my plan is to leave it open under the hot summer sun for the next few months, and hope it outgases the spray paint odor while trapping the fertilizer stank beneath a paint shield. Given the choice of oatmeal that tastes like cow crap and oatmeal that tastes like spray paint, uh, I guess I’ll skip breakfast.

Removing 1/8” of plastic would, at careful best, result in a translucently thin barrel. The sides of those poly barrels are not very thick.

Krylon Fusion has stoopid high VOCs. I don't recommend it without appropriate mask wear. There are negligible VOCs odour sealer paints specifically designed for food safe areas; processing plants, walk-in freezers and refrigerators... It will set you back another 50 bucks thereabouts.

Sounds like the plastic has become impregnated with nasty chemical properties. 20 minutes with a sanding pad?, followed by the soapy baking soda soak?

Brad, being poly I am not sure how well most paints would stick. On the other hand I have been less than impressed with Krylon Fusion adhesion on plastics. I’m sure as heck not dropping $50 on odor sealer paint that might not stick on a $10 barrel.

I have vigorously scrubbed and abraded the inside several times. The barrel smells OK when first rinsed, but when set out in the sun it soon becomes unbearably stinky again.

Before I desperation try Krylon Fusion spray the inside I want to give Foxyotter’s K.O.E. a shot. If that doesn’t work I will find a summer “station” in the yard where I can position the barrel for some interior sunshine heat and UV with the lid removed. And check it daily for trapped chipmunks or wrens.

Since the barrel smells that more worse once sun warmed it must be outgassing stank from the plastic.

The lemon-rub sounds promising. I really don’t want to rub the barrel with vanilla extract, that seems a bear attractant on par with scattering day old donuts.

It is not nearly as generous has you have been with all of your posts, and experiments. It is the least I can do to show a little appreciation.

I don't have any special directions except that it is a 1/4 ounce per gallon. Mix up a gallon scrub the inside shake around, rinse and give smell test. I figure if it easily works on cat pee it should pretty much take care of anything foul and organic.

Foxyotter, if the K.O.E works on that incredible barrel stank I have little doubt it will work on cat pee. I have some carpet and under-tile/moldings reminders of my beloved Coon Cat, from her end-of-life urinary tract infections. I miss her feline brilliance every day, best cat ever. The residual cat piss stink not so much.

I’ll mix up a gallon or so first and scrub it around. For the apparent heat-release stank I may put a solution of K.O.E inside the water filled barrel and let it sit, lid on, rotated in the hot summer sun, for a few days.

More to come.

 

[Foxyotter]

KOE will work on your cat pee issue. If it does not work on barrel I would try isopropel alcohol which is a common organic solvent.

 

[Odyssey]

"Chemist Paul Krebaum discovered a solution that changes the thiols into acids, thereby chemically neutralizing the skunk odour.
The formula is: 1 quart of 3 percent hydrogen peroxide (fresh bottle), • ¼ cup of baking soda (sodium bicarbonate), and • 1-2 teaspoons of liquid dish soap."
This formula was tested just last night when a family dog came face to about face with a skunk lurking amongst the rhubarb. It was quite the climax to our backyard family get together. A thorough soap down with this mixture and a generous rinse from the garden hose soon put things right.
I wonder if this would work on barrel stank too?

 

[LanceR]

Odyssey, that's essentially the recipe I thought I was going to try yesterday but never got to. The directions I saw suggested a 10 minute soaking or wetting down followed by a scrubbing.

 

[Guest]

Blue Barrel Stank part….I dunno, lost count.

Odyssey, that's essentially the recipe I thought I was going to try yesterday but never got to. The directions I saw suggested a 10 minute soaking or wetting down followed by a scrubbing.

Lance, how did the Skunk-off Hydrogen Peroxide solution work? I’m still going to try the K.O.E. next, but tracking on Foxyotter’s package shows it has been stuck at a mail distribution center next county over since Monday.

While I had it out, I thought to stick my head inside to give it a sniff. I can't say I know what urea smells like but I did detect a whiff of something that was familiar. Several years ago, the same odor invaded my shop. Perplexed for months, I must have emptied every cabinet and container in search of the offending source, to no avail. I learned to live with the petrol chemical smell that faded somewhat with time.

