Why can the fluids used to dry-clean clothing remove grease even when water cannot?

1 Answer
anor277
Sep 11, 2016

Can oil and water mix; what about water and hexanes?

Explanation:

A strongly polar solvent such as water is incapable of dissolving non-polar solutes and solvents. A grease stain is certainly composed of long chain hydrocarbons, with which water will not interact.

On the other hand, the use of dry cleaning fluids, which is typically #"perc"#, #"perchloroethylene"#, #"Cl"_2"C"="CCl"_2#, will lift such a stain, as it is non-polar and capable of dissolving grease.

Note other solvents than #"perc"# are used for dry cleaning. And typically, a dry cleaner (so I am told) will spot obvious stains with some other solvent or stain remover before it is put thru the regular cycle.

Related questions
See all questions in Solute
Impact of this question
5997 views around the world
You can reuse this answer
Creative Commons License