sticky drawers, not stuck drawers

November 18, 2019 10:51 AM

i just moved into a new-old house, and two of my kitchen drawers have stuck-on messes i can't make any progress on. help, please?

one drawer has a thick liner stuck to the wood in one patch like something got under the bottom and glued it down, and i've scraped off as much around it as i can. the other one has what looks and feels like melted hard candy stuck to it, pretty thick, and i've tried scraping at it and softening it with hot water/steam with no effect. i can't figure out how to google for this without getting results for drawers that get stuck or cleaning off minor sticky residue :(

pictures

posted by gaybobbie to Home & Garden (12 answers total)

Best answer: This is why God created drawer liners and contact paper. Cover it and forget it.
posted by DarlingBri at 10:54 AM on November 18, 2019 [3 favorites]

Best answer: Have you tried a hairdryer to heat the blob? Much more focused heat than steaming it.
posted by momus_window at 10:55 AM on November 18, 2019 [2 favorites]

Try pouring some Goo Gone on the second one and let it sit for a couple hours.

Otherwise, yeah, drawer liners. That first one for sure looks like it's going nowhere and probably isn't worth spending too much more time on.
posted by anderjen at 10:58 AM on November 18, 2019

I bet you could sand the first one off but it would be a tiresome and messy job, and also who even knows what the glue/liner was made of and do you really want to get that kind of dust all over the place? The second I agree is a job for goo gone, which has terrifying powers of goneing all goos.

I would just cover the first one with another liner and be done with it.
posted by poffin boffin at 11:10 AM on November 18, 2019 [1 favorite]

Borrow or steal a random orbital sander with a disk of 120 grit paper. Wear a dust mask and/or hold the nozzle of a vacuum cleaner next to the sander while you use it.

Then cover with contact paper.
posted by bondcliff at 11:10 AM on November 18, 2019

Best answer: Drawers are nice simple modular things. You can pull the drawer out, take it to pieces, replace parts of it, put it back, and as long as the front hasn't changed everything will match.
posted by w0mbat at 11:25 AM on November 18, 2019 [3 favorites]

I bet you could sand the first one off but it would be a tiresome and messy job, and also who even knows what the glue/liner was made of and do you really want to get that kind of dust all over the place?

It looks like this is vinyl flooring. People commonly used scraps of their kitchen flooring to line drawers. But it is possible this flooring is of the era when it contained asbestos. This isn't particularly dangerous when intact, but if you decide to remove it, make sure you do it outdoors and wearing a good quality particle mask and then wipe it down with a damp rag. Nothing to get overly excited about, but take precautions.
posted by JackFlash at 11:31 AM on November 18, 2019 [4 favorites]

Best answer: Have you tried an actual chisel? They look like real wood so chisel followed by a quick hand sanding with 120 paper is what I would do.
posted by stillnocturnal at 11:32 AM on November 18, 2019

The second one looks like pine resin?
posted by toodleydoodley at 12:18 PM on November 18, 2019

Best answer: The blob kind of looks like spilled glue from a bottle that got knocked over, and that would resist almost any solvent.

I like w0mbat's idea of taking the drawers apart. There's a good chance you could simply flip the bottoms of the drawers when you put them back together and have a pristine surface to work with.
posted by jamjam at 1:08 PM on November 18, 2019 [2 favorites]

Response by poster: Aha! chiseling at the lining and hairdryer on the goo didn't do much, but turns out the bottoms are just nailed on one side and then slide out, so i flipped the liner bottom over and now i've got a nice flat drawer. can't get the goo drawer nails out on first try, so i'll either work on that or pick up some goo gone?

thank y'all!! cover and forget would've been good too but driven me nuts, probably
posted by gaybobbie at 2:01 PM on November 18, 2019 [1 favorite]

Goo gone is pretty toxic and will seep into the wood. I wouldn’t use it on a porous surface, personally, especially where plastic cooking utensils will likely contact that wood when your drawers are full.
posted by nouvelle-personne at 9:31 PM on November 18, 2019