Some six months later I needed to cut a mortise and went to my new mortising machine to use for the very first time. The moment I grabbed hold of the rubber grip on the actuating lever my olfactory senses screamed Ah-ah! It had been a lousy 3-inch piece of rubber from a machine built in China. I am reminded of the cheap Chinese rubber stink every time I walk into a Harbor Freight store and today with my head in a blue barrel

Paul, I had an undiscovered odor in my shop for some weeks. OK, some months. I know what you mean about emptying cabinets and searching high and low. The culprit, discovered after considerable fruitless sniffing and searching, was a jar of old Zip-Wax car wash. I had decanted the remains of from a gallon jug of car wash into a 2L soda bottle to save shelf space; the Zipwax was eating its way through the cheap plastic soda bottle. Must have been a Diet Pepsi bottle, not genuine dissolve-a-penny Coca Cola.

I could maybe learn to live with a whiff of Harbor Freight cheap Chinese rubber permeating my oatmeal. I’d rather not.

Lance may have a better idea/description of the malodorous smell of these barrels than I; to my old farm boy nose it smells like some urea fertilizer (nitrogen-phosphorus-potassium). Not the fragrance of Harbor Freight, but reminiscent of the local farm & feed store when the doors are closed. Not appetizing.

Meanwhile, post various scrubs and soaks, I have been airing out the barrel and lid in the sun. The barrel, lid off, is relatively odorless when cool, still a bit less so when warm, but when the lid heats up woo-freaking-wee.

Back to square one:

Then I discovered that leaving just the lid in shop to stunk to high heavens.

OK, it’s the freaking lid. Or, more specifically, the freaking lid gasket.

I don't know about your WOOWEE barrel stank, but my stank is coming from the rubber gasket imbedded in the lid.

Dammit, Conk was correct. Again. That should be his epitaph. I really should pay more attention, Conk is one smart cookie.

I pulled the gasket out of the lid. It came out easily and fully intact with a pair of mosquito hemostats. That is the beefiest barrel gasket I have ever seen; no mere O-ring, it is a hard-ish “rubber” ring, a half inch wide x 3/8” tall. And my fingers stink just having touched it.

I’m hesitant to try the peroxide solution; I don’t know how the “rubber” would fare, and I doubt I can easily replace that giant gasket. I’m thinking the Kennel Odor Eliminator is less likely to dissolve that rubber, but I dunno.

Back to you Lance; pull a gasket from a stanky barrel and ask Nancy to have a whiff. Whadda ya think Nancy?

Maybe try soaking a stanky gasket in hydrogen peroxide/baking soda/Dawn and see what happens?

I’m convinced the remaining stench is mostly in the gasket, and with the lid on it continues to permeate the entire barrel and revitalize the stink.

 

[Boreal Birch]

Like watching old episodes of Columbo, the truth will come out in end. In this case the "Stank" done it, not the butler. Who is the man in the shop with the wrinkled top coat?

I once came back from a salmon fishing float trip, where I had put my fly rod away in it's sock and tube in the rain. When I got home I took it out, dried it carefully with a towel, then set it in the corner of the furnace room, hung the sock on a hook to dry. The Brass capped tube was wet inside all five feet of it so, I took it outside to my shop/hayshed/horse barn to find a dowel or hoe handle that I could tie a shop rag onto to run down the inside of the tube to get at the dampness. I leaned the tube without the cap against the roof support post in the sunshine in the open end of the hayshed, then forgot about it for a few days, then brought it into the shop. A month or two went by, I started to smell something like decaying flesh. I could never find the source of the smell which gradually got fainter an fainter. Fast forward to the next summer, getting ready for another salmon fishing trip. Found the salmon fly rod in the corner of the furnace room along with the rod sock and the rod tube cap. Where the heck did I leave the rod tube? Oh ya, out in the shop, the rod in it's sock, would not fit all the way down into the tube for some reason. Turned out that a curious red pine squirrel had crawled into the open end of the rod tube out in the hay shed, could not turn around in it and could not back out. Down in the bottom of the rod tube was the dried out husk of a squirrel. The decaying juices of it's body had eaten away at the bottom brass cap that had been swagged or glued on to the brown powder coated aluminum tube, enough so that it fell off. I was a long time in getting the smell of that squirrel out of that tube. I still have the tube somewhere in the shop, if I could find it I bet It still has a whiff of a terrible way to die. I bought a cordova covered plastic tube for the fly rod so that the salmon fishing bears would not be interested in my fishing equipment.

