I got some on my hands yesterday after installing my new larger dog door..are there any solventsor must it wear off my skin
How to get expanding foam off my hands.??
Nov 02, 2015
17 Replies
Any of the chemicals to remove/dissolve it are worse than the foam. Hot water and a scrubbing brush are your best choice.
my new larger dog door..are there any solvents or must it wear off my skin
Try alcohol drygas. Off the edge of my memory, that should work.
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Unfortunately, I've never found anything that will remove spray foam. At least nothing that wouldn't harm me more. :)
It'll wear off in a few days.
I always slip on a pair of nitrile gloves (the blue ones) before I mess with that stuff. I also keep a plastic grocery bag nearby I can toss the can and nozzle in when I'm done with it. Otherwise, the stuff keeps expanding out of the nozzle and gets all over everything.
Anthony Watson
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I know it's too late for you now, but I've started wearing nitrile gloves whenever I'm working with messy materials. I've been using cheap vinyl gloves for years, and they are still OK for many jobs, like yard work in cold and damp weather or washing the car when it's cold, but the nitrile gloves fit much better and are much stronger.
I buy extra boxes whenever HF puts them on sale. I've got almost as many boxes of vinyl & nitrile gloves scattered around the house as I do reading glasses. ;-)
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Use a belt sander?
Only if you get it before it cures. The stuff is like cockroaches. It'll be all that's left after a nuke explosion - cockroaches living in uerethane foam houses
Only if you get it before it cures. The stuff is like cockroaches. It'll be all that's left after a nuke explosion - cockroaches living in uerethane foam houses
I used that crap many times and as much I know there isn't any chemical that you can wash off that I know of Wear out that is about it.
A little sand paper will get most of it off and wont harm you either. Just make sure the foam is dry before sanding it off, or you'll have a bigger mess.
I would try vinegar. May take some time but it can degrade polyurethane. Looking it up, there is advice on cleaning polyurethane coated floors with vinegar but one site says it dulls the finish, attacking it.
Methylene chloride, acetone, methyl ethyl ketone... Maybe you'd rather it just wears off. Methylene chloride is gentler that the rest but I don't know if you can get it in consumer quantities.
It is the main ingredient in most "heavy duty" paint strippers and I sure wouldn't call it "gentle" It burns like crazy when you get it on your hands (or at least it does mine)
I switched to nitrile gloves a few years ago. Regular latex gloves would break down and start ripping apart when exposed to wood stains and similar chemicals. Then my fingers ended up stained anyway, kind of defeated the purpose of wearing them. The nitrile gloves seem much more resistant to most chemicals.
Anthony Watson
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I mentioned vinyl, you mentioned latex.
Would the vinyl gloves have the same breakdown problem?
I keep a few boxes of vinyl gloves around since they are cheaper than nitrile. I use those for some jobs like cleaning the dog's crate and other jobs where I don't really need the durability or dexterity of the nitrile gloves. No sense in wasting the "good" ones.
its wearing off slowly. the tops of my hands look like I am from a horror movie.
Hmm... I don't know. I'm thinking of the traditional tan colored gloves. I've always called them latex, but maybe they are vinyl. I've never really paid attention. They're the cheap ones. :) They work OK for quick tasks, but as I mentioned they tend to fall apart when I'm staining woodworking projects. It's like the solvents dissolve the gloves.
I also don't like that white powder inside the cheap gloves. My hands sweat inside the gloves, then I end up having to wash that goop off my hands when I take them off. :)
The blue nitrile gloves hold up much better, and don't have that powdery stuff inside.
I've used the green gloves too. Don't know what they are made of. I think they're supposed to be even more durable, but they cost more and don't seem to fit as well.
A box of nitrile gloves lasts me a long time, so the minimal cost difference isn't an issue.
Most times I just put a glove on one hand, since the other hand isn't really getting dirty anyway. The gloves tend to last twice as long that way.
Anthony Watson
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At least it doesn't de-fat them down to the bone :) I think the combination with methanol might increase the irritant factor. We used to get methylene chloride in 55 gallon drums for purging an epoxy system. It wasn't hand cream but it didn't burn like KleanStrip. That stuff is one of the few times I break out the gloves and I mean heavy duty neoprene, not those damn rectal exam specials that always tear halfway through doing a roof patch.
If there's a lady in the house, ask her for her bottle of nail polish remover. Works like a champ.
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