GreenKnee wrote: ↑Tue Jan 25, 2022 12:23 pm
Interesting, care to indulge me in why PTFE is bad? I use all sorts of industrial lubricants and cleaners etc in my line of work and so I feel I should be aware of any nasties I could come in contact with. I've kind of gone with the ignorant approach of 'if it's available to use it's probably ok'.
I have bone nuts fitted to all my guitars by my luthier but I still like to add some lube on all points of contact (unless a rocking bridge) to ensure good tuning stability when I'm wailing around on the vibrato arm. When I have a look at friends' guitars that won't stay in tune I find simply swapping the strings and lubricating everything cures it.
There are many safety and ecological concerns with Teflon, but the biggest is PFOA (also known as C8). It's a very well-established carcinogen and is linked to cancers of the kidney and testicles, as well as birth defects and thyroid disease. It doesn't break down in the environment, and can be found in the blood of 98% of Americans. DuPont dumped it freely into the ocean and Ohio River for decades.
PFOA was phased out of the manufacture of food-grade PTFE in the US in recent years, and has been phased out of some - but not all - non-food-grade PTFE has eliminated it.
DuPont began substituting another compound they label "GenX" that has, shockingly, been showing evidence that it's just as dangerous. But, you know,
there isn't conclusive data on that, so they have plausible deniability to keep going with it until enough people develop cancer and/or until it's measurable in the entire human population's bloodstream.
So, I still generally avoid teflon whenever I can.
The artist formerly known as mbene085.
