Ralph Mowery wrote:

May well have been toluene. It was often used as a cleaner in all sorts


of


areas, some as pedestrian as the T/R/S plugs on old lamp-signalling


telephone


switchboards. Unfortunately proved to be a carcinogen and was banned, but


it


WAS used to clean a myriad of hardware in a myriad of situations.



It might have been carbon tet (tetracloride or however it is spelled). I
think it was taken off the market because of either liver or kidney failure
if the user had been drinking .




When carbon tet was removed from telephone offices there was a story
about a technician spilling some
on a operator. The operator lost here hair and finger nails. Don't know
if that is true but we had to
remove all carbon tet from the cleaning supplies.

Bill K7NOM