Blasting cabinet troubles.

[dobbslc]

There is something seriously wrong with your pump then! Have you owned this compressor from new or did you buy it used?

It should fill from empty in about 3 minutes in my opinion going by my own compressors. (One 200L 3hp SIP and a Tandem combined 6hp ABAC 300L)

The head Reed valves can fail or the head gasket can blow like what was the case on my used ABAC compressor I bought. One pump was doing all the work the other one was dead but "pumping" away.

View attachment 431448View attachment 431449View attachment 431450

Mmm interesting,
I did buy this second hand from a place that sells returns, the motor was ******** so I put a new one on and it's been fine although I only normally use it for blowing up tyres etc so it's never really had a big load on it.

 

[dave h 2]

No it's fine.

Head off time then.

 

[dobbslc]

I've had a quick look online but can't find any spares for this thing, SIP say parts are not available.
I don't want to rip it apart before I can get spares.

 

[dave h 2]

A4 Sheets of gasket material are on Amazon.
If it's like Joepro's you can't make it any worse. Just be gentle with it.

 

[LukLagun]

So I been using a similar setup to yours only with a 14cfm Clarke Industrial compressor which does quite a good job tbh.
First setup i did try it was with a pressure pot but didn't last long and was too much messing about with blasting media as i had to empty the cabinet and filll the pot again.
After that, i did fit the DIY flow valve and messed about with the valve setting i did achieve quite good results with my 14cfm compressor.
Now i have upgraded to 36cfm clarke compressor so should be much easier to take factory finish as sometimes i was spending around 30min to do one calliper.
I

 

[JOEPRO]

I've had a quick look online but can't find any spares for this thing, SIP say parts are not available.
I don't want to rip it apart before I can get spares.

The pumps are usually generic items. If you can find a ref no on it they are all pretty much the same. You could even buy a whole new pump from ebay and swap it in.

A4 Sheets of gasket material are on Amazon.
If it's like Joepro's you can't make it any worse. Just be gentle with it.

That's what I did. I bought sheets of gasket paper and made those replacement gaskets in my photos above using the old ones as templates. It has been brilliant ever since no issues so the gaskets held up.

 

[dobbslc]

Some progress
I checked the drive belt and found it a bit loose so tightening that up, the air filter was clear and the compressor inlet looks new, I also drilled a couple of extra holes in the filter cover as it looks very restrictive.
It still took 11.5 minutes to fill so no improvement there.



I found the regulator on the compressor wasn't turned up very high
So with that set at 85psi.


I then checked the pressure on the pot and it's the same.
The pot was only reading 30psi before



I then lashed up the pot with a hose and flattened an air fitting into a kind of nozzle, put it in an old dustbin and tried it.


Feck me it kicks up some dust now!!!

It cleaned half this bin up in a few seconds rather than a few minutes to do a couple of square inches before.

Not perfect but the nozzle wasn't great
This was using some very fine glass bead.
So maybe the compressor does need looking at but for now it's good enough to do the job.

As for the cabinet, I can now see I'll need some extraction, new gloves, better lighting and viewing screens!
Thanks for all the ideas and tips folks

 

[JOEPRO]

11.5 minutes is still a crazy slow fill up time for a compressor something is wrong with it I'm afraid.

It's worth further investigation IMO. May even be as simple as the NRV valve going bad. I replaced them on my ABAC



Easy to check.

Let your compressor fill up and stop.

Then undo the feed pipe at pump and hold your thumb over the end. If there is any pressure in there after a few secs then the NRV is leaking back.

 

[dobbslc]

What I haven't checked is the motor speed, I brought new and I'm pretty sure it was like for like but worth a check.

 

[LukLagun]

Some progress
I checked the drive belt and found it a bit loose so tightening that up, the air filter was clear and the compressor inlet looks new, I also drilled a couple of extra holes in the filter cover as it looks very restrictive.
It still took 11.5 minutes to fill so no improvement there.
View attachment 431615


I found the regulator on the compressor wasn't turned up very high
So with that set at 85psi.
View attachment 431605

I then checked the pressure on the pot and it's the same.
The pot was only reading 30psi before

View attachment 431606

I then lashed up the pot with a hose and flattened an air fitting into a kind of nozzle, put it in an old dustbin and tried it.
View attachment 431607

Feck me it kicks up some dust now!!!

