Community Forums

F4Jock · 09-17-2019, 07:24 AM

We recently replaced all of the carpet and padding in our MH. While at it, I decided to make a new oak dinette table and stain and polyurethane it. (Pictures in "What Did You Do To Your Old RV Today" thread if interested.)

In any event, soon after completing this my LP gas detector started alarming. To make a long story short, after some research and playing with my explosive gas sniffer, I found that the solvent leaching from the table refinish was the likely cause. Not sure exactly what component in Minwax will do that but after a good airing out everything returned to normal.

Just posting this as an FYI. Please remember that as part of my consulting I have an explosive gas sniffer that I was able to use to pinpoint the source. Do not ignore an alarm. It may be real. Take precautions!

Skip426 · 09-17-2019, 11:52 AM

Check the build/ best before, date on the detector

Early ones were prone to false alarms ( hair spray , bacon cooking , diesel engines running close by ).

leadman · 09-21-2019, 10:21 PM

I had a 2 year old propane alarm going off when my wife sprayed Lysol air freshener. I replaced it with a new unit as it started going off randomly after the air freshener. Told wife not to spray near the alarm to prevent having to replace it again.
There is likely some type of solvent in the finish that is evaporating as the finish hardens. The MSDS sheet should be online and will give you most of the contents of the finish.

When I was working as a heavy equipment mechanic we had some propane fueled Wisconsin engines we had to find leaks on. I used my R-12 Freon detector and it worked very well for this. I also use the same detector on 134a with no issues.