Official Luthiers Forum!

We've now been in Kenya for just over a year and my workshop has been running since May. No mega home improvement stores here, so some items that builders in the developed world take for granted are bloody hard to find. I thought far enough ahead to pack a supply of lacquer and thinner, and stocked up on all sorts of shop "consumables" when we prepared our move in New Zealand, but never thought I'd have difficulty finding good ole' naphtha. I knew that naphtha is sold for various uses, the most well known being Coleman camping fuel, lighter fluid, and automotive painter's "panel wipe". Until today, I had struck out in my search, and it's not exactly the kind of thing you put in your luggage when you travel (which is the solution for most "can't-find-that-here" items).

I finally discovered it in a supermarket -- labeled as "home dry cleaning fluid". And there in small print, the very short list of ingredients :"Naphtha". Stupid me, I'd always thought of tetrachloroethylene as "dry cleaning fluid" -- and being a strong carcinogen, you wouldn't want to use that in your shop!

Of course it also means I've found fuel for my back-packers stove!

Here in Australia you will never find a product on the shop shelves labelled Naptha. It is called Shellite. Why? I don't know.

And in New Zealand (where I was last) it's sold as "Fuelite". I found a website that gave various pseudonyms and brand names for Naphtha in various parts of the world, but Kenya wasn't on the list.