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HF blasting cabinet

chuck hahn

chuck hahn

Forum LongTimer
Past Site Supporter
I have the big HF sand blasting cabinet. My compressor is a 26 gallon ( I think it is ) and the problem is that at 90 PSI on the regulator dial the media wont suck up the pick up tube. If I crank it almost to red line on the gauge which is 120 PSI it will suck up the media.

The guy i got the cabinet from gave me a big 30 LB box of pretty course black aluminum oxide looking stuff and a same size box of walnut shells. The walnut shell is lighter and will suck up better than the aluminum oxide does..but the walnut shells suck for paint removal and heavy corrosion.

So the dilema is this. Should i go for the HF 70 grit glass beads or maybe the soda media for doing things like paint removal, heavy oxidation or rusty parts???
 
PERSONALLY I wouldn't use soda on rusty parts, too much material used to remove rust. It's a one time use product.

Can you find sandblasting sand locally? I would try that first and if necessary, crank up the pressure as well.
 
I can find whatever is suggested in OKC..but i want some info before i go drop coin for nothing.
 
HF sells aluminum oxide media which works great to strip paint and rust. The glass media they sell works pretty good as well but it's not as fast.

As far as poor media flow is concern, I think that kind of goes hand and hand with a suction feed system. I strain the media through an old stainless steel mesh colander to get rid of the chunks and that helps. The blaster will still clog up on the suction side due to moisture from the air. When that happens I pull the suction tube out of the media and put my thumb over the blast gun outlet and give the trigger a few pulses to push the media backwards and clear the clog. Works almost every time. When it's humid outside the need to do this is more often. Oh, and I've got a water drier on the compressor and on the blast cabinet as well, and water still gets through.
 
Ive done the hand over the nozzle trick and it doesnt make a difference. The unit has the stock hoses that came in it when new. It just seems that the course black crap is too heavy for the suction to lift it....and the walnut shells are so soft they take a week to do anything realistically effective. The walnut will suck up..but its schit as far as leaning power. Thats the basis for the delema as to what to get that would actually suck up the tube and yet do some actual work to the parts.

Im not doing stuff with a 1/4 inch of rust. I want to just spray off calipers for repainting, corrosion on cases, just basic clean up of parts kinda work.
 
Nessism said:
As far as poor media flow is concern, I think that kind of goes hand and hand with a suction feed system. I strain the media through an old stainless steel mesh colander to get rid of the chunks and that helps. The blaster will still clog up on the suction side due to moisture from the air. When that happens I pull the suction tube out of the media and put my thumb over the blast gun outlet and give the trigger a few pulses to push the media backwards and clear the clog. Works almost every time. When it's humid outside the need to do this is more often. Oh, and I've got a water drier on the compressor and on the blast cabinet as well, and water still gets through.
Click to expand...
Listen to the man. It sound's exactly what was happening to me while using my sandblaster.

The only thing else I can suggest is using some sort of device to vibrate the cabinet while blasting to keep it from clumping..
 
This is the black stuff that was given with the cabinet ( bought it off Clist ). Consistency is like coffee grounds.

 
chuck hahn said:
Ive done the hand over the nozzle trick and it doesnt make a difference. The unit has the stock hoses that came in it when new. It just seems that the course black crap is too heavy for the suction to lift it....and the walnut shells are so soft they take a week to do anything realistically effective. The walnut will suck up..but its schit as far as leaning power. Thats the basis for the delema as to what to get that would actually suck up the tube and yet do some actual work to the parts.

Im not doing stuff with a 1/4 inch of rust. I want to just spray off calipers for repainting, corrosion on cases, just basic clean up of parts kinda work.
Click to expand...

I'd get the glass for what you describe, particularly with aluminum. That "black crap" looks like coal slag.
 
I have shook the cabinet, shook the feed tube up and down while trying to blast, put in the biggest holed nozzle, hand burped the air back down the feed tube, and on and on without any change as far as it sucking up the black stuff. I would think that since it sucks up the lighter walnut shell just fine its a media problem and not anything else going on.

BUT the walnut shell is so soft it take all day to do anything. I want to do away with all the crap media the guy gave me and find what works ( will suck up the feed tube) and strip paint and light corrosion effectively and not turn into an all day project.
 
I dont know what it is but equal amounts in the hands and the black stuff is noticably heavier than the walnut shell.
 
I have a HF sandblasting spot blaster....wont work with the heavy grit....I need to use the fine...(recycled coal slag)....I was able to use a slightly heavier grit, but I needed to modify the feed orifice (heh heh, he said orifice)...but seriously, stick with the fine (I get mine from Tractor Supply), ans might take longer but will work. My spot blaster is rated for 90psi also btw, and i just run it off of a pancake compressor (5 gal mebbe ?)...
 
I was thinking the big compressor wasnt the problem as it runs the air impacts and such just fine. So guess i need to find some real fine glass beads then?????
 
Gimme about 3 minutes and I'll go out to my shop and give ya the brand that I use....I "think" its "Black Diamond" and is made from pulverized coal slag.....gimme a few....be right back....

...yup....Black Diamond brand 30/60 or the super fine (30 ?)...

Hay !...I know somebody right in yer town !.....small world....and you GOTTA have a Tractor Supply there....

Tractor Supply.....2030 S Telephone Rd, Moore, OK
 
Last edited:
Nessism said:
You don't need "really fine" media, all the various medias HF sells should be fine.
http://www.harborfreight.com/catalogsearch/result?q=media
Click to expand...

Theyre not though....Ive tried, believe me...I have bags of media I added to the gravel in my driveway because it was junk....my best result was with the Black Diamond from TS....and glass beads will work, but will cost 4x more.....is someone wants to soda blast, its a major thing....new nozzles, etc....IMO not worth it....
 
Si basically whats happening is the black stuff is so course and heavy it wont suck up the tube...right??? How is glass bead sizes graded??? Bigger the number the bigger the size of the beads???
 
I think glass beads are rated/scaled like shotgun shot pretty much....so the more "O"s, the smaller they are....could be wrong though....the one thing about glass beads, is that they are slippery....so tend to flow better.....and since you have a cabinet, you can reuse, right ?....might be worth a try....but they aint cheap....I wanted to blast a 1962 Harley tank, went to get the beads, and it was like $30 for like a gallon container....I pay $7 for a 40 lb bag of the Black Diamond....
 
Mines a 40 LB rated cabinet with the sump that the media fall back down into and is resucked up the feed tube. Not any orifices to be drilled out that i know of like theses gravity fed units.
 
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