4" Flexible Ducting Gone Bad?

[Keith Weber]

About 8 years ago, I bought 30 feet of 4" clear, flexible ducting to be used in my then basement workshop for dust collection. Due to unforeseen employment/moving circumstances, I would never complete that shop. The ducting remained sealed in their 3 cardboard boxes until yesterday, when I opened the boxes to use the ducting in my new shop that I'm working on. The ducting was very sticky, like the polyurethane or whatever they were made of had gone bad. I had to set the ducting down and go wash my hands. Washing them with soap and water helped a little, but my hands remained sticky for a while. I had bought the three, 10-foot sections at Rockler Woodworking at the time.

Has anyone else seen this or had it happen to them? Now I've got 30 feet of useless ducting because I doubt if dust would even go through it without getting hung up on the flypaper coating. Not that I'd even want to handle the stuff if I even wanted to try to use it. I've got a similar duct on my bandsaw that has been there for 12 years and isn't sticky at all. The coil wire on that one, though, is thicker, so it likely didn't come from Rockler. I think I was just given that one at the time.

Weird! Maybe it's got something to do with the fact that it was packaged in a cardboard box the whole time vs. being exposed to the air. Maybe it's just made in China and has reached the end of its 4-year service life.

Keith

[Dick Mahany]

I have had the same thing happen twice, but it was on other things that had plastic/rubberized type handles, not ducting in my case. I couldn't clean the tacky surface from my hands or the problem handles with anything. I tried soaps and solvents. I found a resource somewhere on an auto detailing forum where a chemist explained the root cause. In that case the person had the same thing happen to all of the interior knobs and handles in his Chrysler Crossfire. I can't remember the details but there was not a way to restore or fix the problem. The breakdown is permanent. In my case I had to discard the products as I couldn't stand to handle them without using gloves.

[Keith Weber]

Yeah, that's kinda what I figured. I have 4 Hercules guitar stands that had the handles and adjustment knobs all go that way, too. The manufacturer took their contact info off their website after they started getting bombarded with complaints. I've never heard of it with ducting before though. I was hoping that airing them out for 6 months or so would dry them back out, but they might just be destined for the dumpster. Funny how some plastics are fine for many decades, but others go bad in a few years.

[scott vroom]

Our wedding album from the 80's was made by Art Leather and covered with a simulated leather material called Aristohyde, which began to breakdown after a number of years, eventually becoming sticky/gooey and useless. Damage claims drove Art Leather out of business if I recall. Who would have known? Sometimes you just get bit.

[Alan Gan]

I have had the same thing happen to those rubber worms used for Trout fishing...I am not much help but you could try Talc powder...

[ken masoumi]

Instead of throwing them out I would leave them outside behind the garage somewhere for one winter,cold weather might just bring it back it's original condition.

[Dan Hintz]

It's generally caused by too much (or improper chemical capture) of the plasticizer... once it starts leaching to the surface, cleaning it (if you can) will only last for so long.