I don't recall seeing this done. What type of product did you use and was the gourd green or dry?

Jan

Easy Off. It was a dried very nasty gourd. I picked one that was real dirty. I sprayed, let stand, brought into the laundry room and used a rag to wipe most of it off. Didn't have a copper scrubber so used a green scrubber with hardly any scratch too it, an old one but that gourd came so clean I was ready to do some more but restrained myself cause I had chores to do! I have put them in a barrel and used a pressure washer, but you have to be careful because you can damage them. I don't know where I saw it but along with the oven cleaner I saw Oxie clean. It seems to me it was a list of how to clean gourds. Let us know if you use it and give us a report back.

We cleaned a good supply for winter crafting before the cold weather set in, but will keep the Easy Off method in mind for the next time.

Jan

I am so impressed. I am an artist and use easy off to remove old paint from canvas. Works great. Now I'll try it on gourds.

Always a naysayer... The active ingredient in Easy Off and other brands of oven cleaner is sodium hydroxide (lye). While it is an effective cleaner, it is also a pretty effective wood destroyer. Sodium hydroxide is one of the ingredients in chemical stump removal products because it breaks down the cell structure of wood thereby causing the stump to decay faster than it normally would. The lye will penetrate the shell of the gourd, and make it decay much faster than normal as well.

Well, couldn't you just wipe the gourd with vinegar to counteract the lye? I am a soapmaker and keep vinegar around to counteract lye burns