Basics Of Sandblasting

 Sandblasting may be a process that involves forcing solid particles at high speed using compressed gas onto a surface to smooth, etch, or clean a tough surface. The systems wont to sandblast surfaces have four main components: the air source (usually an air compressor), the sandblasting blast pot, the basting media, and a dust collector. We use an outsized booth to deal with our blasting system, with the dust collector to clear the air within the room during blast operations.

Safety precautions when sandblasting. Sandblasting operations require specialized safety gear to guard the operators. First is top quality hearing protection, blast goggles to guard your eyes, and either a blast mask or blast supplied air system. The blast mask features a filtering system to supply safe air to the operator, and therefore the supplied air system provides a supply of fresh air through a blast hood and helmet. Heavy duty gloves and a blast suit, apron or similar clothing will help protect the operator from ricochet. Steel toed boots also are recommended to guard from heavy objects which may land on your feet. 

Sandblasting has existed for years, and permanently reason. If you've got rust or paint to get rid of , a replacement steel surface to profile for coating, weld slag or discoloration, or a bit of machinery or equipment like a concrete mixer , a car haul flatbed or a bulldozer to repaint, sandblasting is that the fast and effective method to organize the surface.

First, we should always clear up the question of sand. We don’t use sand, don’t even stock it, once we mention sandblasting we actually mean media blasting, as we primarily use the mineral garnet as our blast media of choice, but we also use crushed glass, bicarbonate of soda , corn cob, alumina , walnut shells, starblast, coal slag and plastic beads, among other sorts of media. 

There are two broad basic uses for sandblasting. First is removal of some sort of contamination, like paint – failing paint, wrong color or sort of paint, rusted surfaces, concrete or tar on a surface and similar substances that exist on a surface. The surface is typically steel, but are often iron, aluminum, or other sort of structure. 

The second use is to organize a surface for a coating, like epoxy, paint or powder or e-coating. it's often the case that the surface needs both sorts of basic use, removal of the old failing paint and therefore the profiling of the surface for better adhesion of the new coating. Steel with a profile offers far better coating adhesion since the profiled surfaces features a thanks to lock the coating to the small “peaks and valleys” of the blasted surface which improves the effectiveness of the coating by improving the sturdiness of the coating. A corollary to the present use is that the customer who desires a consistent surface for cosmetic reasons but isn't getting to apply another coating after blasting. this is often usually chrome steel or aluminum, which don’t rust, where they have to get rid of weld marks and conceal that removal by blasting the whole surface to seem an equivalent , or where they designer wants a profiled surface for appearance reasons.

There are other uses for sandblasting, like etching or artistic uses (think of mugs or mirrors with etched sayings or names on them), but within the industrial blasting world, 90% of our work falls into the categories of removal of a cloth on the surface and preparing a surface for a coating.

Sandblasting provides fast and reliable surface preparation for several hard surfaces. Indigo has industrial blasting experience that creates us experts within the use of all kinds of blast medias, on many differing types of substrates, all to supply our customers with the results they have for improving their products.