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Tallow in plastics – why? (2016)
41–50 of 97 posts
Re: Tallow in plastics – why? (2016)
#42Perhaps the main thing about tallow is that there's a glut of it, likewise lard. People want more and more meat, but want it to be leaner, creating a surplus of tallow. Also, its use in deep fryers, e.g., by the fast food industry, was curtailed when vegetable oil became preferable in the market. A relative of mine worked in a chemical factory in Detroit, that made lubricants for metal working. Many of them were eith…
I was curious, and found the ingredients for a 1992 bar of zest from an eBay photo. It was a mix of soap with the detergent sodium cocoglyceryl ether sulfonate. The current recipe is all soap but they added a couple of chelating agents: Pentasodium Pentetate, and Tetrasodium Etidronate. The problem with the new recipe is these chelating agents suck. The only thing that can jail Mg/Ca2+ faster than soap scum forms is sodium triphosphate, but that is no longer allowed and doesn’t belong in bar soap. It makes no sense that they changed the recipe.
Detergent products have gotten so bad that I have started mixing my own. I add STP to laundry and dishwasher powder and I never rinse dishes before putting them in the dishwasher. They come out sparkling. The whole phosphate thing is overblown. Phosphates promote algae growth, but the algae also breaks down loads of other contaminants. The problem can be mitigated with a simple fountain in the discharge pond.
Removal of STP from everything is great for plumbers as pipes are now all lined with sticky soap scum which means periodic snaking.
Re: Tallow in plastics – why? (2016)
#43This submission claims that "traditional banknotes which are based on special and expensive paper suffer from poor tear properties and they have limited life", and touts tallow-dependent plastics as a solution. US currency is made of a cotton-linen blend, so (pedantically) it is not paper. Per US Currency Education Program [1], "it would take 4000 double folds, forwards and backwards, to tear a banknote". Is this ins…
Old UK banknotes, made of 'paper', had no real durability issue. I think the key benefit of polymer notes is the opportunity for far more security features. Holograms, Prismatic effects, braille printing, variable transparency, etc. Also, they're probably cheaper, considering most of Europe uses polymer notes too. The UK had issues with banknote forgery, so a change over to a new base material makes a good clean cuto…
The United States created the Secret Service in 1865 to combat forgery: https://en.wikipedia.org//wiki/United_States_Secret_Service
And the currency itself has numerous security features to detect counterfeits: https://carnation-inc.com/blogs/money-handling-blog/100-bill...
Re: Tallow in plastics – why? (2016)
#44This submission claims that "traditional banknotes which are based on special and expensive paper suffer from poor tear properties and they have limited life", and touts tallow-dependent plastics as a solution. US currency is made of a cotton-linen blend, so (pedantically) it is not paper. Per US Currency Education Program [1], "it would take 4000 double folds, forwards and backwards, to tear a banknote". Is this ins…
They say “paper” but it was a cotton blend much like USD. They’re shit talking old notes because it’s good for business. I haven’t touched cash in a while but I don’t recall any meaningful difference in the durability of “paper” GBP and USD. Edit: the additional context for this article is at the time the notes were released, there was a lot of anger when people discovered the notes contained animal products.
The polymer ones always look pristine, which is nice, and they're fairly difficult to tear.. however as soon as you do manage to get a nick in them, they tear right the way across almost immediately.
I suspect most notes end up being replaced mainly because they get tatty rather than being torn, though, and I would bet a high denomination that by that metric, polymer notes last far longer.
Re: Tallow in plastics – why? (2016)
#45Perhaps the main thing about tallow is that there's a glut of it, likewise lard. People want more and more meat, but want it to be leaner, creating a surplus of tallow. Also, its use in deep fryers, e.g., by the fast food industry, was curtailed when vegetable oil became preferable in the market. A relative of mine worked in a chemical factory in Detroit, that made lubricants for metal working. Many of them were eith…
> soap scum in hard water areas I have a question, I live in a soft water area so I'm not familiar with the problem. Would you have the same issue if you were using vegetable oil-based soap (e.g. Marseille soap, Castile soap etc.)? Or is any type of "fat" going to cause the same issue?
They are all made from some type of oil/fat. Things with sulfate at the end of the ingredient don’t form soap scum, but classic soap made with fat and lye produce a salt of a fatty acid which combines with hard water to make soap scum.
Re: Tallow in plastics – why? (2016)
#46This submission claims that "traditional banknotes which are based on special and expensive paper suffer from poor tear properties and they have limited life", and touts tallow-dependent plastics as a solution. US currency is made of a cotton-linen blend, so (pedantically) it is not paper. Per US Currency Education Program [1], "it would take 4000 double folds, forwards and backwards, to tear a banknote". Is this ins…
Even more pedantically, paper made from cotton and linen is paper by most definitions. Wood pulp paper is by far the most common these days, but that's surprisingly recent (mid-19th century). Before that it was mostly cotton, linen and hemp.
> that's surprisingly recent
Cellulose in wood is contained in a block of wood, not like the easily accessed strands of cellulose in cotton. It's mixed together with lignin and other components in wood. It is possible to make a weak, brittle kind of paper with straight wood pulp that's mashed and cooked and pressed. Mixing in a little sawdust to rag paper is an old practice. But properly freeing the cellulose requires both extensive mechanical shredding and chemical treatments. As far as 19th century technologies goes it's underappreciated. From what I can piece together, around 1800 in England, a labourer's daily wages would buy a few dozen sheets of paper. By 1900, they could buy literally reams and reams of the stuff.
Re: Tallow in plastics – why? (2016)
#47The phrase "There are alternative options such as non-animal fats and hydrocarbon waxes, but these might increase the cost of production, reduce efficiency, affect recyclability and finally negatively affect the environment.".... ....is such a semi-randomly grab-bagged set of statements similar to a set of nigh-unverifiable closing statements made as a desperate last-ditch attempt at proving a point in a debate that…
Anything from a corporation saying “fearful” (for your wallet) things like “may cost more to produce(costing you more)” or reduce efficiency (costing you more) etc… Is just reworded excuses as to the corporation’s choosing profit. For they will never say “profit us less.”
I dunno… it isn’t always a sliding scale… sometimes a change actually switches a product to too expensive to sell.
Re: Tallow in plastics – why? (2016)
#48Perhaps the main thing about tallow is that there's a glut of it, likewise lard. People want more and more meat, but want it to be leaner, creating a surplus of tallow. Also, its use in deep fryers, e.g., by the fast food industry, was curtailed when vegetable oil became preferable in the market. A relative of mine worked in a chemical factory in Detroit, that made lubricants for metal working. Many of them were eith…
> soap scum in hard water areas I have a question, I live in a soft water area so I'm not familiar with the problem. Would you have the same issue if you were using vegetable oil-based soap (e.g. Marseille soap, Castile soap etc.)? Or is any type of "fat" going to cause the same issue?
I live in a hard water area and use exclusively Castile soap in the house. I clean soap scum every time I wash the shower/tub.
Re: Tallow in plastics – why? (2016)
#49This piece avoids mentioning why it was written- around this time, it came to light that new UK bank notes contain beef tallow so are problematic for Hindu and vegan people who rightly have problems with these replacing old paper notes.
>rightly have problems with these replacing old paper notes. Rightly?
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Re: Tallow in plastics – why? (2016)
#50Stearic acids are used everywhere, including detergents, shampoos, soaps, etc. TIL they're made from tallow.
Not all. Some is from plants, like palm or shea.