I got a small can of cigarette lighter fuel (the liquid stuff) to use 
as a solvent to dissolve the adhesive used in items like foam "sticky 
pads".

In the can of lighter fuel it refers to "petrol lighters".  

Does this mean that for my purpose I could have simply used some 
orinary car petrol?

Or is lighter fuel made of a different composition to car petrol?

In sci.chem Joe Smith  wrote:

: In the can of lighter fuel it refers to "petrol lighters".  

Are you sure that it doesn't say "petroleum ether"?

-----
Richard Schultz                              schultr@mail.biu.ac.il
Department of Chemistry, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel
Opinions expressed are mine alone, and not those of Bar-Ilan University
-----
And when I found the door was shut,
I tried to turn the handle, but --

"Joe Smith"  wrote in message
news:969A94F7A9833D5E712@204.153.244.156...

> I got a small can of cigarette lighter fuel (the liquid stuff) to use
> as a solvent to dissolve the adhesive used in items like foam "sticky
> pads".
>
> In the can of lighter fuel it refers to "petrol lighters".
>
> Does this mean that for my purpose I could have simply used some
> orinary car petrol?
>
> Or is lighter fuel made of a different composition to car petrol?
>


Lighter fuel is more refined than car petrol, but you can use normal petrol
as a solvent as well of course.  Paraffin is also a good solvent for
adhesives, along with liquid butane, propane etc. etc.

> Does this mean that for my purpose I could have simply used some
> orinary car petrol?


Put simply, yes. Petrol is commonly used as a cleaning fluid. For
occassional cleaning purpose, it is more convenient as lighter fluid than a
2l minimum purchase of unleaded into a sealed container.


> Or is lighter fuel made of a different composition to car petrol?


For the purpose intended, the differences are negligible.

Christian.