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WARNING: Ethyl Glycol can Kill

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bryan_d

Member
Joined
Dec 27, 2001
Location
Santa Clara, CA
Just a heads up to those that do not know.

I am sure everyone knows not to consume your coolant but pay attention to your pets! It can take only one teaspoon to kill your dog and far less for a cat. I had the misfortune of having a leaking resevoir that I had to drain quickly only to return to a huge puddle of coolant right beside my cat. Cats and dogs WILL lick the coolant because Ethyl Glycol smells sweet and they will drink it readily. What is even worse is that you will not know your pets have consumed this substance until it is too late. So basically if you see your pets acting drunk or stumbling about, the damage is already irreversible.

For more info check out this site:
http://www.petplace.com/cats/ethylene-glycol-toxicosis-in-cats/page1.aspx

I know many of you will say, "I leak check my system to make sure I do not have leaks", but so did I. 48Hrs of leaktesting to be exact. I was lucky enough that I got my cats to the clinic in time.

No more watercooling for me:(
n1e3i8.jpg
Bryan d
 
Man,
I am really sorry to hear about this. A familiar thing happened to my girlfriend a few years ago. Her father left an open bucket of coolant in the garage, and the door wide open. Their cat smelled the coolant and drank a decent amount of it, only to seizure later on that night. It was a terrible accident, as well as your own. I am very sorry about this bro but glad that the cat made it out ok.

Dom
 
if you get the "pet safe" antifreeze, it doesnt smell sweet to them and isnt as harmful. that is the **** i use as a just in case. you always could just not use antifreeze and just use something else.
 
RV antifreeze (for an RV's watersystem) is the safest, being made for drinking water systems using Food Grade propylene glycol. The "pet safe" stuff is not food grade PG, but is considered safe.
The drawback is that the corrosion inhibitors are meant to be flushed out yearly and replenished, so no long term system running with this stuff...
 
You don't have to go that far as not to water cool because of Ethylene Glycol. Besides you don't need that poison or any other poison coolant in your system.
Distilled water is OK to use without anything else.
Check my post on this on a other thread. I gave up Ethylene Glycol because of health matter.


MoreGooder said:
Huh? Oil and water don't mix. Now, I wonder how this combo works? Please elaborate, and most especially on the health issues you refer to.

Thanks,
MG

About my health I can tell, using distilled water and ethylene glycol 20%. I removed my fans so the water temp gets pretty high. I now use only a small external aluminum water tank.
So I started to have problems with my eye's, they started to itch and get red. Next I started to have stomach aches and muscles started to hurt in my legs. Next I ran for the toilet every time I started the computer. What I'm saying in this is that the ethylene fumes forced me to go an pee, and also that hurt allot.

I looked up everything about ethylene glycol and found this things happening to me described. It attacks kidney, brain, tissue, liver, blood-vessel and many other things.
You will wonder now, yes occurs if you drink it this will happened, and also drinking 100 ml will get your life.
But there is the fumes that we find irrelevant but they are relevant. And they easily get out of the system, wondering that small things like atoms you can not seal how much you try, and this fumes will cause this to you. The more temp there is in your loop the more affected you will get.

So as I said I use olive oil and water. The oil I use for grease my system, and it does it very well without me getting poisoned.
 
Maviryk said:
:cry: :cry: No more kitty!!! :cry: :cry:

No no,

My cats are still here but I still feel horrible for what had happened and just wanted to spread the word so other cats and owners do not have to go through the same ordeal as I.

I will look into the "pet safe" additives but right now I am getting out of the game because my girlfriend and I had to drop a great of money for these two guys. It was in the excess of $1,500.00 to get them treated. So if anyone wants to know, the antidote is roughly $600.00 a bottle.

n1qr2h.jpg

Thanks for the reponses guys,
Bryan d
 
I'd say someone make this a

STICKY

because if it's true that many people use Ethyl Glycol, it should be something to put in the stickies as an important precaution.
 
after filling my w/c system with prestone's eth glycol antifreeze, i got some on a cut i had on my hand and it felt sore for 3 days or so lol
 
STICKY. I'm sure most of us would agree that we would rather have our pets than a good computer.
 
Sticky! I love kitties. Good to hear they're ok!

I wanna get one... as soon as I move in to my new apartment...

But yea, sticky, and more kitties! :clap:
 
Thanks guys,

I just found more info from www.care2.com:

"The toxic element in traditional antifreeze is ethylene glycol. The new kind of antifreeze contains not ethylene glycol, but propylene glycol, which is somewhat safer. In fact, propylene glycol is found in pet foods, cosmetics, and over-the-counter preparations."

Hopefully others hear the word,
Bryan d
 
Hmmmm, that would explain why i felt weird after sucking out the coolant in the bottom of my loop.

Thanks for the heads up. I think ill use an alternative to it when i rebuild my computer over easter break. My only pet is a bird who is deadly afraid of even going near my computer, but I would rather be safe then sorry.
 
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