 

[lowangle al]

I had an unrelated and totally different thing happen to me this week. I cut 25 salmon for my neighbor and helped him get them in the freezer. When I got home I absentmindedly left my fishy pants on the chair on my wife's side of the bed. My wife who is in bed and has a good sniffer says, "I smell tuna" I ignored it and hoped she would fall asleep. A few minutes later, again she says"I SMELL TUNA" I said "I don't no nothin about any tuna" Now if she said she smelled fish I would have said something.

OK so I would have fessed up if it weren't for three things. Number one, we did have tuna earlier in the week, for all I know she could have smelled that. Number two, I was already on her bad side that evening and didn't want to make waves. Number three, she has had a thing about fish in the bedroom ever since the day that she had to forbid me from ever eating sardines in bed again. I did the right thing as she did fall asleep and is none the wiser.

 

[Guest]

Turned out that a curious red pine squirrel had crawled into the open end of the rod tube out in the hay shed, could not turn around in it and could not back out. Down in the bottom of the rod tube was the dried out husk of a squirrel.

a terrible way to die.

I can feel for that squirrel’s terrible way to die.

When I was a kid I had “forts” for miles in every direction. On one long woods wander I found a massive fallen tree spanning a small creek bed that was decayed mulch-like in the center but still solid all the way around on the outside.

I was obsessed with the book “My Side of the Mountain” at that age, and decided to excavate the soft center, making a horizontal abode. This went well at first, but then I had to start wiggling further and further into the trunk, fill my bucket and backing out to dispose of my excavated mulch.

Yup, I eventually got my entire body a good ways inside the tree, and found that I could not wiggle my way back out; what I had excavated was now too narrow to get my arms beside my body and push backwards. I doubt I knew the term “freaking out” at age 10, but yeah.

After considerable wiggling I managed to loose enough mulch alongside my body to move my arms, but there was a longish period of time where I figured I was gonna die in that tree trunk.

I gave up on that “fort”, but the memory still kinda gives me the willies.

Back to the barrel. Foxyotter’s package has been stuck in the mail next county over for six days. I ordered some K.O.E. Said I was gonna try it and dammit I will.

 

[frozentripper]

I eventually got my entire body a good ways inside the tree, and found that I could not wiggle my way back out...

Loggers found a dog mummified inside a tree trapped the same way. Glad you made it out, searchers would prob not think to look inside there.

Ripley's Believe It Or Not sort of material....


https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...ee-museum.html

 

[LanceR]

Mike, sorry for the delay in getting back to this. I've been dealing with some projects around the house and a few family matters.

Yes, the stink is coming from the foam lid gaskets on the two smaller barrels (30 and 45L?). I thought there were a couple of barrels with round tubular gaskets but I was mistaken. A spare lid has a tubular gasket but none of the lids currently on barrels do. (italics added in edit)

I suspect one good way to replace the gaskets would be to order a roll of closed cell neoprene sponge strip and lay in a new gasket. The stuff is inexpensive, self adhesive (and non-adhesive is available but harder to find), available in assorted widths and thicknesses and flexible.

The foam strip is available as little as 1/16" thick (maybe thinner?) so fine tuning gasket thickness should be easy enough for these barrels or any others someone may have that have tired seals and are leaking. The link below shows pretty high prices and neoprene sponge strip can be had for much less but it gives an idea what is available..

https://www.amazon.com/Strips-Adhesi.../dp/B07WK2J1BN

EDIT: The five 60L barrels had the lids on them but not locked on and they have foam gaskets that do not seem to have an odor issue. But as that was sitting on the cool concrete basement floor under a pallet rack I locked the lids and set them outside in the sun where it is headed to around 88F today. I'll check them in several hours as heat seems to make the stinky gaskets worse.

