Real screw up

[brassrat]

At the risk of guys with good memorys, I will confess my error. I went and casted with several moulds and got melted polyester? on (mostly) the outsides of all of them.Using an old bathmat? that I used to use on shooting bench to rest an arm on. Today, I was vexed with some lead smears but I stayed on top of that. This stuff was insane when cooled off. Started with #1 and they look ok and got, fine tuned up, to boot. What a nightmare :roll: I usually look after my babies better. The boolets are really nice, anyways. I have a Pelican type case with lots of VPR? paper inslde and they stay very well and no oils. If ever for sale, they will work fine, if scratchy, outside

[M-Tecs]

https://motivationjob.com/advices-skills/does-anything-dissolve-fiberglass/

What dissolves cured polyester resin?
Acetone, methyl ethyl ketone, and diacetone alcohol are the solvents most commonly used to remove cured polyester resin from the substrates to which it is attached

[brassrat]

Nothing would dissolve this mess. I started with brake cleaner and moved to acetone. This helped a very little bit but mostly used a construction type blade and scraped and sanded. A brass and a steel wire toothbrushes too. Lucky the cavities were clear and just got extra cleaned with acetone and qtips. These were all steel Lymans. Luckily

[brassrat]

I tried a smaller and next a real plumber type propane torch that did nothing, guess it needed more time. I imagined it would wipe off like while casting but it had lead mixed in for more fun. One 2 cavity was welded up extremely tight by a coating on the inside bottoms. I banged a couple boolets in to finally crack em open. :x:x

[M-Tecs]

Nothing would dissolve this mess. I started with brake cleaner and moved to acetone.

If you just wiped it on or sprayed it on no surprise. Soaking it for 24 hours should have done the trick.

[Land Owner]

If your molds are scratched on the outside, after scraping "all but the last 0.005 inch" of the burned polyester off, you can refresh the mold sides to "like new" surfaces using finer and finer grit sandpaper.

I found a 1.5" x 1.5" x 2" cube of brass (a paperweight?) with six (6) corrosion pock marked surfaces and zero luster. To eliminate the pock marks, I started gently with back-and-forth motions across 220 grit sandpaper that had been laid on a flat surface, then 600 grit to cut down the 220 scarring marks, then 800 grit to polish, then 1500 grit using oil on the sandpaper in the latter stages, which gave the cube a high luster. Near "cutting" edges were maintained on the cube. Steel will be similar.

Depending on the condition of the surface (you decide), course sandpaper may be eliminated in favor of less aggressive sandpaper, oil, and more time polishing rather than cutting.

[Smoke4320]

Soak molds in acetone overnight then scrub

[gwpercle]

Try using a folded cotten towel in place of the bath mat ... 100% Cotten , no blends , no polyester and don't use the wife's good bath towels ... get a couple old ones .

The cotten towels are also good to drop hot boolits onto if you air cool like I do .
Gary

[Rapier]

Metal coffee cans…… Acetone or MEK over top of steel parts, soak. Put the lid on to prevent or slow evaporation. A piece of plywood, left natural.

[GregLaROCHE]

Why not try a propane torch on it and turn it into carbon? Be careful not to get it too hot, especially if it’s aluminum.

I once wore a polyester sweatshirt when using a cutoff wheel. It melted a big hole in it in a lot less than a minute. I never had that problem with cotton Charharts.

[Chaparral66]

From an old biker friend that had a huge plastic sheet (think 4 mil poly sheet) melted onto his chrome exhaust pipes he used oven cleaner on the hot pipes and it came right off. Maybe put the mold blocks (without handles) in a toaster oven (do not used the Mrs.), get 'em nice and hot, spray with cleaner and keep them warm as long as possible, sitting on a sheet of steel or aluminum as a "rack" in the oven. Hopefully that will be the trick.

[Greg S]

Stay away from aluminum with oven cleaner. It will eat the surface of untreated aluminum and maybe anodized aluminum.

[brassrat]

All cleaned up but not polished, I am content for now.298690 That was a large job to get everything, including lead, gone. I am used to instant results with acetone and didn't think to soak, Thanks for the tips everyone

[WRideout]

Stay away from aluminum with oven cleaner. It will eat the surface of untreated aluminum and maybe anodized aluminum.

Agree. Aluminum is proof against acid, but not caustic. When shipping liquid acid waste, aluminum drums are acceptable.

Wayne

[oley55]

Try using a folded cotten towel in place of the bath mat ... 100% Cotten , no blends , no polyester and don't use the wife's good bath towels ... get a couple old ones .

The cotten towels are also good to drop hot boolits onto if you air cool like I do .
Gary

I may have misinterpreted the OP’s post, but it sounded to me like he did ‘t realize his bath mat had polyester in it. I too have inadvertently rubbed molds with towels and teeshirt cloth I assumed to be 100% cotton but was actually a blend of some type. Fortunately my misadventure was not so severe.

[brassrat]

This material was a thrift store buy just to use at range until better mats came along. I tossed it out. I was aware it could have been dangerous and thought I could handle it but I was way wrong.

[charlie b]

I had the same thing happen on a motorcycle pipe. After that I went through all my rags and towels to make sure they were all cotton. Watch out for the microfiber stuff too.

[1eyedjack]

Polyester shirts and tinsel fairy is a very bad combination! I like to cast outside when it's cool enough to wear Carhart jacket and heavy leather boots and heavy denim jeans since I trashed a nice Polyester shirt that thankfully fit loose enough that no skin was involved...

[dswancutt]

Brassrat, on a positive side note, what size case are you using to store you molds? I was looking for a way to store my molds and I think I have found it.

[brassrat]

Brassrat, on a positive side note, what size case are you using to store you molds? I was looking for a way to store my molds and I think I have found it.

The box is pretty big and shown in the pic in full size. It was a great find back several years ago. Th e name was Condition One and sorry to say, nowadays, was like $40 shipped