Soda Blaster

[Ron]

Hi,

I'm planning on doing some painting on my Cub and a 1955 Chevy that I have.
I know of most ways of stripping the paint off oven cleaner, wire brush, and sand blasting.
I ran into a guy the other day that was talking about using baking soda to blast the paint off.

Have any of you guys used this type of media before??

Thanks,

Ron

[John *.?-!.* cub owner]

Never heard of using baking soda, but there are many different medias available for blasting. I have done a little sandblasting, and I would NOT blast anything that is assembled if you intend to keep it and use it. The dust and grit will get in everything. The result will be premature failure of seals, and possibly bearings to. Several years ago when I managed a 2 way radio shop one of our customers sand blasted the interior of a concrete mixer truck to repaint the interior. The radio was bolted to the rear wall, and they taped plastic over it to keep the sand out. Three times over the next six months I had to remove the radio and blow it out with air and retune it.

[Ron]

Thanks John!!

This guy said the advantage of using soda was that it would not hurt metal trim or glass.
Therefore, you don't have to do a lot of masking/removing before you blast the paint off.
He said you can rinse the soda residue off with water.

I don't think a regular sand blasting unit will work using soda though.

Ron

[rondellh]

Ron,
At work they have a unit like that. It is'nt used anymore but they say it cleaned well and would take the paint off if you wanted to do so.
It was applied with the pressure washer.
Rondell

[johnbron]

In food plants they use dry-ice as a blasting media on there machinery. It cleans everything spotless and leaves no media mess to clean up.

[danovercash]

When I worked for the school system they had a pressure washer with a "sand point" that could be used for sandblasting without wearing protective gear. Worked very well to remove graffiti etc. I used it to clean my disc harrow and some aluminum lawnmower parts. An injection system was used to provide protection from rust on ferrous iron. When I cleaned the bumpers on the VW truck, they rusted as fast as I cleaned them without prep. solution. The name of the machine was Hydro-Sander. (They have a web site) I saw a demonstration where different layers of paint were exposed using baking soda and water. We just took a barrel of water and a bag of blast sand in the back of a truck to remove paint from sidewalks.

[Todd]

I had my cub soda blasted, works great. You can also use plastic media. Sand works good but can distort the sheet metal. you can ruin a hood with a sand blaster. The Soda works good but you still have to be a little carfule on large flat surfaces. An interetesting story: I used to paint at a GM dealer and we sent a brand new 0 mile vette to get plastic media blasted, they had a new guy who messed up and sand blasted it. Actualy put holes all the way throught the vette. It was a white aniversary model. It totaled the car, went right the the junk yard, never even titled. Damn shame

[beaconlight]

Todd that hurts!!

Bill

[Bigdog]

I was wondering if the guy still had a job.

[Todd]

He was gone by the time they delivered the car back to the shop.