How Does Bromothane™ Compare
to HCFC-141b?

There is no doubt that HCFC-141b is a great cleaner and for more than a decade it has provided companies around the world a reasonable choice for precision cleaning. It's powerful, it easily forms azeotropes with cleaning additives, it works great in vapor degreasers, it has relatively good toxicity ratings, it's nonflammable, and so on. Not bad credentials.

But HCFC-141b is an ozone-depleter; specifically, a Class II Ozone-Depleting substance under the U.S. Clean Air Act. Because of this fact, the Montreal Protocol required that (for most of the world) the manufacturing of HCFC-141b was phased-out at the end of 2002. So this would be a bad time to be selecting HCFC-141b as your primary cleaner!

Other regulatory complexities vexed HCFC-141b. For example, it was legal in aerosol applications in the U.S., but not in the E.U. However, it was legal to use HCFC-141b in a vapor degreaser in Europe but not in the U.S.! Those regulators work hard to keep things interesting, don't you think?

Another issue is the boiling point of the cleaner. Most of the HCFC-141b products had a very low boiling point. In manual cleaning applications, this meant the solvent dried quickly -- which was convenient -- but in a vapor degreaser it increased the solvent losses.

[Photo, left] HCFC-141b was a popular solvent choice in North America for more than a decade. One of the most popular brand names was "Genesolv", now made by Honeywell Corp. The Bromothane™ products, due to their low surface tension and high wetting index, can easily replace HCFC-141b products in most circumstances.

Another potential problem with HCFC-141b was the aggressive nature of the solvent. HCFC-141b attacks many types of plastics, gaskets and coatings. It can be diluted with less aggressive solvents to minimize this problem but those additives add to the cost.

Contrast these parameters with Bromothane™. First, Bromothane™ solvents are stronger cleaners and will exceed the performance of HCFC-141b in almost every cleaning application.

Bromothane™ materials compatibility is almost identical to HCFC-141b.

And, best of all, Bromothane™ solvents work perfectly in the same equipment used with HCFC-141b, so it would be unusually to need any new investment (although if the degreaser was old, it may need some upgrades to minimize solvent losses).

But it's not a perfect fit. HCFC-141b has a toxicity rating of 400 ppm. Bromothane™ solvents have been given a AEL of 10 ppm. Because of this, Bromothane™ solvents are only sold for applications using engineered systems -- no dipping, wiping, cold cleaning or aerosol sprays are permitted. If those types of applications are required, we recommend switching to the Vertrel^® solvents from DuPont.

Bromothane™ solvents also have a pronounced aroma. After about 15 minutes people stop noticing the aroma, but it is quite obvious at first use. A little user training resolves this issue.

In terms of the environment, Bromothane™ is not completely ozone-safe. It has an ozone-depletion potential of 0.0006, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The cleaner has a high VOC content but a very low global warming impact. The cleaner has been proposed for SNAP-approval and recommended as an excellent replacement for HCFC-141b in cleaning applications.

So if your company is using HCFC-141b for any application, time is running out. Since the production has shut-down on this great old cleaner, prices will rise and availability will decline. Now is a great time to switch to Bromothane™ before the global inventory of HCFC-141b is exhausted and your change-out is rushed.

Updated: Jan 5, 2004
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