My really cheep, I mean inexpensive, blast cabinet

[Zooks]

I think it's great! Could you maybe sew some gardening gloves on the ends of the sleeves?

Only thing for me if I was to do it is... where do I find a cheap container big enough for my frame!?

An old fridge works well. It's fairly common. You buy a cheap blasting gun from a hardware store, a pair of shoulder length chemical gloves and strip the interior out of an old fridge. I've seen it done a few times. It works quite well.

I've got an old dishwasher here that I am going to turn into a blast cabinet (stainless steel liner will last forever). I'll cut a window in the door and glue in a sheet of clear perspex (plexiglass) and I'm good to go.

I belong to the VJMC and one of the local guys in the club has one of those large fibreglass tubs (like they use for dog washing) that he has turned into a blast cabinet.

I've also seen 44 gallon drums used quite often. They're cheap (free), large and robust.

[Zooks]

BTW - mighty13d, good work. I love recycling like this. Very innovative.


Type - homemade blast cabinet - into google pics and you'll get heaps of ideas.

[mighty13d]

thanks guys. I got laughed at a little when I first voiced my idea for making something like this. I made it anyway and holy crap, it works good for what I need. I usually have a few little things that i can't use the wheel on my bench grinder to do and stuff like that maybe once a month avg for the year so this works perfectly. I turned it down to 40 psi for aluminum and it comes out nice and clean without going deep. I then hit it with a green brillo pad and about 15 seconds with some steel wool and check ou the results:

BEFORE:


AFTER:



That took me about 5 min start to finish and very very little elbow grease involved! I might not polish it up any better than that. I think it looks great just like it is. That would have taken forever to try to dig all of that paint off from it by hand.

[Billy Ricks]

I have a set of stock 350Z wheels I've been wanting to polish and sell. I had thought about sending them out to be blasted but this just confirms I need to build my own cabinet.

[Zooks]

mighty13d - that would be referred to as 'brushed aluminium' in the trade. Nice job.

[pete]

This just gets better and better, you've done well mighty13d!

And Zooks, good idea on the fridge/dish washer thing... that should work a charm.

[scrapper]

Really cool idea and just the right size for smaller items. I am wondering what is the cfm or psi you would need for steel. I got a smaller air compressor don't know if it will work. would it matter with the type of gun you use? I was really thinking it would be nice to have one just didn't think of making it, figured with the cost I'd forget about it, not now.

[mighty13d]

I run 90 psi for steel. and my tank is a 26 gallon one. my compressor runs a lot when I'm blasting steel though so if you had one less than mine, it would be on constantly

[SqDancerLynn1]

Put a hole in the bottom with a funnel to empty into a bucket

[Zooks]

Put a hole in the bottom with a funnel to empty into a bucket

[mcloud]

I don't need gloves on the end because when I blast the aluminum it doesn't really bother me and I have some thin leather ones that I wear when I crank it up for steel. The sleeves are thin enough to let some sand through them so I think that eventually I will end up either putting some thicker material on there for sleeves with gloves or actually buying a real blast cabinet!

It really works good for what it is though. As you can tell though, what I use for a blasting gun is actually a plant sprayer for fertilizer and stuff like that. When I blasted parts of my frame, I took the gun part out and put the frame on a large tarp and blasted it that way in the driveway. You have to use a cheep welding shield and stuff when you do it that way and you make a mess all over yourself, but it works

I wouldn't neglect the rubber gloves part. Fine aluminium particle dust can get deep in your skin.

For the dust caption issue, you need a hood. The velocity in a 1 1/2- 2'' hole will be high. An old funnel would do the job. Cut a 1/2'' X 6'' slot on the opposite side , and there you go! You have a ''push'n pull counterflow dust collection system!!

[Jethro]

I love it! Well done, can't wait to see your home brew paint booth later on!

[ALB80-850]

Great idea. Have been working on a blast cabinet as well, only in reverse order. I started with dust collection 1st. I too am going to use a shop-vac. My idea was to run a short lenght of hose form the cabinet to a 30 gallon trash can for collection, and another short section of hose to the shop-vac. Let the heavier sand collect in the trash can while the dust goes to the shop-vac. I now know what I'm going to use for a cabinet. You do need to have an air inlet of some sort in the cabinet, if the vacume is too great it will bust the plexiglass before you know what happened. A friend of mine did that to his new store bought cabinet 1st time out. He got mad and I chuckeled to myself for 2 days.

Andy

[Planecrazy]

You do need to have an air inlet of some sort in the cabinet, if the vacume is too great it will bust the plexiglass before you know what happened.

Pssst ... that's why I suggested he cut some "pass through" holes into a section of the vacuum tube "just in case," but it never hurts to get the extra reminder of what can happen if he doesn't provide an inlet...

Regards,

[ALB80-850]

Psst... I did read that too, brain fart. My thinking is, with a port in the cabinet, you will be able to utilize all the vacume and have air movment through the cabinet. Your idea would work equally as well, not tryin to offend or slam the idea.

Andy