Throw out your old caulk and paint

 Last year I discovered a puddle of paint had formed in the garage under the
cabinets where cans of paint are stored.  Upon inspection I noticed that a
can of white latex paint had rusted through the bottom of the can, making a
big mess all over.  I took all the cans of paint out, cleaned up the mess,
and now the cans are in a box outside the cabinet. I looked at several of
the cans yesterday and most had rusty bottoms. I'm thinking of just
throwing it all away, even though some of the paint are custom colors.
I'll write down all the numbers and then toss it, it's just unusable stuff.

And then yesterday I sealed the corner joints of my kitchen countertop
using a brand new unopened tube of GE's best clear silicone. The tube had a
best by 2005 date, but I figured it was never opened so it should be ok.
The texture did seem a little granular but otherwise flowed well.  Checking
the joints this morning I noticed the stuff was still completely wet.
According to the tube it should be tacky in 1 hour with a full cure in 24
hours. This stuff was still completely wet, no signs of setting at all.
I'll have to redo the whole job using a brand new tube of caulk.

The moral of the story here is don't use old paint and caulk, even if it's
unopened. Throw it out and buy new. And even if you don't use it all, just
assume it won't be useable again. Always use fresh products for all your
home improvement projects.

 
You don't work for Lowe's or Home Depot, do you?  But seriously...if
the tube said best used by 2005...and it's 3 years past that
now...that could explain it.  Or perhaps it wasn't stored in a cool,
dry place.  If your garage is damp, that would explain the rusted out
paint can, too.  These days paint can be bought in those handy plastic
buckets or dispensers; that should keep it "fresher".

 

DIY Person wrote:

Always have extra supplies on hand for when a bad product is
discovered. Rotate your stock. When something is far out of date, use
it on a throwaway project. Store paint cans upside down and shake them
up periodically.
PS> I have had similar results with some GE silicone that was not out
of date. It may have been defective from the start. The usual failure
mode is that it won't come out of the tube.

 "Al Bundy" ...

Another thing one can do is to put the small amounts of leftover paint into
small clear jars and write the information on them with a Sharpie.  You want
there to be as little air space in the jar as possible, as it is the air
that causes the paint to harden.  Ensure that the jar is sealed up really
well.  Using a clear jar also lets you see the color of the paint.
Tomes

 
Or, you can donate any leftover unopened paint or caulk to someone like
Habitat for Humanity, where it'll got put to use in short order.


Gary

--
Gary Heston  gheston@hiwaay.net   http://www.thebreastcancersite.com/
"a member or members of Osama bin Ladens' Al Qaeda network, posing as
computer programmers, were able to gain employment at Microsoft..."
claim made by Mohammed Afroze Abdul Razzak to police in India, 12/01.