soda blasting

shine

shine

Member
i see more and more threads started by soda blasters all claiming soda can not damage the surface. well i have to call bullshit on this claim. first it tells me he is a retiree out to conquer the world with his new magic trailer.
the MOH hardness of soda is 2.5 , the MOH hardness of type6 acylic is 3.0 , walnut is 3.0 as is corncob and several others some being under 3. any one of these will destroy a corvette body. but only one will contaminate it. but thats another story . but i am seeing more and more of these type of claims . my composite supplier sells the trailer rigs but the buyers only get a general idea of how to run it. i have seen first hand the damage done now. both by residue and the blasting itself. the damage done to the vette body was just sad not to mention having soda impregnated into the glass. i had to pass on this one.
just my humble opinion thrown out as food for thought .
 
That's got to be a really bad mess when the soda it pounded into the fiberglass, poor car!!!
 
I wonder how you ever get it back out again, soak the car in vinegar? Then how to get out the vinegar, lol!
 
No contamination here. Pressure wash and simple green, then an hour or so in the bake booth.

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Most of the guys spewing their soda business have no idea what they are talking about or doing, I agree. I'm actually re-doing a 1971 Charger after a shop in the next state sodablasted it, blew it off and primed it. Was a candy orange job..guy took it to his first show and the paint started bubbling off the hood. Talk about sick...he probably has 30-40k just invested in the motor and suspension work on this thing. Even though we have had nothing but success using soda, it is almost worth not recommending it to anyone considering the failure rate of bozos not doing the propper prep.
 
the one i just looked at was tore all to hell . surface opened up with soda embedded everywhere. i'll stick with acrylic and corncob . both are just as safe and have 0 chance of contamination . during the peeling days of the 80's acrylic was used to strip the cars without removing trim or glass. no anchor pattern no damage.
 
the last 2 soda blasters that approached me knew absolutely nothing about paint . same misinformation crap they have read on line. they really believed they could not harm anything with it. soda is no different than chem strip to me. neither is compatible with the paint system. i strive to introduce as little as possible into the job. if it's not there to begin with it is not a problem.
i just grow tired of the same old stories . they flood the net with spam threads instead of paying for advertising.
there are at least 5 different abrasives with the same MOH level without the risk. i have recycled acrylic until it got too fine to use. then it goes in my cabinet.
my advice , if they come by your place with a shiny new trailer loaded with the holy grail , send them packing.
 
Hi Guys. I may have posted on this forum a long time ago (the old one) I had read a post on a boat forum and the guy was bashing soda and said it messed up his new paint job on the hull of his boat.

Well if the idiots that get into soda were better trained and also had enough brains to learn all about it then there would be no problems. Soda leaves a protective film on the item and has to be washed off before any painting process begins.

I do blasting using AO and Black Beauty or whatever else you want to call it and then I blow off and prep and then powder coat it. And no not the real big stuff. I have just set thin up with my other blaster for my son to blast stuff out side for customers but when blasting with any thing beside soda parts will rust real quick. I do have stuff that will help stop that for a while and I use it all the time after blasting and before coating.

I would love to have the money to go full force in to soda but can't afford that expense and not in a big enough town to pull it off so if we do get into it then we will just have to stay small I guess? But at least I know what needs to be done to it prior to painting.

There is or was another blasting media that was also great for blasting fiberglass and even wood. Its main use was for making molds in the foundry industry. It was a very fine media and a company in VA found a new use for it. It is called Olivine Just put this into Google . " Olivine as a blasting media" Here is a link to all types
http://wes7.web.officelive.com/TypesBlastMedia.aspx I also saw where it is also used in a wet blast setup.

We also have but never used a water sand blaster that hooks to a good pressure washer and then the pickup end goes into a bag of media. The guys that have used it says it will really do some great blasting and no dust but just get ready to get very wet! The only problem with using it and doing steel is flash rust so you have to be ready to dry quick or buy a product that is used to stop the flash rust after use and sprayed on.

