Distilled de-ionized water is what is used. On the West coast, fog moving in from the ocean will deposit a layer of salt on the insulators. When I lived on the central coast, at night I could usually see, and hear, some arcing on the insulators. PG&E usually used a large tanker truck & washed them from ground level, no PPE involved.
I'm not going to dig out my old chemistry books, but for water to be acidic or basic, wouldn't it have to have something in it that isn't water?
[This message has been edited by Tom (edited 09-02-2001).]
