The C-clamps I’ve been using for a few decades now have seen more than their fair share of epoxy, either dripping out of the joints or dabbed on by the gloves I wear for gluing up. The accumulation of cured epoxy has coated the screws and the handles, limiting their range of motion if not seizing them up altogether. I’ve used a heat gun to soften up epoxy for removal, but that method creates a lot of unhealthy fumes and handling clamps individually takes quite a bit of time. Cured epoxy softens at around 200°F, but with a heat gun I have no way of knowing if I’m applying too little heat or too much, and while I’m heating up one spot, the rest of the clamp is cooling off.

A batch of clamps going into my foam steam box will be ready for cleaning in about 5 minutes.photographs and videos by the author

A batch of epoxy-fouled clamps going into my foam steam box will be ready for cleaning in about 10 minutes.

The temperature of steam and boiling water is 212°F, just on the high side of the temperature required to soften epoxy, so I've boiled my clamps in a rectangular stainless-steel cake pan on the stovetop and heated them up in my steambox.

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