Thread: Home Sandblaster

Build yourself a PA blaster, all you need is for example and old LPG bottle (or bottle of any sort really.

https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/...dblasting/info

If you can't join, yell out. he used to have ebay auctions and a webpage where for a token amount of money (bugger all .... < $10.00bucks) he's send you his plans. If you can't get into contact with him, let me know and I'll forward you them ( but hey, he put a ****load of effort and time into this... so pay him his token amount).






This is my sandblaster, you can probably work out why it's wwwwaaaaaayyyyy, wwwwaaayyyy, way better than any store bought one just by looking at it.

What I did was chop an LPG bottle in half and weld it back together so we had a nice big funnel in the top that allows you to easily fill it with blasting media. Basically you feed about 5psi of air into the top of the blaster above the blasting medium and this pushes the blasting media through to the gun so it doesn't clog. It works brilliantly.

Though the parts are free, you'll probably find you'll spend close to $100 on air fittings and the regulator to add the 1->10psi of air into the tank to push the abrasive through to the gun.



You also *need* a cabinet so you can recycle the abbrassive. This is just an old computer desk I "re-arranged" into a box so I can feed big stuff in. I just sweep it back out and re-use the blasting media.



I just pull the desk side off to load it.



You don't want to breath this stuff!!! I cut a hole in the top and screwed a radiator fan into it (from a car wreck), then siliconed an old plastic tub over the top .... it blow the dust out of your work area.





the work brilliantly with just the cheapo blasting gun (about $18.00 from memory). This is a brake caliper after clean up. this is glass media from memory





glass beads versus blasting media ...





the grit is far more aggresive, you'd never go near aluminium with it.

I have my old 16CFM clisby compressor and another 8CFM compressor I picked up at the tip.... running these side by side is borderline, but works well for me. You need a LOT OF AIR to sandblast with.

seeya,
Shane L.

Originally Posted by p38arover

My sand blaster is one that looks like a spray gun with a nozzle, something like the one below. One fills the pot with sand rather than paint.

I just bought one of those toys, didn't really do the job for the amount of grit it consumed and the loss of grit was a lot. I think a proper sand blast box is on my Christmas list

How good is Shane's setup????
Great work.
Andrew

Hi

There is a some well thought through blast pots/chambers here. But you have to be blasting fairly often to make it custom building one worthwhile

But thinking back to the op original question, I would be thinking taking the parts down the shop may be the answer, unless you want to build a blast pot/chamber.

The difference between domestic compressors and commercial blasting compressors is substantial Blasting is essentially a high energy process.

The flow rates mentioned in this post are way down on what is used commercially.

250 cfm is widely regarded as the minimum for blasting, say garnet. If your profiling the metal for painting or removing rust cant see too much less working. We've tried with less air and haven't achieved what we wanted, even with big pipes on the pots, etc.

We use a 400 cfm ingersol rand compressor at work for blasting, which works very well.

Clive

I have done this blasting thing a bit now.
I started off with a 30 dollar gun which worked well,but uses to much grit for big jobs and too much mess.
The next step was a 700 dollar machine which is portable and has a vacuum arrangement in the blasting head that recycles the grit and stops dust.
It is possible for a larger single phase compressor to keep up with the needs of this machine, but it is very slow in removing paint and rust and will only recycle the grit and not make a mess when working on flat surfaces.
The next step was a cabinet machine.........a large one I purchased for 1500 dollars and has been the machine I use the most.
A motor cycle frame to large truck wheels,radiators etc will fit in it.
It requires 415 power supply for the fan and has blow back system to clean the air filter.
My 415 compressor works extremely hard to keep up to the needs of this machine..
I use garnet in all my machines.
The large cabinet machine always has a problem of lack of grit feed to the gun and requires a lot of fiddling to get it to run well.
I am now looking in a different direction.
To be serious with air grit blasting you need a diesel driven compressor and about 30 thousand dollars and a old shipping container to blast in so the grit and be recycled.
I now am setting up a grit blasting attachment to a pressure cleaner.
It has a lot of advantages.
No dust
Cheaper purchase price for the given grit blasting effect.
Is possible to recycle grit with a lot of effort.
Can use beach sand as one use and not have to worry about health effects.
No compressor required, but a large electric or petrol pressure washer needed.
Cost of large pressure washer is cheaper than a large compressor.
The cost of a wetblasting lance is expensive to purchase, but can be home made with only the harden nozzle being purchased.

Shane, I sent you a PM- not sure if you got it. Pls let me know- I'm trying to duplicate your splendid system onto an old cage trailer I hardly use anymore.
Thnx


George

Originally Posted by geodon

Added up I may as well buy this:

Sandblast Sandblaster Cabinet Sand Blaster Beadblaster With Stand Massive Sale | eBay

I bought one like this from the local Gasweld store. Unfortunately it isn't big enough to get a wheel inside. And my compressor is a 13cfm petrol driven Peerless job.

Does a great job with ordinary sand, but yes, it can clog up sometimes with paint chips. Bloody army and their 12 coats + of paint

That's a great setup Shane.

Originally Posted by numpty

I bought one like this from the local Gasweld store. Unfortunately it isn't big enough to get a wheel inside. And my compressor is a 13cfm petrol driven Peerless job.

Does a great job with ordinary sand, but yes, it can clog up sometimes with paint chips. Bloody army and their 12 coats + of paint

That's a great setup Shane.

Hate to throw a spanner in the works, but most types of sandblasting can cause damage or premature failure of the sand blasted part, e.g.
A mate sandblasted his HQ Holden Panelvan, hired professional equipment, the blasting media stretched the metal panels so much that when he drove his van the side walls of the van and the side body panels used to flap like a flag in a gale.
Another more serious incident a bloke had his Norton Feather bed frame and Triple Clamps sand blasted, during the next race the fork steering head along with the triple clamp snapped at speed, he lost a leg in that crash.
Sand Blasting changes the surface of the metal being blasted, it peens the metal which can cause case hardening, esp. on already high tensile metals
it can also change the structure of case hardened metals and change their characteristics.
A lot of Pro sandblasters use much softer blast media like Bicarbonate soda powder or nut shells to prevent metal change and damage, so check out whether it is safe to sand (Hard) blast a particular item, Regards Frank.