Use of commercial aerosol lubricants
 

Are commercial aerosol lubricants like WD-40 used for applications such as lubricating cabin and cockpit seat tracks?

Only if you use the special formula from "Bunnings Aerospace".

Or Mitre DC 10?

Actually WD-40 is a Water Dispersant, and took 40 recepies before they got it right; WD-40 is useless as a lubricant. There are a whole lot of good lubricants out there. The best ones are dry film lubricants for your applications on seats and such. Won't smell, and won't pick-up dust, lint, and dirt, and won't mar your pant legs.
Graphite in spray cans,( black in color) Teflon in spray cans ( colorless) are excellent, and widely used.

Cheers,

Thanks for that. I'm actually trying to determine if airlines use WD-40 and the like for in cockpit/pax cabin applications rather than identify a suitable lubricant per se.

It is widely believed one of the largest constituents of WD-40 is fish oil - which is the reason why the spray is water-repelling, and leaves a protective coating. As a lubricant, it is on the lower levels of lubricating ability.
There are better seat slide track products available. Look for some of the door lock spray lubricants, that leave a lubricant coating.
My personal choice is the spray lubricants that contain PTFE and Molybdenum Disulphide. MoS2 is well known for its dry lubricating abilities.
Greases are constructed from heavy-consistency metallic soap fillers, that contain mineral oils suspended in the filler material.
Over time (a month or two) the oils will drain away from the metallic soap filler, which then can no longer carry out its job of lubrication.

Thanks for that onetrack but I'm not actually looking for a good lubricant for seat tracks, I'm trying to determine if airlines use WD-40 and the like for in cockpit/pax cabin applications.

I think I know where this thread might be headed! Are you trying to link the demise of MH 370 with a possible explosion due to the reaction of a cockpit crew oxygen leak with a hydrocarbon source like WD40?

I think you might be right. I'm not thinking explosion (that would not be consistent with any of the data or physical evidence), I'm thinking fire - oxygen enriched atmosphere, cockpit foot heaters, seat track grease or other hydrocarbon-based lubricant, ...

I'm not putting forward that hypothesis, I was just pointing out the direction that you might be headed in! :ugh:

If I may add to onetrack's response, the major component of WD-40 is kerosene (paraffin, to those in UK).

I was saying that I think you're right when you say you think you know where the thread was going, and you were.

I'd looked up the safety data sheet for WD-40 a while back, by weight it's >60% naphtha (petroleum), hydrodesulfurized heavy (CAS #64742-82-1). Naphtha has basically the same flash point (47 °C) and upper/lower flammability limits (1. 4 - 7. 6 % (V)) as petrol (motor spirit, gasoline).

I think it unlikely that a gradual leak in the 02 system could cause the problem. The equipment cooling/aircond would disperse that limited amount of 02 very quickly. Though you couldn't argue that a major leak might not cause a reaction "if all the holes in the cheese lined up"!

You might be right. You only need a 10% increase in the concentration of oxygen (from the usual 21% to 23%) to achieve an oxygen-enriched atmosphere. Get to 23% and the chemistry of fire changes and it changes dramatically - ordinarily non-flammable materials become flammable, ignition temperatures come down, flammability ranges widen, rate of combustion goes up, flame temperatures go up.
And it takes far less oxygen (by weight or number of molecules) to raise the concentration of an 8,000,foot atmosphere to 23% than would be required to achieve the same result at sea level.
However, as interesting as that might be it is all largely irrelevant if WD-40 or a similar compound isn't present. Which brings me back to my original question:
Are commercial aerosol lubricants like WD-40 used for applications such as lubricating cabin and cockpit seat tracks?

What you really need to find out is what materials Malaysian use on their 777s. It doesn't matter what other operators use!

I might add, WD-40 is regularly used as a tractor diesel/industrial diesel engine, aid to cold starting, in place of the ether-based starting aids.
It is quite flammable - but no more so than diesel - and it has the benefit of not burning explosively as large doses of ether do, which quite often results in broken piston rings.

Well, I can't answer that question precisely - nor can I definitely say it's in use in Malaysian aviation - but it sure looks like the Bulgarian agents for WD-40 are happy to recommend it for aviation purposes. :)

http://bomarbg.eu/wd-40_aviation.html

I've got a similar thread in the South East Asia forum. You wouldn't know any maintainers at MAB would you?

Be careful of WD40 around some plastics, specifically Polycarbonate and Polystyrene, it attacks a degrades them.

Not come across it in use on AIRBUS/BOEING for any applications , don't believe its in the list of materials for either. Recall its use in the military at least 25 years ago , spraying it down Buccaneer engines after low level sea trips .Got stopped when it was found to attack different rubbers and insulation on cables