Cheapie 5 Gallon Sand Blaster problems

[5tonpuller]

Any body try the pressure washer on from northern?

 

[disco]

No, but I got a 1550 psi cheapie from Home Depot for about $100. I bought it mainly to wash my vehicles and push dirt off the driveway. It's capable of removing some of the flaking paint. It's not exactly a powerhouse.

 

[BKinzey]

I'm using a pressure pot type.

I need to find a different gun, I'm only finding siphon guns. I made up my own nozzle, out of pipe, adapted down to 1/4" and put a cap on it. I'm currently working on hole size for the cap, I'm somewhere between 1/16" and 1/8", it's still plugging up.

Without a trigger I run through too much air though. I've got 80lbs set at the blaster and it doesn't take very long at all to run down a 20 gallon air tank.

I really needed some help finding a workable gun to use.

 

[jasonjc]

HF has some.
And I think 5tonpuller is talking about the press washer sand blaster. I too have been wanting to know how they work??

 

[disco]

Ah, pressure washer sand blaster. I haven't seen that yet. The local store doesn't have it in stock. Do you have a link?[/quote]

 

[BKinzey]

A Pressure Washer Sand Blaster? Nevaah-heardofit


Hey, Thanks for the Harbor-Freight Suggestion. They have a deadman valve / gun I'd like to try.

Hopefully it will work better than the Northern Tool one.

 

[cranetruck]

Ah, pressure washer sand blaster. I haven't seen that yet. The local store doesn't have it in stock. Do you have a link?

[/quote]

Joel showed some pictures back six months or so,

http://steelsoldiers.com/index.php?name=PNphpBB2&file=viewtopic&t=4293&highlight=washer+battery+box

 

[BKinzey]

Harbor Freight has one available on the web sight. My local store didn't carry them So $19.99 jumped to $30 for tax & shipping

Looks like Northern Tool had the overseas mass producer change the design of the gun so they could patent it I cannot recommend the Northern Tool gun at all for sand. Probably got less than an hours worth of run time before it failed Maybe it's OK for beads, plastic or walnuts

Problem is the shut off. It's a spring operated internal plunger. The dust and fine particles grit it up so it doesn't seal completely so you have blow-by. The plunger is about 1/4" thick pointed metal rod. The point gets worn as it passes through the stream which creates more blow-by and so on.

The Harbor Freight type is external and has replaceable, or at least fabable, parts and much simpler design. It should work better.

 

[yorkgulch2]

I have been using the 20 gal sandblaster from tool king for 7 years, with reasonable success. Have found the biggest problem is clogging caused by the air pressure getting to low. I have used it on 2 m37's, lots of little parts, and the inside of my house (1100 sq ft. did all of the log walls). My 40 gal compressor is ok for little jobs but I rented a trailer mounted ford v8 compressorfor the house and one truck. It was well worth the money as I had much less clogging. On the truck I ran play sand (very angular and unsorted) first with the largest nozzle and then switched to washed and sieved silica sand (uniform size well rounded grains). I will check the sieve size tonight I have a couple on bags on hand. Also I open up the sand last and shut it off first.

 

[BKinzey]

Got the new gun from Harbor Freight and it works much better. Got a lot done but ran into some clogging problems. I have 2 water separators, one on the compressor and one on the blaster tank. I get water out of the blaster but not much at all at the compressor.

I might swap out the sand shut off on the bottom of the tank. It's pretty cheesy and might be part of the problem. Doesn't clog at the gun any more.

 

[M215]

sand blaster

Hello SS.
I have had good success using Black Beauty through our cheapy pressure blaster. Works well and no health problems like sand / silica, usually runs about $15-18 per 100lbs. The Black Beauty can be reused 2-3 times after screening, does not to wear out the ceramic nozzles.
I made up a gun for the blaster using threaded pipe, ball valves and ceramic nozzles, the ball valves wear out after a 4-500 pounds but they are cheap.

 

[BKinzey]

$15 - $18 for 100lbs of Black Beauty? I'll have to check that out


So the saga ends. Replaced the bottom abrasive valve with one from the hardware store.

Runs pretty well now. Wish I'd bought the 20 gallon one though Now I run through the sand pretty fast

 

[jasonjc]

I seen one of the pressure washer sand blasters being used on a car show on spike. It seemed to do a good job. And no dust of any kind. You would have to dry your sand be for reuseing thought. When they brought the frame in it start work on it. It had a coat of flash rust. But that would be real fast to remove with a dry blaster. Maybe use the water one for all the thick stuff and than just do a fast pass with the dry to clean it up. Or they may have left to out side for days I don't know.

 

[badboyblasters]

Got one from Northern Tool. They all look about the same.

Using 30 grit sand, not the play sand. The ceramic nozzle lasted about 2 minutes

Still worked pretty well though until I released the deadman valve. Then the hose would fill up with sand and my next spray would be a 2 to 3 second fountain of sand until the hose cleared. I think part of this is due to the valve getting gritty and often didn't shut off completely

Didn't somebody say these worked fairly well? I'm not too pleased but I figure I'm probably part of the problem.

Any suggestions?

Visit www.badboyblasters.com and you will see we sell quality blasters.

 

[badboyblasters]

I'm working on making a blasting cabinet. I will attach a shop vac (Rigid brand actually) with a HEPA type filter to the cabinet. I'm not sure if that alone will cut it so I also have a two cartridge mask I'm wearing. I think if I buy more outlet hose, I can pipe it outside and get away with not wearing a mask entirely. The shop vac moves way more CFM of air than the compressor so I should have lower air pressure inside the cabinet. No dust should escape.

Has anybody else done anything like this?

Go to www.badboyblasters.com and we sell complete blasters and also vacuum syatems for them

 

[AZDeuce]

I like the looks of the "soda blasters" they're so GREEN and we all know how important that is. (semi-sarcasim). But I'm still using a siphon blaster. (cause I'm cheap) But what I'm writing about is "water blasting"

Back in '90-'92 I used a 3500 PSI water presure sprayer, with a sand attachment to sandblast my M3A1 Halftrack. The halftrack had about seven layers of paint on it, the water blaster ate through it like a knife through butter. I was really impressed, at how well, and quick it removed the paint.

Now for the downside, after blasting a large section I would shut down the machine, when I turned to look at the halftrack, the freshly blasted area was already turning a light "orange" color from rust! I had to wash that area down with "metal prep" before moving on with the blasting, to neutralize the rust.

Giving her an entire rub down with metal prep with a green scotchbrite pad was time consuming. On the other hand I was able to blast it right in my driveway in a regular residential neighborhood, without a big dust cloud. The wet sand fell right were it hit the halftrack, and clumped up beng wet. Then I spread it out on tarps to dry, once dry I sifted it through a window screen (I see I ain't the only one and reused it.

I would use the water blaster again, but I'd wait until I blasted the entire vehicle before I worried about the metal prep treatment. But I think I'll try the soda blast thing on my next big project. Somebody on this site soda blasted a 5-ton for a fire dept. They didn't mask the the windows or gages, the soda didn't hurt them, but it remove all the paint. The neat thing is that the soda blast doesn't remove any "skin" on the metal so you can blast it, and leave it unpainted for months, if it's in a dry enclosure....you can't do that with sandblasted metal!

Anyway, somebody above, mention waterblasting, so I thought I'd share my experience, hope it answered some questions.

Later - Tom