OK that enough I guess!!!!
 
you absolutely do not want to use olivine on glass. it is a harsh abrasive with a high moh rating. the biggest problem with soda is the fools who claim it can not harm anything. it is a 2.5 on the moh scale and will absolutely harm fiberglass , stainless and even glass.
 
Lets be clear, anything an ample amout of pressure behind it can do damage to a surface. Even a pressure washer. Those guys saying soda will not harm anything are just taking that from the manufacturers and passing it along. As if the manufacturer knows it all. It can, but used properly it won't.

You would be wasting time/money if you sink a bunch of money into soda blasting in the automotive field. Most of what we use now with soda is industrial off site stuff. A few years ago we blasted an old chevy dealership downtown that was being turned into a bar/restaurant type deal. Most of the exterior glass was paint over probably a few hundred times over the years and the soda worked perfect for it. On the inside walls and outsite we used black beauty and fine crushed glass...depending on what they were going to paint or weren't. All brick building.

No stand alone soda blasting business ever lasts, if it just pertained to the automotive field. A lot of it due to the failure rate when used impropperly and the sour taste it has given a lot of people. Bad news travels faster than good.
 
geeze dont bring up pressure washers :( while cleaning up the nasty bottom on the 57 i brain farted and put a nice 3 ft gash in the bottom. 3k lbs of water will rip a fender off.
i look at soda the same as acid or chemstrip. it has to be used right and absolutely has to be neutralized . which is where the problems come in . although i detest chemstrip on fiberglass . if all the info given was correct it would be ok but there is just too many fools doing it . like you said no training, knows nothing about paint and just reads the sales brochure . my next vette job will be done with cornstarch or corn cob . both have the 2.5 to 3.0 moh rating .
 
shine;17471 said:
you absolutely do not want to use olivine on glass. it is a harsh abrasive with a high moh rating. the biggest problem with soda is the fools who claim it can not harm anything. it is a 2.5 on the moh scale and will absolutely harm fiberglass , stainless and even glass.
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Some time in the 80's I went to a business in VA to look into the olivine blasting. They had a Vette they had just finished and was nice and clean and smooth and they had wood furniture they had also done with it. You could still see and feel the sharp lines of the edges. I think the key was the grit and the amount of pressure used. I have maybe 4 oz of it in a bottle left from back then and it is fine. I also have some 120 grit AO and I think it is even finer. That was given to me and I have not found a good use for it yet?? But I think it would do real well with low pressure to blast thin sheet metal and thin aluminum. That was what it was used for on a base in a cabinet blaster and maybe even in one of there other blast rooms. Aircraft want take much abuse.

I have a 72 vette conv and for the life of me I don't remember what I used to strip it with???? It had 4 paint jobs on the darn thing. I know I used a stripper that was safe on it and then used a DA to finish and then did whatever repairs that were needed. It was done in the early 90's I think? I did it and my 72 MC at the same time. When I would get tired of working on one I would walk over to the other !!!!!!!!!!!!
 
will have to look into that. i use olivine to remove rust. it is pretty aggressive. it is a 6.5 on hardness. unless there is a lesser moh there is no way it can work on glass. talcum powder is rated as 1 if that helps. 2.5 - 3.0 is about as hard as you want to use on fiberglass and even then you can really cut the glass. anything that will chip away paint will chip away resin . gets real tricky doing the glass cars.
 
All I know is what I saw at the time. While I was trying to fig out how to spell the dag word and finally got it right. I think I did see in my searching that it can be bought in diff grades. So that I guess would be the answer and then the next thing would be the pressure used. Just like when a customer want me to powder coat over chrome. I cut my pressure down to 30 or 40 lbs because all I want is an etch and then something for the powder to adhere to. Powder does right well holding on to chrome with out like when I want to clear over it or shoot some candy colors but it can chip easy that way.

I am going to see if I can add my web site to here and then you can see some of the stuff I do.

Not having any luck with my web site showing??? OK what am I doing wrong?
 
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