Soda Blasters

I'm thinking about buying a soda blaster for paint removal and large parts cleaning. I don't do production work, so don't need something especially heavy duty. I've looked at HF and Eastwood but the reviews aren't that inspiring. Anyone have experience with soda blasters. I've got a relatively stout air compressor, so that shouldn't be an issue.

 

I've been playing with a cheapo one, a forty pounder. I am new at this and suspect the tool is not the best. But my two cents…

My machine has trouble feeding, the soda seems to clog constantly and not enter the uptake tube. Maybe I need a finer grit.

But when it works, on something like a carb or an alloy wheel it does a very nice job of cleaning without attacking the metal.

For paint or rust removal, it has very little effect and is extremely slow, compared to regular sandblasting. Plus soda is much more expensive, and not locally available.

 

Thanks, Pete. Since I spent several hours yesterday scraping 60 year old baked-on grease from an SM420, I was thinking another method would be better. And faster. The YouTube videos I've seen make it look like a very long process to do an entire body or even hard top, which is the next project.

HF has a 25% coupon for use tomorrow only, so I was thinking of pulling the trigger. The Eastwood unit has a dead man nozzle but not the HF.

 

Soda blasting is very mild but something like what was once grease goes really slowly because it's not that hard. A "fairly stout" compressor means different things to different folks, heed the air requirements on the tool, I have a 7.5HP-3PH compressor and it's more than enough for my blaster but not by as big a margin as you'd think.
Have you considered a good pressure-washer? Much better on oil+grease and will take off loose paint as well as mud deposits and just being generally handy.

 

I have a 1500 psi pressure washer that does most of what I need for it to do but I wouldn't have much need for a more powerful one. In the past, for sure, but not now. My 60 gallon, 240 v., 4 H.P. SP air compressor keeps up pretty well for the blast cabinet. It puts out 10.3 CFM @ 90psi and 8.4 CFM @ 135psi. The HF soda blaster average requirement is 8.5 CFM @ 90 PSI, so I think it's fine.

If the soda isn't aggressive enough, I've got some walnut shells that would work. Just need a larger nozzle.

 

Very good, Sounds like you are GTG.
I just see people thinking their compressor is bigger than it actually is. I recently had a woman ask about running a die-grinder off her pancake compressor!

I didn't see much difference and in fact my walnut media seems *less* aggressive than the soda I tried. It might have been a peculiarity of my nozzle and feed combination.
I'm intrigued by those wet-blasting attachments... put a dry pick up for soda or whatever on the end of one's pressure-washer. Might be the best of both worlds.

Of course, my world changed when I got the hot-water pressure washer... combines the erosional force of water with the cleansing power of flame.

 

So I bought the HF 40 lbs soda unit today. HT was a mess due to the 25 percent off and other holiday coupons. Some of the unit is fairly cheezy but it'll do until I can put some decent air fittings on. My compressor kept up fine but the unit uses a lot of soda. I used about 30 pounds just doing the top edge of my Meyers hardtop side. I'll have to figure out the flow. Maybe I had it flow too much. It took the last coat of primer and two or three coats of previous paint but didn't touch what looks like the original primer. You can see were it had been sanded off in a few spots before. I'm thinking it was factory baked on. It got some of the surface rust, too. So overall, I'm pleased, even though it'll be a long process to do an entire body or even the whole hard top. But cheaper than paying someone else to do it.

 

I'll do that. So far, I can see that it would be useful to have an industrial-sized unit with a much larger media holding tank, bigger nozzle and a compressor big enough to run it. One good thing is that with all the rain yesterday, it washed away any trace of the soda left on the ground and covering all the junk out where I used the unit. And I feel no environmental guilt.