It cleaned half this bin up in a few seconds rather than a few minutes to do a couple of square inches before.
View attachment 431608
Not perfect but the nozzle wasn't great
This was using some very fine glass bead.
So maybe the compressor does need looking at but for now it's good enough to do the job.

As for the cabinet, I can now see I'll need some extraction, new gloves, better lighting and viewing screens!
Thanks for all the ideas and tips folks

Those plastic screens dont last long in them blasting cabinets. Replacing mine with solid glass and doing a mod so it can be easily replaced in the future.

 

[brightspark]

Those plastic screens dont last long in them blasting cabinets. Replacing mine with solid glass and doing a mod so it can be easily replaced in the future.

thats all i use just glass it lasts ages you can see what your doing and quick to replace when i do

 

[Wedg1e]

I've had a quick look online but can't find any spares for this thing, SIP say parts are not available.
I don't want to rip it apart before I can get spares.

I'm sure when I looked into this some years ago the pumps were made by ABAC, not SIP themselves - and ABAC have (or did have) a searchable parts catalogue on their website. You do of course first need to identify your pump from the myriad on offer...
I did have another of these compressors, rescued from a skip by my son-in-law's mate. With a 150L tank, it had already been robbed of various bits but the majority of it was there. I got a local hose place to make me a flexi from the pump to the tank as that was missing, pressure switch from Machine Mart to get it away, new DOL starter etc.
After all that we found it made pitiful pressure. With nothing to lose we took the head off and found the reed valves were choked with solidified paint (the air filter gauze was missing so probably fair to say that had also been choked and previously binned). Scraped the reeds clean, bolted it back together: it banged straight up to pressure and has worked fine ever since - I donated it back to the son-in-law as I have no room for two and didn't want to commit to losing my 100L in case the 150L proved to be short-lived.

 

[Wedg1e]

Those plastic screens dont last long in them blasting cabinets. Replacing mine with solid glass and doing a mod so it can be easily replaced in the future.

I went the other way: after replacing the glass a couple of times I switched to a sheet of 10mm Perspex but wrapped it in 2 layers of clingfilm. Eventually the film gets tatty but you can just rip it off and replace in seconds (only two knobs hold the glass in place on the Guyson).

 

[dobbslc]

I bought a new 3/8" ball valve and male to male nipple to give me a nozzle instead of the guns.

I heated up another air fitting to make a better nozzle that wasn't cracked and will give I a blast! tonight
Hopefully this valve will make it easier to control what I'm doing without having to reach under the pressure pot all the time.

 

[brightspark]

I bought a new 3/8" ball valve and male to male nipple to give me a nozzle instead of the guns.
View attachment 432199
I heated up another air fitting to make a better nozzle that wasn't cracked and will give I a blast! tonight
Hopefully this valve will make it easier to control what I'm doing without having to reach under the pressure pot all the time.

to be honest there not much cop and i wouldnt bother they tend to fill the blast hose and block

 

[dobbslc]

What's the best size mesh to sieve the media with? I'm thinking 2mm or close to it as you only need to get the lumps of paint and rust out really.

 

[brightspark]

What's the best size mesh to sieve the media with? I'm thinking 2mm or close to it as you only need to get the lumps of paint and rust out really.

depends on the media size for the the course sieve you choose i fine sieve mine out as well to get rid of the dusty stuff otherwise it clogs up and hurtles a dust storm round the cabinet

 

[dobbslc]

Mmm!
There's a hole in the side!

That lasted less than five minutes!

 

[brightspark]

Mmm!
There's a hole in the side!
View attachment 433505
That lasted less than five minutes!

its probably one of those valves that expells the air when its turned off by the looks that cant be wear surely

 

[dobbslc]

I had another go last night on this thing but it still isn't working
I get a few seconds of decent blasting and the media stops until I kick the pot and it'll then spit out some more for a few seconds then it'll send a solid plug of media down the hose and block up. What am I doing wrong?



I've just checked the motor speed and it's 2800rpm so I think that's right???