How many of you here are using products like Thermaclean as an Acetone replacement for cleanup?
http://www.ccponline.com/products/cleaners/index.html
http://www.ccponline.com/products/cleaners/voc.html
http://www.ccponline.com/products/cleaners/displayprod.asp?group=waterbasedresin#
I got some replacetone from tap plastics. It is an emulsifier, it works in a similar fashion as liquid dish soap without water, only better. I got it to use with epoxy, and it basically makes everything slick, and neutralizes the sticky surface of uncured or curing epoxy. (I have a basic grasp of the chemistry of this, but not enough to explain it…chemists?)
It’s about water-thick,evaporates very slowly, and washes off with water. Gives your hands a slick feeling, like bleach or laundry detergent. The resin will generally come off tools or your hands pretty easily, but you have to work them, it doesn’t dissolve or break up the epoxy, it just coats it so it won’t stick back to the surface it came from. Apparently (i haven’t tried it) you can use a container full of the stuff to clean your tools, and the resin will fall to the bottom in blobs. simply pour off and keep the good liquid, toss out the resin blobs…
some info from the label:
contains 2-Butoxy-Ethanol
Cautions suggest ill effects are similar to Alkaline detergent solution, household detergent.
Biodegradable, non-volatile, non-flammable.
Instructions suggest vigorous agitation at elevated temperatures (80-90deg.F, 26-32degC) gives best result.
I’ve only used it to clean my hands, a squeegee or two, and a glass tabletop. Worked well.
wells
I guess I just figured that the bigger surfboard shops would have a wash area with this stuff for cleanup. But it looks like from the response (only one) that acetone is the cleanup solution of choice.
I guess really that this is for shops that use fiberglass rollers and such for large layups. More like the boat builders. I worked in a fiberglass shop once and we used this stuff and it worked great for cleaning tools, squeegies, fiberglass rollers, etc. We did big layups and the end results was a lot of messy tools.
There was a 2’ x 4’ heated wash bin, with a metal mesh at the bottom with this stuff in it. It lasted forever, just cleaning out the gunk at the bottom from time to time.
I was just curious as to if production surfboard shops used it too. Or even if the smaller guys used it liking a more friendly cleanup solution.
Can you kindly describe how you washed the tools? did you have a brush / scrubber dedicacted to the basin, or jets of it, or could you just swirl them around to get the stuff off? I wouldn’t mind outfitting a 5 gal bucket with a sealable lid and a screen and having a semi-portable, safe resin clean up…
Yup, you can plug me in as the small guy. I have only done three boards, but plan on more. Acetone from what I read is a no-no with epoxy, so I tried this stuff. seemed to work well, and I like the idea that it won’t serve as a vehicle to skin absorption. Like I said, I haven’t used it as a tub of liquid to wash with, only in little amounts, scrubbing with paper towels.
wells
PS I’m kinda surprised nobody’s responded either…?
Wells,
Yes they had wire and plastic brushes and brush combs to clean stuff that were at the cleanup station. Did the stuff you got need to be kept warm or say anything about heating. The wash area we had was a dedicated heated wash bin. I’ll just assume that it was special for heating the solution because I never looked that close at it. But seeing that it was 2’ x4’ and about a foot deep and I could not see the heater I’ll just assume that the heater was permanently attached under the bottom.
I noticed on the ccp site that they had one Thermaclean that said it was for epoxy
http://www.ccponline.com/products/tds/thermaclean/whd-095-0080.pdf , did the stuff you got say it was for epoxy, I don’t think “replacetone” is specifially for epoxy, you might want to check. Wells, how did you find out about this stuff? Are their other brands besides ccp’s?
Grant