Gary, Marty:
Soda blasting is the perfect media for this type of work. In fact soda
is so good for Autobody panels that you do not have to mask off glass or
chrome. It will not be harsh enough to do any damage to your body panels. It
is
pretty soft, so you cannot reclaim the spent soda to reuse, once it hits a
panel it is smashed & not reusable. It is very environmentally friendly. Also
when you use soda, you do not have to degrease first, the soda will clean off
the grease & oil at the same time, unlike other medias where you need to clean
the item first.
Because it is so soft, it will only remove the finish, it will NOT
remove rust. If you have rust you will need to remove that with a harsher
media
(black beauty or glass bead). But be careful when you use the harsher media,
as
this will hurt the panels if you do not reduce the psi. I have a TR6 bonnet
that was ruined by a shop that used high psi. & harsh media.
Soda is water soluble & can be rinsed off your panels with water. The
soda residue also prevents rusting while you wait to prime & paint.
As for consumption ... most "soda blaster" systems use about 1lb. per
minute. So a little more than a 50lb. bag per hour.
Search the web, there are many companies that rent out soda blasting
trailers with built in air compressors by the day.
As FT, pointed out. Never EVER use sand, unless you want the big "C"
cancer!
Good Luck!
Bob
_www.capecodpowdercoating.com_ (http://www.capecodpowdercoating.com)
Marty, when media blasting a body or panels care has to be taken or the heat
of the stripping will warp the panels and depending on the media it can pit
the surface too. Baking Soda is pretty safe, as are a couple of others as
long
as you take it slow and keep the pressure down. But for heavens sake DON'T
use sand on anything you want to be straight or have a nice finish on. The
biggest problem, in my opinion, is people get in too big a hurry and use too
coarse a media with too high air pressure. The combination of which will
leave you
doing more work that stripping the paint with a brush on chemical & scraper.
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