soda blasters, sand blasters and the like

[Badger1bear]

what experience have you had ? what ones to avoid and which ones are good buys, compressor air supply is no problem

Looking to make some extra moolah on the side and was wondering what you guys could give me in the way of real world advice

 

[brightspark]

well if your doing any blasting of any significance bigger than car wheels and motorbike frames u will need a decent size mobile pot and a mobile compressor bigger than 90cfm / i run a 90 with a 6mm jet and a 28cfm with a 3mm jet presumably u have somwhere u can do open blasting or in a shed ?

 

[Anguz]

i would rather be poor than do blasting for money............

 

[rtbcomp]

From making money

i would rather be poor than do blasting for money............

That's from the heart!

BB - what do you intend to blast? Lightly rusted small steel components can be done in a cabinet with a small compressor. I do a lot of scooters and I have a small blast room and 2 x 3hp compressors.

You need to consider:

1) What size items you are blasting
2) Space to store items waiting to be done
3) Space to store items to be collected
4) Dust extraction and filtration
5) Space to store new media
6) Space to store used media
7) What type(s) of media
8) PPE (An air-fed blasting helmet comes in at >£200)
9) compressed air requirements (Blasting & breathing)
10) If you're doing alloy wheels you'll need a stripping bath
11) Are you going to recycle grit
12) Noise

 

[500e]

As Anguz says
Iwould rather be poor than do blasting for money............
We have been blasting for about 18 months now
We only use Soda Wet or dry it is a S**t job tried cabinet, in open, in a small blast room we built with good extraction\filters the dist still gets everywhere (Note) soda does not just disappear when wet, we also tried walnut shells & plastic media All are messy, it is done in house due to time & product constraints not because we want to.

 

[rtbcomp]

i would rather be poor than do blasting for money............

I've managed to combine the two.

 

[Gareth J]

i would rather be poor than do blasting for money............

X3

The only way it is bearable in my opinion is small scale, in a sealed cabinet with extraction. Or massive scale with a diesel compressor so the job takes as little time as possible. The chap I use for blasting big stuff uses a compressor with an 80ish hp John Deere engine. He killed 2 normal roadside compressors before this one. Unless you have something with mega 3 phase motors in the 10s of hp or a chunky diesel, you won't have enough air to be able to compete with someone with the proper setup...

 

[brightspark]

i used to do a lot of steel and alloy wheels along with motorbike frames and did beadblasting and it was a good easy earner on a saturday morning ,i did it in an 8x4 shed with rubber lined walls the dust crap and noise didnt matter and no one complained , all the waste grit went under my drive the only reason i stopped was i was getting a lot of electrical callouts easy fast money and i didnt have the time

 

[Badger1bear]

I have a hydrovane road compressor and a large field, I've been asked if I could do a few lorry chassis, it's all bunce work, not my regular income :-)

 

[rtbcomp]

Glass grit from Stacey Processing would be ideal, 10-15 p/Kilo by the tonne, inc VAT & delivery.

Get a decent pot, see Hodge Clemco or Anglo Scott Abrasives. Get one with a pop-up valve for filling, saves ages.

The glass will cause dust which will travel in the wind. HMRC, The HSE and Environmental bods will be interested.

The ground will be contaminated with the crud from the chassis.

 

[clarkey31]

As said above its not an easy way to make money and not a nice job to do, i started off years ago with cheap set up and was a waste of time my current set up cost me £4000+ ( we blast cars etc on a daily basics)

This is were we blast a 20ft square room


this is our blast pot holds 12 bags of grit smaller pot means your are constantly filling up


this is the beast to run it all 100cfm


All i can say is thank god i have staff to blast cos if i had to do it anymore we would stop doing it..

 

[brightspark]

100 cfm is about the entry minimum and if u were doing wagon chassis and trailers 150 cfm up over or your flogging a dead horse. the idea is get it done fast and make money .doing it part time on a shoestring wont earn u much at all .and blasting in a field is weather dependent unless u have a roof overhead

 

[SmartWerks]

The chassis will also need thourghly degreasing, when I was i kid that was the delightful task I was given before they went to the paint shop, middle of winter as well. Sucked big time and I was frozen to the core. This isn't easy money and the outlay nevermind the legal stuff as rbt mentioned won't be worth it. Truck chassis work is for the dedicated blaster and cutting legal corners could leave you neck high in sh1te with some serious financial penalties.

you say you have a suitable compressor but what about the air dryer. Have you priced up a suitable pressure pot, the cheap ones most of us plumb into our cabinets just Wont cut it.

SmartWerks

 

[rtbcomp]

13) breathing air filter.

 

[Badger1bear]

point taken guys .......thankyou for saving me some money :-)