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Stained tubing

A

AggieMEEN

Gawd
Joined
Mar 2, 2003
Messages
756
*sigh* I hate to bother everyone with this...

I'm transferring my current WC rig into a separate external enclosure. When I drained the rig, I noticed that the UV dye that I had been using (red) had stained the tubing with a red/pink hue.

Is there any tried-and-true method to removing this stain, or am I SOL?
 
I think you are SOL, that is the dye being absorbed into the tubing.

You can try to bleach it though, but that might just make the tubing white, I dunno.
 
Originally posted by AggieMEEN
*sigh* I hate to bother everyone with this...

I'm transferring my current WC rig into a separate external enclosure. When I drained the rig, I noticed that the UV dye that I had been using (red) had stained the tubing with a red/pink hue.

Is there any tried-and-true method to removing this stain, or am I SOL?
Click to expand...

your kinda sol.. that is dye doing its job
 
Tubing is the cheapest part of a WC setup. Just replace it with something better than you already have.
 
you should be able to clean it... the tubing shouldn't have 'absorbed' anything... if it absorbed it that'd mean it was permeable, and tubing is meant to hold things inside the tubing, not within the walls (and therefore eventually out... of the walls?)...
It's probably just crap build up on the walls of your tubing that have been dyed/stained by your dye... I get cloudy tubes all the time. It may or may not be algae, but with proper anti-algae/growth additives (read betadine) you shouldn't have too many problems. A quick fix would be taking (depending on the length of your tubing) a chopstick and a cotton ball (make sure the cotton ball is large enough to fully touch all walls of the tubing, but not too big as to get stuck) and jam the cotton ball through the tubes. Does a pretty good job of cleaning it, but unless you're using pricier tubing such as clearflex or tygon, it's probably not worth it.
 
all forms of vinyl can be permeated by certain chemicals. There si some kind of tygon that has a liner that is designed to be checmical-proof, so I would say to try that if mal-colored tubing is that bad of an issue.
 
I was really upset about this at first too, until I realized my silicone tubbing glows way better after the UV dye soaks in :)
 
Lol, what would happen if you ran alcohol through the motors and pipes? That seems to be able to get just about anything out... ^_^
 
you should be able to clean it... the tubing shouldn't have 'absorbed' anything... if it absorbed it that'd mean it was permeable, and tubing is meant to hold things inside the tubing, not within the walls (and therefore eventually out... of the walls?)...
Click to expand...

Actually, all compounds are permeable to some degree to other chemicals, there is no such compound that does not posses to some degree a level of permeability. To suggest that such a compound exists would be saying that the molecular structure of this compound is such that there is absolutely no inter or intramolecular 'gaps'. For such an event to occur all laws of physics would need to be defied, specifically the Weak and Strong Nuclear forces. The closer two nuclei approach one another the stronger the repulsion (until they reach their potential energy well, which is the optimal distance found between these two nuclei), when their distance leaves that of their potential energy well as they approach each other the repulsive forces QUICKLY (they approach a lim actually) repel them from each other. My point? There is ALWAYS space between nuclei, and INSIDE nuclei. As such there is ALWAYS the potential for other molecules permeating these gaps. Being that the sole purpose of a dye is to permeate these gaps and permanently imbed themselves within these gaps I find it hard to believe that tubing is completely impermeable to dye. On a side note the major mechanism through which tubing prevents water permeability is based on polarity. Water being very polar is resisted by the non polar nature of the tubing and effectively keeps water from escaping, and keeps intramolecular permeability low due to electrostatic repulsion). Anyways, not trying to be rude or anything, but I thought you might appreciate a little science lesson (lol yeah right eh?).

In terms of actually removing this dye, I doubt you will find an effective way of doing so ... though the bleach idea sounds like a good one, give that a try :). If not, go spend 0.50/foot on some new tubing :).
 
owned :(
Thanks for the science lesson, but... i know :p
I have no clue what tubing he's using, but i doubt that it's absorbing the dye (noticeably, at least). Clean it out with the cotton swab/chopstick method and see what happens. I've always gotten a cloudy film develop on my tubing, and i'm guessing (from experience) that it'll come off with the cleaning.
 
I do know for a fact that tygon R-3603 will absorb the dye from antifreeze, and the higher the water temp, the more readily it will absorb it.

I have about 5ft of sickly green colored tygon sitting around now. I really should throw it all out.

As far as my cloudy tubing....I expected it to get like that, it's just generic home depot vinyl. At $4 for a 20' roll, I can't complain too much.
 
Thanks for the responses, everyone.

I'm using Clearflex 60.

I also have some pretty long segments of tubing, so I doubt the cottonball/chopstick solution will work all that well for me. The solution I was looking for was more of a solution I could run through the tubing that would clean it up (there is none that I know of, save bleach, and I sure as hell am not running that through my rig).

Other than a slight pinkish stain, the tubing works just fine. Screw appearances, I think I'll just go with what works and save myself a little money.
 
i run clearflex as well, i get a bit of cloudy residue no matter what, i added a bit of bleach into my loop this time (never got around to picking up some betadine) and it's still cloudy... i use hi-liter as dye though, so i'm not expecting all too much..
 
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