UV Resin: First Experiments

I've been resisting resin crafting for quite a while. It's expensive, fiddly, and sometimes toxic. But once I learned about UV resin, I figured it might be a good option to try. It's used specifically for small projects, doesn't need to be mixed with a hardener, is less toxic, and sets in minutes. After trying a bunch of air dry glazes on washers, I thought that UV resin might be a good thing to try.

During prime days, a starter kit from Mr. Resin went on sale and I decided to bite the bullet and give it a try. The kit came with resin, two resin spatula/stirrers, two resin cups for mixing, and a uv light. There were pretty minimal instructions with the kit. I had seen some YouTube videos of people using UV resin, but I was left to guess about a lot of things. So, it was time to do some experimenting. I bought a resin mold kit for making jewelry, though not everything in the kit is ideal for UV resin, but it was a good place to start. You will also need a silicone mat to cover your works surface, some toothpicks for stirring/poking bubbles, a lighter to pop bubbles, and possibly some gloves (I went gloveless and managed just fine).

Truthfully, I had several failures before I started to figure out how things worked, so bear with me. This (pictured above) wasn't even my first failure, it was like my third. I learned things along the way. The first thing I learned is that the resin is really thick and the stirring spatulas that come with the kit are too floppy for most purposes, so I switched to toothpicks. Then I learned that the light that came with the kit has to be plugged in to work (which makes total sense, but it was powered with a usb cable and did not come with a wall plug, so I thought it was rechargeable). So I had to find a longer cord for it to reach my table, which meant the cord weighed more than the light--so I had to secure the cord so the light wouldn't move around when in use.

From my first failures, I learned that thin layers are required, that it takes about 3 minutes of light time (the light has a timer built in, but for much shorter lengths, I had to use the max amount of time twice) with the included UV light to get a thin layer to set, and that mixing in too much of anything will mean it won't set. Multiple layers are possible, but still too tricky for this beginner--the photo above was three layers and ended up bowing/cupping.

Here's a photo from one of my first failed attempts--it's the full 1/4 inch-ish mold filled with th UV resin and several drops of alcohol ink all in one go--it never fully set. I had it under the light for about 15 minutes before finally I gave up on it.

On the multi-layered attempt above that bowed, I had mixed glitter into one of the layers, but it was uneven, so I tried coating the mold with a dusting of fine glitter--surprisingly this works really well. I was also able to use two layers to mostly fill this little mold.

I set each layer with about 3 minutes under the light (I did not turn off the ceiling lights--it just looks like I did in the photo).

This one turned out pretty well, but the back edges are very uneven and it's an odd size that I'm not sure I'd know what to do with, but I was making progress.

I decided to go back to using a bit of alcohol ink--but only one or two drops. I used two drops of Ranger Vineyard stirred into enough resin to fill the mold about 2/3 of the way full. I used a toothpick to stir the ink until it looked evenly mixed.

I poured the resin into a mold and used a clean toothpick to clean along the edges of the mold to reduce the craggy edges. Then I used a lighter to pop any surface bubbles.

Then I put it under the light for about 3 minutes. One of the tricky things about this resin is making sure it's completely cured before calling it. If you try to touch it or de-mold it while it's soft, you'll ruin it. Though it doesn't seem to be hurt by running the light on it for an extra 90 seconds even after it's mostly set.

This one worked pretty well. There were some bubbles and edges that weren't 100% smooth on the back, but it came out nicely.

I was emboldened to try another, so this time I mixed Ranger Sailboat Blue into my resin and poured it in the mold. Again I went around the edges with a clean toothpick and popped the bubbles with a lighter.

The mold was a bit fuller this time, it's a bit hard to tell how much you need to mix. I left it under the light for 4 1/2 minutes and it was still a touch tacky.

Other things I learned: my UV flashlight also works for setting the resin--it's not quite as fast as the kit light and has to be hand held, but it was handy for cleaning up. Any spills or silicone tools need to be cleaned up by setting them with light and then peeling them up. But using the toothpicks to pull all the resin out of the cup after it has set is super satisfying and almost makes cleanup fun.

I left my projects to finish cooling and setting for a couple hours, and it was clear that the two simple inked pieces turned out the best.

So I grabbed some faux suede cording and strung them up to make a couple of cute transparent necklaces. I still have a ton of learning left when it comes to this medium, so if you have any tips or great tutorials, feel free to leave them in the comments!