5 Go-to Tools to Get Resin Off Your Hands Easily

Getting resin on your hands is messy and tricky. No matter how careful you're, you'll always get resin on your skin accidentally. Don't worry, you'll learn how to get resin off your hands effectively and easily without any skin damage in this tutorial.

What happens if you get resin on your hands?

Resin is an irritant and would make your skin become irritated along with itchiness and redness. Some skin inflammation like allergy and eczema would be caused by direct contact with resin, especially for some resin artists who have sensitive skin. So keep in mind that you should remove resin as soon as possible when you accidentally get resin on your skin.

How epoxy ends up on your hands?

We should admit accidents happen even if we take the necessary precaution(wearing gloves) when working with resin. The gloves may split, large silicone mold may explode, or you're overestimating your resin skill, and let's admit it, it's evitable.

How to get resin off hands?

There are many methods that can be followed but only one basic principle: act fast and remove it before it's cured. The baby wipe would be the best and safest option to wipe most of the resin off your hands. However, if you get sticky resin, you should go with the help of the techniques listed below.

 Wash Your Hands with Soap and Water

Washing your hands with soap and water can be the first step in getting resin off your hands. However, this alone cannot suffice because this cannot help remove all the resin and may feel tacky after washing your hands. It works fine with some exfoliant-based cleansers like cooking oil.

soap and water

 Use Citrus-based Cleaner

Just because we said citrus doesn't imply you go and rub lemon and wait for the magic to happen. We wish it was that easy, but it's not. What you need to do is pour some citrus-based liquid cleaner on your hands and rub it with a cloth. You may want to dilute it a bit because pouring concentrated citrus may irritate sensitive skin, and you don't want another problem to the one you already have, do you?

If you need to remove the resin from your hands right away, you can try to use this method.

All that needs to be done is put 1 tbsp. baking soda on your dry hands along with 1 tbsp. of liquid dishwashing soap (preferably citrus-containing). Mixing these two and scrubbing will help you get rid of the stubborn resin stuck to your hands.

P.S. Keep in mind that do not add any water before you finish scrubbing.

 Use Sugar Scrub

It's not as effective as other methods we mentioned but it also works fine if you don't have any items around. Making sugar scrub is simple and just needs a few items that you can find at home. Just simply mix 2 cups of sugar with 1/2 cup cooking oil and 15-20 drops of essential oil and that's it! It's a little bit complicated but you can store the sugar scrub in a container for long periods for incidents like this in the future.

sugar scrub

P.S. Any kind of exfoliant does the trick. Abrasive ingredients like poppy seed, coarse salt, and pepper work fine.

 Rubbing Vinegar

All you have to do is dip a piece of cloth in the vinegar and rub it on your resin-y hands. However, some artists don't recommend using vinegar because they think vinegar can break down the resin and result in irritation on your skin. It's true, but it is allowed to be removed from the skin. The grease-fighting dish soap does the job of removing it before it can be absorbed. 

No matter what you're using to remove resin from your hands, make sure you wash them off completely. Remember to apply some moisturizer if you have sensitive skin.

How do I remove resin from clothes?

Resin spills, sometimes, not only affect your hands, but your clothes can also be the victim of these incidents. If the resin has not cured yet, wipe all of the excess off with paper towels and then blot with isopropyl alcohol to try to dissolve the resin. Once you have removed as much as you can, you can wash with soap and water. If this doesn't work, or if the resin has already cured, then you can consider this your new resin outfit. 

How do I remove resin from the workplace and tools?

Unlike removing resin from your skin, we don't need to worry about workplace or tools absorbing the resin, so we can apply alcohol on them to break down resin and use a paper towel to wipe them off and then wash them with soap and water afterward.

Tips & Tricks

  • Wearing your gloves to lower the chance of getting resin on your skin.
  • Prepare the hand-cleaning items in advance to avoid resin transfer from your hands.
  • Clean it off as soon as possible before it turns out to be sticky or cured.
  • Try to avoid using solvents to remove resin from your skin.
  • Apply some moisturizer after cleaning the resin off your skin.

Do you have any lifehack to get resin off your hands? Comment below to let us know.

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1 comment

I use my husband’s Cherry Bomb hand cleaner. It has pumice in it good for scrubbing resin off your hands. It also has moisturizers.
Tami Dolphay

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