On Tue, 15 Jan 2008 17:17:11 -0500, "Not@home" wrote:

Aircraft deicing fluid, which is usually a mixture of ethylene glycol
and alcohol, removes ice and prevents, for a while, at least, reicing.
You could probably find it at the mechanic's shop at a small airport.

wrote:
We are having a very cold spell again, after a January thaw. The
push-pull start switch on my tractor is stuck. I also have sliding
aluminum barn windows that are frozen in their tracks, and I need to
be able to open these windows so the horses get fresh air or it gets
real stinky inside.

I use a hair dryer on the tractor, but that gets tiring to do that all
the time in freezing cold. I have not used the hair dryer on the
windos because I am afraid the glass might crack from the heat
difference.

I am looking for some sort of spray that will displace the ice as well
as lubricate and prevent freezing again. Does any such thing exist?
(Not WD40, I tried it, it dont help). Silicone spray seems to help on
tyhe tractor switch for a few days, but only after using the hair
dryer, and it dont last long.

Is there anything made for this that will both thaw, and lubricate?

This has been the worse year for things freezing up because the
weather keeps changing.

Thanks


Lots of good tips on here, not sure which to try first. Maybe just
some antifreeze mixed with Heet would do ?????

Thanks for all the advice. I welcome any more ideas, and hopefully it
will help others too.

There's always one thing I wondered. When people live in the antartic
where it is always winter, dont their houses (and everything else) get
buried after a few years? We've had a tougher than usual winter so
far, and I walk to my (farm type) yard hydrant, and I have to bend
down to connect the hose now, when I water my animals. In the summer
that thing is face level. The spigot on my house was buried and I had
to dig a hole in the snow to even get to it. The other day I told a
friend "I'm getting really tall". He looked at me with a puzzled look
and said "why is that". I said the yard hydrant is getting really
short. He laughed....

That snow just keeps packing and building up, and since we have had a
record amount this year, I hit my head on the barn roof overhang on
the feed room. That's an addon, so its a lower roof, but in summer I
got 2 feet of clearance under it. Now I got to be careful not to get
the sharp corner of the tin agaisnt my forehead. In fact I took a
snips and rounded it off the other day. I have had several doors that
no longer opened on the barn until I finally started busting ice
packed snow.

Winter will end here (soon I hope), but in the antartic, it would seem
that every few years a new house would have to be built on top of the
old one, and the old one becomes the basement, which over time could
be basement upon basement ???????