There are two skinny barrels of around 30-35L capacity with unusual lids and foam gaskets that also do not have a noticeable smell....at least not when in the cool basement. I locked those too and put them out in the sun. We often have edible purple spored puffball mushrooms in our lawn. Now they're joined by the rare inedible blue spored puffballs......



I pulled the two stinky gaskets and one measures 5/16" tall and the other is 3/8" tall although the lids and barrel rims seem identical and measure the same. Both have a tapered cross section like a v-belt for a pulley drive setup but I suspect that neoprene sponge wouldn't need to be tapered in cross section to work just fine. They are so darn stinky I put them in a zipper lock bag before tossing them into the trash so the garage wouldn't stink. Pulling them out of the lids exposed more surface area and they are pretty potent.




And I dug out two bundles of 1/4" closed cell neoprene sponge without an adhesive coating, maybe 40-50 square foot worth(?). I will try to cut strips off what I have and use a scarfed style joint on the ends to seal it and see what happens with two layers in the lid although it may be a few days before I get to that.



Best regards to all,


Lance

 

[LanceR]

Of course while we're pole vaulting over all these mouse turds maybe we should go into the belt and suspenders mode and add a heavy weight round bottom waterproof drum liner bag something like this....

https://www.bestcontainers.com/2m-0...reU7Mc2W96-Fcwmt-AmNyV59Z8Y4tIk8aAktFEALw_wcB

Those are nominal 15 Gallon bags but bags for 5-gallon and other pail/drum sizes are available, too. The biggest challenge would be to find a reasonable source without a $200 or 300 dollar minimum order policy. At least this place has a $30 minimum even if the bags cost more. And they are designed to roll down on the barrel as a long cuff to keep the barrel clean while filling it so they are way oversized and would allow ample space to use something like Gorilla Tape and a thin strip of foam with side lock buckles to make a roll down dry-bag style seal.

For the smaller drums I think our current pack liners of stout trash compactor bags will work just fine. Heck, there may even be enough left to form a sealing cuff on a standard 18 gallon trash compactor bag in a 60L drum. I'll have to see whether the compactor bags we have are 15 or 18 gallon.....

Best regards to all,


Lance

 

[Guest]

K.O.E. Woes Update

The K.O.E Foxyotter kindly sent me went to a post office/mail distribution center 21 miles west of my home, where tracking showed it sat for an entire week. Yesterday tracking showed that it suddenly moved to a mail distribution center 43 miles south of my home. This morning it moved to my local post office, and is now out for distribution.

I will have plenty of K.O.E. The bottle I Amazoned came one day shipping and is enough to make 64 gallons. “Eliminates even old, deeply impregnated odors from cages, floors, tables, wall and other areas”. Sounds like just the ticket, ‘cause that barrel odor is the very definition of deeply embedded. And I have some other odor areas where I’ll give it a shot.

Since I have ample K.O.E and more coming I over-proofed the ¼ oz to 1 gallon mixture recommended. The barrel is now water filled with a double-strength mix of K.O.E, alongside the K.O.E filled upside down lid. The stank source gasket is soaking in a bucket with an inch of that high-strength solution, and I may change out the K.O.E solution in the gasket bucket tomorrow.

I have it all on a wheeled platform on the back deck, so I can roll it around in full the sun. Forecast hot and sunny for a spell my plan is to let it all soak for a few days, then empty the lid and gasket soaking bucket, let them dry and have a sniff test. If they pass the sniff test I’ll empty the barrel and see how it smells in the hot sun, both open air and lid sealed.

I wonder if Southcove broke down and ate his brownies yet?

++++

Update to the update: I now have high hopes. Filled with that overproofed K.O.E solution the water in the barrel smelled just like the odor eliminator concentrate, kinda laundry detergent-ish. After a couple hours I moved the platform a few feet and the water that sloshed out had a bit of fertilizer stink to it.

I’m thinking, hoping, that the K.O.E is displacing the stank embedded in the plastic and, fingers-crossed, maybe the stink-source gasket.

I’d really like to save that gasket if I can.