Cleaning Uncured Silicone From Your Brush.

bweapon

New Member
Hey, tried a few things here, obviously all the usual solvent dunks etc but to no real avail.
Also, who wants a medly of toxic chemicals around the house we have kids/pets, Hopefully this is a safer a MUCH cheaper method
Until tonight, after applying that loving first layer of silicone to a sculpt, the brush is usually kaput... correct?
at least thats the way things have always been for me, UNTIL NOW!!
lol...
what i did was, using a plastic hair comb, i guess the finer toothed the better, i attempted to comb as much of the silicone as possible from all angles out of the brushes bristles (only took a couple of minutes)... then took a liberal dusting of talcum/baby powder into my palm and agitated the brush into the powder as much as i could also. a few hours later the silicone is cured on the sculpt and the brush is still a brush!!
okay, okay so i wont be doing pin striping with the brush but hey it seems to work and the brush is totally now my silicone brush.
Anyway, like i say i have literally done this this evening and its helped me, thats my new method tried but not really tested.
thanks.
 
Sounds easy enough! A good way to keep the landfill empty!

I hate using so many chip brushes, seems like such a huge waste. Especially when you use it once and its toast. Always wondered this, thanks for posting!
 
Funny, before I started using sponges to paint my layers of latex, I was doing the same sort of thing with chip brushes to clean out the latex buildup. Finally found that those metal dog combs work great at cleaning out the latex...
 
I have a much easier way--- Harbor Freight-- Chip brushes-- 4.99 for 36 of em!!!!!

Thats also fair enough lol... but yeah saving landfill is a good enough reason.
Also when you're down to your last chip brush and need a couple of coats and its 1 in the morning on a sat .... then what you gonna do, get your comb and your talc... i guess any fine absorbent dust might work???

Just done another layer, brush is still good as when i started...almost.

Just to note also i do this when the brush has literally just been used so no time to cure in their.
 
Hey-- was just being me there--I totally agree about the landfills an dsuch-- if you can recycle then for sure do it-- good tips. I succumb!!!!!
 
Clearly a new brush is the best solution - but when I do have to salvage a brush with SOME latex on it --- I've just dipped the wet brush into powdered laundry machine detergent, careful not to get it in the ferrule of the brush - (where the brush hairs are glued into the metal band)- and massage and pick the latex off. It got off orgainc materials pretty well in the past.
 
Hmmmmmmmmmmmm, well there is only one other thing I can think of, and that is delimonene. Awesome stuff, not toxic. Basically it is 100% pure distilled citrus oil. It should work to loosen the silicone, but you will want to them rinse the brush in some 99% isopropyl alcohol, which I don't particularly consider a harsh solvent per se. I figure if you can clean wounds with it, then it should be safe to have around.
 
Excellent tip man. I just did this but simply using a paper towel to clean up as much of the silicone as I could. Baby powdered the brush several times and it's totally reuseable. now I won't need another brush when my first coat of silicone becomes tacky. Thanks!
 
Hopefully nothing in the powder you are using inhibits the silicone. With silicone, at least platinums, you are always better using a 100% clean brush.
 
No issue with it inhibiting the silicone but I did find one thing. Applying another coat it looked as though the powder clumped up and was left behind in the new silicone. No issues or air bubbles. Just a little lumpy in places.
 
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