Fellow Shop Rats,
I had an experience this evening while working with fiberglass that I
thought you might find humorous and possibly useful. I wouldn't recommend
getting fiberglass resin and fuzz stuck all over your fingers, but that's
what always seems to happen to me. I'd brought home a fresh can of brake
parts cleaner just to remove the 'glass. Turns out this new brand of brake
clean was alcohol based and did nothing for my sticky digits but make them
cold.
Now I was really in a jam. I dug the can of MEK out of the trash and got
a couple drops out, and tried again to get a little more out of the two dead
cans of brake parts cleaner that had been on the shelf. I was now ready to
break an important shop safety rule and puncture those aerosol cans for
their precious contents. I picked the one that had the most remaining
liquid and started to clamp it in the bench vice. It was really flat, with
no compressed gas remaining, so I figured puncturing it would be pretty safe
anyway. Then it struck me...what if I mash the can a little and get the
brake cleaner out? I pointed the nozzle down, with the can horizontal in
the vice and soon had enough liquid on a rag to clean the goo off my hands.
Best of all, there's more left for later!
Crude? Yes, but effective, and lots better than trying to explain my
predicament to my wife.
Chuck "sticky fingers" Rothfuss
|