> Anyone else out there find that they're allergic to the standard
> disposable gloves? I started out with the standard powdered latex gloves,
> with which the skin on my hands broke out in hundreds of pin-head sized
> blisters that itched like crazy. I then tried latex non-powdered,
> non-latex powdered, and non-latex non-powdered, and had repeated
> outbreaks. The non-latex non-powdered worked the best, but I can still
> break out if I wear them for longer than a half hour or so. So eventually
> I went glove-free halfway through my boat-building and tried to be as
> careful as possible. I figured I would chance the reaction to epoxy rather
> than get a guaranteed reaction from the gloves.

> Anyone wanna buy some gloves? I've got latex, I've got powdered.......:)

As I understand it, the alergy problems com from actual contact with the glove material. If you keep a barrier between your skin and the glove this effect should be minimized, or totally eliminated.

Check with a commercial photography store -- one that deals with professionals, not your usual drug store counter. They have, or can order, several items that might help.

The first thing I would suggest is wearing lightweight cotton gloves under the latex gloves. Photographers wear these to eliminate fingerprints on negatives and slides during photofinishing operations. They are not very expensive. You can wear them for several days, wash and re-use them, or dump them every day if you wish. Porters Camera sells them mail order for about $4 for 2 pair ( 4 gloves) (http://store.porters.com/Store/main.asp or www.porters.com ) Search their site for: gloves. These types of gloves are made so that they can be worn on either left or right hand, so if you work with only one gloved hand you can get more use from a `pair'. They are made of a very lightweight cotton material which is about the weight and consistency of cheesecloth, which makes them very `breathable' (your hands won`t sweat a lot) and they stretch to fit large hands, although they don't come up to your wrist if you have large paws. There are many brands but mostly these things are pretty much generic gloves.

I've seen the same gloves used by pall bearers at funerals. In some ceremonies the gloves are buried with the casket (definitely a disposable item) and in other cases they are returned to the funeral director. If there are no commercial photoshops around, you maight ask at the local funeral parlor for their glove supplier's address, or maybe you can buy a few from them.

There are various creams you can use on your hands, either to protect them WITHOUT gloves, or to protect them FROM gloves. The ones available from cameras stores are designed to prevent allegic reactions with photochemicals. Some leave an oily film on your skin that repels waterbased chemicals. These may not protect you from resin, but they might protect you from contact with the latex gloves.

If I understand the Dr. Ruth columns correctly, petroleum jelly is not a good match with latex -- at least with condom use -- as the petroleum attacks the latex and can lead to leaks. I assume the same thing would happen with latex gloves worn over hands covered with a petroleum based barrier cream. The thing to use here would seem to be a cream that is designed to NOT dissolve latex, and the places that would probably sell this type of cream would be sex shops. By the way, an ad in the Chicago Reader for a local sex shop promotes a paint on liquid latex. imagine that if you are NOT allergic to latex you could paint on skin protection for your hands, or the rest of your anatomy. (The picture with the ad showed a model who was completely covered with the stuff.) I'm sure you can find many sites on the web where you can buy these products. My interest in this is strictly limited to whether this material could be used to waterproof a canvas fabric kayak skin, of course.

My appologies to those who are sensitive to these issues, but there ARE some, umm, unusual sources of supply for materials and tools for kayak building.

I believe it is conventional to tell the sales clerk that these things are being bought `for a friend'. Heck, if you told them you were buying them so you could build a kayak they would never believe you.

Paul Jacobson