I was wondering if the dust from sanding epoxy is a skin sensitizer? If it isn’t at what point does it stop being a risk to your skin (wet, dry but not cured, fully cured)?
I can’t speak for other epoxy systems but as for ours (RR) we’ve only seen this twice. It actually didn’t cause a sensitization but there was an skin outbreak kinda like poison ivy. It was very hot, in summer and the guy was grinding the glass not just resin. He sanded four boards in the morning (hard grinding on some screw ups) and didn’t wash and worked all day in the heat and sweat. 15 years later, same guy, same kind of job, same result. The guy said he knew the second time exactly what he’d done. This is a guy who has sanded thousands of epoxy boards with no problem. It took about a week to clear up. So I guess what I’m saying is watch when grinding glass. Be sure to wash up when completing the job and wear protective clothing.
More to the question though, in all my years, I’ve never seen a problem with standard hot coat sanding or even doing light sanding on a laminate.
I’m glad to hear this. I’m so freaked out about getting sensitized my mind plays tricks on me.
Dan
I second what Greg says, it seems to be the fibres in the glass/kevlar/carbon that cause the rashes and itching with poly or epoxy. I usually wear cotton glove liners under latex gloves when sanding, still have plenty of ‘feel’ but no sweaty ‘glove hands!’
Cheers
Mark