Socket Blockers | Aqua Coat

Today is Tool Talk Tuesday and I'm going to be talking about two products that I use and I actually really like. One of them is Socket Blockers right here and another one is Aqua Co. If you haven't seen these products, if you don't, you're not familiar with them and you want to know what they are, why I like them, you want to stay tuned for this video. All right, the first product I want to talk about is Socket Blockers. So I have them right here. This is a box of them and they come in multi packs and this is a product. Let me just open it up and I'll show you right here. This is a box just out of my trailer. You can see some of them are used and they're used to cover the Sockets on, you know, in a house when you take off the switch plates or the plate covers and they're also used to cover the switches when you take off the switch plates and they're very simple and easy to use. They have a double-sided tape on the back of them. They just stick right to the switch plate or the socket very quickly and easily. I'll show you some new ones. They come right here on double-sided tape right there. Just peels off quickly and easily and now they're going to stick, you know, right on the socket. You know, in the past before I was ever introduced to Socket Blockers, I just simply masked them off. So I've used, you know, inch and a half tape. I would typically use frog tape. I want something that's going to come off the Sockets or light switches, you know, simply and easily. But Socket Blockers, you know, unlike masking, I'll grab a, you know, roll a tape here. I know you're you're walking up the each socket and you're trying to, you know, get the edge of your tape, you're peeling off some tape and now you're sticking that and you know, molding it around your socket or molding around your light switch. And you know, that's a fast process that I've got to say Socket Blockers is peeling them on and they just stick right on the switch plate quickly and easily. It's probably two to three times faster. Now, you know, once again, they are reusable and I'll tape itself. You're going through the tape. It is not reusable. So tape will cost you money. It's just a little piece of tape covering the socket or the switch so it's not a big investment. But Socket Blockers, I've used them, you know, up to five times on five different jobs before they begin to lose their tackiness. It's a three in double sided tape that tax very well and then they just stack together and go back in the box. It's a great little tool that I began using years ago that I absolutely love. They're a lot faster and more efficient to mask with and it protects the entire socket. You're not going to get any bleed on it bleed through. A lot of times, you're putting tape on the the face of the socket or you're putting tape on the outlet. If you're actually spraying, you'll get all over spray on the sides of bleed through. If you're not masking, you know, and really paying attention to what you're doing. And they're going to be cleaning off that that over spray or paint that cut on the outlet or socket. It's way better putting something like this on there than even nothing. So even when I'm rolling balls, you can, you know, quickly roll around them. But, you know, if you're rolling really fast and you touch that outlet or socket, then you got to go grab a rag, clean it off. You get it inside the outlet and that's a big pain in the neck to try to get it out. So it's better safe than sorry. And these things protect, protect well. You can roll right up to them. You can see like these are views right here. The roller is actually, you know, the paint is actually hit. The socket blocker and touched it and protected, you know, either the outlet or switch play as we use here's my box right here. I just reuse the box, stack them in back inside the box. And they will come back and handy once again, paint peel, stick, paint socket blockers for outlets and switch plays. Absolutely love them. All right. Now, the next product I want to talk about is AquaCode. I've been using AquaCode for quite a few years to eliminate grain when painting cabinets and furniture. Now, AquaCode, let me just open it up and just show you what it actually is. AquaCode is like almost like a solid resin product. It's and it's tinted white and you just skim it on. So I skim it on using like bondo spreaders or I skim it on with credit cards. There's a lot of different things you can skim it on with. You want to skim it on with something plastic. That's not going to scratch, you know, your wood that you're applying it to. But Aqua, you know, fills grain. It's an absolutely amazing grain filler. And some of the things, the qualities that I like about it, one of them is it is tinted white. So you know exactly where you've applied it and you know where you need to sand. And as you're sanding, you need to know what needs to come off. Because really you're just using it to fill grain and wood. And so you don't want, you know, white left over all of the wood just in the grain. So it is really nice and convenient that it is tinted white. I was using it years ago when it didn't even have a color in it. It was just clear. So it's really difficult to see, you know, where it was applied. Then you go apply your top coat. Then you have like, you know, trial marks and stuff like that. Because you missed where the Aqua Co was. Now being white, absolutely, you know, love it. So if they do sell it and clear, you know, if you're clear coating, but we're typically never clear coating cabinets, we're always painting them. So we always, we always want our Aqua Co tinted. So one of the reasons why I really like Aqua Co is the application process. You're actually traveling on skimming it on and it actually pushes it down, you know, into the grain and into those pinholes and fills it up. The resin fills it up. It dries hard and it's not going to crack and it's not going to actually come out, but it completely fills the holes. So when you go to applying your top coat, you don't have really dark pinholes. A thing of a Aqua Co like this, this core of Aqua Co is from my experience, like an average set of kitchen cabinets. This will probably do three to four, you know, average sets of kitchen cabinets. Now, the investment to Aqua Co versus, you know, spraying on several gallons of grain filling primer, you're going to be a lot more money. And then you're going to be doing a lot more sanding trying to sand, you know, that primer flat. Aqua Co is guaranteed. You're going to get this super flat finish. Now, Aqua Co is great, you know, for achieving a super flat finish, like on tabletop. So if you're a tabletop, if you want a glassy smooth, you know, without any type of grain profile to it, you know, multiple coats of Aqua Co is going to achieve that for you. People see me use it on cabinets. I've used it on furniture and they say, and I'll put on one, I'll skim one coat on because what I'm trying to do is fill all the pinholes. I actually want like a grain profile. I don't want to eliminate all that profile. I want to just fill all the holes and pinholes so you don't see, you know, dark, ugly holes in the final product. Now, if you want to eliminate what we call the grain profile and actually get a 100% flat finish, you're going to want a sand apply Aqua Co and then sand it and then apply Aqua Co to get it sanded. But Aqua Co is that absolutely amazing product. It's simple and easy to use. It is water based, which I absolutely love. It's almost no odor to it. You can take and use it and it doesn't smell bad at all. It's a very light odor, kind of pleasant odor to it. It says it's an eco friendly. It's a water based wood finish and you can actually apply it on bare wood. You can apply it on a lacquered cabinet, a varnish. You can put it on painted surfaces. You don't actually have to, you know, had a primer first and simple, easy cleanup on your tools. Just whatever spedders you're using, they wash up with water. If the product actually dries on the tools, you can still get it off pretty easily. You know, you can use it for painting cabinets. You can use it for tables and chairs. I use it for doing furniture. I flip a lot of furniture, so I use it on, you know, furniture. You can use it on mill work and anything that has grain to it. That's been previously stained and lacquered and now you want to paint it. You definitely want to use a grain filler, at least one coat before you paint it.