Safety Tidbit 3.08 – So you want to refinish your cabinets

Safety Tidbit 3.08 – So you want to refinish your cabinets

Reference: https://www.osha.gov/dsg/hazcom/whatishazcom.html

How many of you have refinished your kitchen cabinets or a piece of furniture? Wasn’t it a pain to strip off the old finish especially when covered with lacquer or polyurethane? You probably did what I did and go to your local hardware store or big box chain (e.g., Lowes or Home Depot) to get some stripper. Yup that’s what I did, but once I arrived at Lowes, I was surprised that there were quite a few types of paint removers to choose. So, the industrial hygienist in me began to inquire: Why so many? And What is the difference between them?

Some are in paste form and some in a liquid. Some say hazardous others say biodegradable. Being the novice, 
I asked the salesperson in the area for some help. She advised me that Formby’s was the “good” stuff and to stay away from the Citristrip™ that smells like oranges but doesn’t work as well and besides, Formby’s stripper is cheaper than Citristrip™. I prodded her a little and asked why does Formby’s work better than Citristrip™? Her response was disturbing: "Formby’s stripper works because it has some powerful chemical in it that the other one does not.” So now I changed my hat from novice to industrial hygienist and asked, Can I get more information about the two products and what is in them?  I think she knew she was had and tried to push me to her supervisor that she called for on her radio. 

Once the supervisor arrived I again asked for more information about the products such as the safety data sheet. The area supervisor pushed me to the customer service desk as “supposedly” all of the SDSs for any products sold are distributed there.  Unfortunately, I received the vacant stare when I asked for the SDS for each of the products I was considering using in my home. Just to keep the exercise going I offered, what happens if a commercial entity like a construction company comes in to buy the same items and asks for the SDS? That lit up the customer service desk’s light bulb above his head.  He shuffled me over to the commercial client desk on the other side of the store. He looked as relieved as the other two when they were able to hand me off to someone else. The client customer service representative was very confident as I asked my questions about the getting the SDSs for the products. He promptly gave me the www.NameofStore.com website and said I needed to go online, and all of the SDSs are there. Problem solved, right?

Well of course not, I got home to look up both items on the store’s website and could not find the SDS anywhere. So now my stubbornness kicks in, and I go to the manufacturers’ websites to get the SDSs. Although not particularly intuitive or easy to find after 15-20 minutes of searching on each of the products' sites I finally found what I was looking for. Moral of the story if your client is missing an SDS see if they have a systematic approach to get or find the SDS from the manufacturer or distributor. Unfortunately, with the manufacturers only having to provide the information electronically via an internet address very little has been done to ensure the address is accurate and actually leads the client to the information.

Hope this was helpful and thanks for reading my Safety Tidbits! Comments and questions are always welcome. ~ Bryan

P.S. If you have an interesting safety or health question please let me know.