The news in New Orleans has been carrying stories about problems in rebuilt homes where the copper pipes are corroding. The cause has been traced to sulfur in poorly manufactured sheetrock made in China and shipped to the US. The sulfur has been turning to sulfur dioxide which corrodes copper. Does anyone know of a home chemical test to detect the presence of sulfur? Has anyone heard of this problem in other parts of the country?
thanks
further research showed that a) industrial detectors are readily available and not way too expensive if I am really concerned, and b) there appears to be almost no support for the story. The only site I found was an anti-international trade site that was way too long on innuendo and short on facts. That should teach me not to post before researching the issue.
CNN has been running stories about this the last few days, so it’ at least not just your local news.
As it happens, you already have a highly sensitive sulfur dioxide detector, capable of detecting it at concentrations a thousand times more dilute than would cause any damage. Moreover, the detector is constructed in such a way that it’s virtually impossible to ignore the warning when it detects any.
In other words, if you’re not running out of the house, gagging, retching, and screaming “What the Hell is that horrible stench?”, then you don’t have a sulfur dioxide problem.
However, I believe the problem is that the SO2 builds up in the space between the joists, where it can attack the wiring. I’m not saying I am verifying that there is in fact an issue, but just saying what I’ve heard reported is the issue.
I assumed that, but it seemed too simple. I thought that there had to be more to the story.
There are these nifty little chemical testing tubes for quantifying various nasty vapors in air. I think there are several brands, one of which is Draeger, but the only thing I have ever heard these things called is “Draeger tubes”.
You buy a little rubber squeeze bulb with one way valves in its ends, and you buy tubes for the compound (and sometimes the anticipated concentration range). The tubes are packed like cigarettes except they’re maybe 50% longer. Inside the tube is some kind of powder, or perhaps multiple layers of different powders, with filters wadded into the ends, which are sealed shut. You break both ends off, and plug it into the rubber bulb, and squeeze for 10 seconds or 2 minutes or whatever that particular flavor tube requires, and then one of the powders may change color. You match the color with a chart and there’s your result.
The problem with H2S is not so much it’s toxicity (and it certainly isn’t healthy stuff) but rather that it can accelerate corrosion, or cause stress sulphide cracking at extremely low concentrations. Right now I am looking into a pile of 316 stainless steel that has turned brittle like a twig. It had been exposed to trace amounts of H2S that wasn’t detectable on a commercial h2S gas detector. We used a SEM to identify the sulphur build up in the surface layers of the metal.
Incidentally H2S above 150-200 ppm actually deadens your sense of smell, and sustained exposure to this level , or elevated levels, is a fatality waiting to happen. If you smell H2S and then stop smelling H2S, the situation has either improved, or has degenerated badly. One of the key points often emphasized in H2S safety training (for those who work in industrial/mining environments where exposure to H2S is a possibility), is ‘don’t trust your nose’. I’d seriously doubt that these levels would be likely in a home environment.
I thought the chemical we were discussing was SO[sub]2[/sub]?
Don’t mind me , I’ll just be in the corner dribbling inanely then.
Sorry, got h2S on the brain at the moment.