Mineral oil is any of various colorless, odorless, light mixtures of higher alkanes from a mineral source, particularly a distillate of petroleum, as distinct from usually edible vegetable oils.
The name 'mineral oil' by itself is imprecise, having been used for many specific oils, since 1771. Other names, similarly imprecise, include 'white oil', 'paraffin oil', 'liquid paraffin' (a highly refined medical grade), paraffinum liquidum (Latin), and 'liquid petroleum'.
Fluid power is the use of fluids under pressure to generate, control, and transmit power. Fluid power is conventionally subdivided into hydraulics (using a liquid such as mineral oil or water) and pneumatics (using a gas such as compressed air or other gases). Although steam is also a fluid, steam power is usually classified separately from fluid power (implying hydraulics or pneumatics). Compressed-air and water-pressure systems were once used to transmit power from a central source to industrial users over extended geographic areas; fluid power systems today are usually within a single building or mobile machine.
Fluid power systems perform work by a pressurized fluid bearing directly on a piston in a cylinder or in a fluid motor. A fluid cylinder produces a force resulting in linear motion, whereas a fluid motor produces torque resulting in rotary motion. Within a fluid power system, cylinders and motors (also called actuators) do the desired work. Control components such as valves regulate the system.
Oil is any nonpolar chemical substance that is composed primarily of hydrocarbons and is hydrophobic (does not mix with water) and lipophilic (mixes with other oils). Oils are usually flammable and surface active. Most oils are unsaturated lipids that are liquid at room temperature.
The general definition of oil includes classes of chemical compounds that may be otherwise unrelated in structure, properties, and uses. Oils may be animal, vegetable, or petrochemical in origin, and may be volatile or non-volatile. They are used for food (e.g., olive oil), fuel (e.g., heating oil), medical purposes (e.g., mineral oil), lubrication (e.g. motor oil), and the manufacture of many types of paints, plastics, and other materials. Specially prepared oils are used in some religious ceremonies and rituals as purifying agents.
The plastics industry manufactures polymer materials—commonly called plastics—and offers services in plastics important to a range of industries, including packaging, building and construction, electronics, aerospace, manufacturing and transportation.
It is part of the chemical industry. In addition, as mineral oil is the major constituent of plastics, it therefore forms part of the petrochemical industry.
Fragrance oils, also known as aroma oils, aromatic oils, and flavor oils, are blended synthetic aroma compounds or natural essential oils that are diluted with a carrier like propylene glycol, vegetable oil, or mineral oil.
To allergic or otherwise sensitive people, synthetic fragrance oils are often less desirable than plant-derived essential oils as components of perfume. Essential oils, widely used in society, emit numerous volatile organic compounds (VOCs). Some of these VOCs are considered as potentially hazardous under federal regulations. Most high quality essential oils are extracted from natural sources such as plants, herbs, and flowers. However, synthetic versions of the same compound as a natural essential oil are usually very comparable. Furthermore, natural oils are in many cases significantly more expensive than their synthetic equivalents.
Liquid paraffin, also known as paraffinum liquidum, paraffin oil, liquid paraffin oil or Russian mineral oil, is a very highly refined mineral oil used in cosmetics and medicine. Cosmetic or medicinal liquid paraffin should not be confused with the paraffin (i.e. kerosene) used as a fuel.
The generic sense of paraffin meaning alkane led to regional differences for the meanings of both paraffin and paraffin oil. It is a transparent, colorless, nearly odorless, and oily liquid that is composed of saturated hydrocarbons derived from petroleum.
A hydraulic fluid or hydraulic liquid is the medium by which power is transferred in hydraulic machinery. Common hydraulic fluids are based on mineral oil or water. Examples of equipment that might use hydraulic fluids are excavators and backhoes, hydraulic brakes, power steering systems, automatic transmissions, garbage trucks, aircraft flight control systems, lifts, and industrial machinery.
Hydraulic systems like the ones mentioned above will work most efficiently if the hydraulic fluid used has zero compressibility.
Grease is a solid or semisolid lubricant formed as a dispersion of thickening agents in a liquid lubricant. Grease generally consists of a soap emulsified with mineral or vegetable oil.
A common feature of greases is that they possess high initial viscosities, which upon the application of shear, drop to give the effect of an oil-lubricated bearing of approximately the same viscosity as the base oil used in the grease. This change in viscosity is called shear thinning. The term grease is also sometimes used to describe lubricating materials that are simply soft solids or high viscosity liquids, but these materials do not exhibit the shear-thinning properties characteristic of greases meeting the narrower definition. For example, petroleum jellies such as Vaseline are not generally classified as greases.
"Snake oil" is a term used to describe deceptive marketing, health care fraud, or a scam. Similarly, snake oil salesman is a common label used to describe someone who sells, promotes, or is a general proponent of some valueless or fraudulent cure, remedy, or solution. The term comes from the snake oil that was sold as a cure-all elixir for many kinds of physiological problems. Many 18th-century European and 19th-century United States entrepreneurs advertised and sold mineral oil (often mixed with various active and inactive household herbs, spices, drugs, and compounds, but containing no snake-derived substances whatsoever) as "snake oil liniment", making claims about its efficacy as a panacea. Patent medicines that claimed to be panaceas were extremely common from the 18th century until the 20th century, particularly among vendors masking addictive drugs such as cocaine, amphetamine, alcohol, and opium-based concoctions or elixirs, to be sold at medicine shows as medication or products promoting health.
Flit (stylized in all caps) was the brand name for an insecticide. The original product, invented by chemist Dr. Franklin C. Nelson and launched in 1923 and mainly intended for killing flies and mosquitoes, was mineral oil based and manufactured by the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey, before the company, now part of ExxonMobil, was renamed first Esso and later Exxon. The Esso formulation contained 5% DDT in the late 1940s and early 1950s, before the negative environmental impact of DDT was widely understood. Later marketed as "Flit MLO", it has since been discontinued. A hand-operated atomizer called a Flit gun was commonly used to perform the spraying.
The Flit brand name has been reused for another insecticide product, with the primary active ingredient of permethrin, marketed by Clarke Mosquito Control. The current product is most often used to control adult mosquitoes. Spraying it into the air kills adult mosquitoes that are present and then by settling onto surfaces it kills mosquitoes that may later land.