Mixing Resin the Right Way

Jess, here's what I think happens. People get resin, they get hardener, they're starting to work on the stuff in their shop and there's more chemistry involved here, maybe, than they're aware of. There's more to mixing this stuff than just throwing it in a cup . We're not making an angel food cake here, we're mixing resin, right? We are, we're definitely mixing resin. So, I guess the very first, number one most important thing, is your shop temperature. Because the colder the resin is, the harder it's going to be to mix. Okay, and do you have a number there? Like don't work below? Don't work below 72 degrees, optimally. And in addition to that, you need to have had your resin at that temperature for preferably 12, 18 hours ahead of time. Well, yeah, it's gonna take those a while to warm up. Yeah, they don't like moving fast, so. All right, so ambient temperature, I mean, and, boy, that's good to know. So, optimal is 72, can I still do this at 60? Am I gonna be okay? You can still do it at 60, but I would recommend maybe grabbing a heated blanket and cuddling your resin up in the heated blanket for just a quick 20, 30 minutes ahead of time. Okay, all right, what about humidity? Humidity is a factor, a little bit more so with ratioed with a two-to-one or a five-to-one versus a tabletop, but it's not detrimental. If you can pour it from Alaska to Florida, you just have to get your shop space dialed in. Okay, so now, these have only caps on 'em, these have pumps on 'em and this is important, using those correctly, right? So, most manufacturers have a color-coded cap, but from experience, you do not want to switch these because then you have now sealed your entire cap onto your bottle. 'Cause there's gonna be a little bit of liquid on the bottom of the resin that then goes on the hardener one and vice versa. Okay, so that's a good lesson is get the caps back on the right jar. Get the caps back on the bottle. And then, so we're gonna talk about the cups, but let's hit on this 'cause you were mentioning to me with these pumps, the manufacturer preset these to do what? So these ones are metered pumps, you can see slightly by the neck here. So, one pump is still equal to one pump. They've removed some of the calculations for you to make it a little bit more user-friendly. Okay, so when it says, whatever, two-to-one, people need, we're gonna keep coming back to read the directions. Read the directions. Because if this is a two-to-one, don't do two pumps, one pump, that's automatically coming from one pump, one pump. Absolutely, and most of the manufacturers nowadays have very detailed instructions on the way that you should be using the resin, whether it be a one-to-one or a two-to-one, and they almost always offer these metered pumps for free with your first purchase. Well, and they're color coded so this blue, when on the bottle, it had the blue cap on it, that tells me this is the right metered pump for that application. Yeah, absolutely. All right, so then, the cuppy cups are sitting here because the alternative, if you don't always use this, what's happening with these cups? So, if you don't have access to a pump system or if you're using a one-to-one, which usually doesn't come with a pump system, making sure that you're using cups that have measurements on them. These cups are great because they're designed for epoxy use. So, if you're epoxy dries inside of it, just roll the cup between your hand and after it's dried, the epoxy will pop right back out. Oh, it's a mold, sort of. Yeah, so measuring cups are great. They've got the different ratios, as well as ounces, milliliters. Okay, to help make sure to get the mix right. To help to get the mix right. All right, so that gets us to where by one vehicle or another, we have stuff in there. And then, do I put an egg beater in there and beat the heck out of that or what's the mixing procedure? So, for smaller portions, definitely try and stick with a stir stick, a Popsicle stick works great. Or, if you need to do a larger quantity, that can get really tiring on the arm, you just wanna keep it steady consistent. So, what you can grab is a plastic paint stirrer. So, they've got the flanges, the plastic flanges on 'em, and you can use that attached to your drill. But here's the thing, is that don't hammer down on your drill. You just wanna do it in the rotation that you would naturally do it. It just helps make it a little bit easier, especially for me, I use those quite frequently. Okay, and part of this is don't undermix 'cause then we don't actually mix, right? Yes. And what happens if there's another, the other extreme is overmixing, what goes wrong with that? So, undermixing means that you're gonna have tacky and sticky resin and your project's not gonna set up. Overmixing, you could introduce a lot of bubbles, micro bubbles, which won't come out either with a torch or with a heat gun, and you could set up your resin too fast because you just altered it so much. If you've mixed it for 15 minutes, now you've cut your pot life as well. So, this is a cool thing, when we were mixing for other video stuff, Jess kept saying, "Put music on." I'm like, "We have two minutes 'til we go again." So, your trick with the music is? So, most resins require about three minutes mixing time. An average song is three minutes and 10 seconds to two minutes and 80 seconds. So, it's a great indicator as you're sitting there, humming along to the beat, I'm mixed for three minutes, so I'm pretty safe. Listen to a tune and mix away. Listen to a tune. All right, we have alcohol. We do. Why do we have denatured alcohol out? So, if you wanted to clean your cups or your utensils right away, fill this cup with denatured alcohol, let it sit for an hour, clean right up. So, as long as it's wet. As long as it's wet. It'll dissolve. Clean up right away. All right, you're a big fan of gloves. Gloves, always have gloves. Never ever play with epoxy resin without gloves. We are working in an extremely well-ventilated area right now, otherwise, we would have a VOC mask on. But gloves, proper PPE is super important. Okay, so follow directions. Yes. Mix correctly, not over or under. Yep. Listen to Imagine Dragons or someone while you're mixing. Just listen to a song while you're mixing, that's a good tip. I think that shop temperature has gotta be a really big deal. Top. And then, metered pumps or pour into the cup correctly. Into a measured cup. All right, any other advice to make sure people get this chemistry right when they do their resin pours at home? I just really implore people to make sure that they've read the data sheets that come with the resin. Every manufacturer is different, from one tabletop brand to the next. And riddle me this before we go away. Is there a shelf life on the unused stuff? Not that I've seen. I've had some resin that's been sitting there, opened, remarkably, because I found it in the back, a little over a year old and I just wrapped it up and it still worked beautifully. Okay, okay. I would just make sure that your lids are super secure and not by switching the cap lids and then finding out the hard way. Yeah, that would make 'em really secure. Yeah, that's a good way to waste a couple gallons. Make 'em airtight for sure. All right, good tips and very helpful to get people mixing it up.