Topic: Soda blasting not to my expectations - what's the problem?

[markb]

I just had a guy do a test with soda on a junk air box bottom.  I'm glad I did, it tore it up pretty good.  I'm wondering if it was the type of soda, air pressure or what.  He did some aluminum side covers too and I didn't think they came out very clean (certainly not like what I've seen posted) so it just didn't seem like it was abrasive enough to do damage to the plastic.  I hate to start on new thread on an old topic but I just spent a half hour looking for a certain thread about soda blasting and couldn't find it.  It shows pictures of soda blasted side covers or air box.  They looked great - nice and white and smooth.  Does anyone remember it, I'd like to get some details on the process.  I was pretty excited about seeing the soda blasting results but my first experience is less than satisfying.  Any ideas why mine didn't turn out?

[Greggo]

Mark, I just did some K0 carbs, and they didn't come out perfect.  I think I needed more pressure, more powder, or more time...Or, more of everything I spent about fifteen minutes working on them, and used most of a 13 lb. bag of Arm n Hammer from Costco.  It doesn't look like much of a difference in these pictures, but it did remove all of the darkest spots, and the bowls, which were really dark, turned out much nicer.

Before:


After:


Do you have any pics of the air box?

[Rigid]

Just glass bead blasted a plastic airbox myself. Thought i ruined it, decided to shoot some clear coat on it anyway.  Bam! Looks like new. 

[oldbob]

I recently soda-blasted my 400's motor, and air-box. 110 psi and sodium bicarbonate from the local pool supply did a reasonably good job. However, it took much longer than I expected. And I still didn't get all of the paint off of the motor.

Bob

[Red Good]

Just did a bunch of carbs with soda and not really happy , did them again with glass and very pleased . We will see how it works out in the end . Spent very little time on critical surfaces and parts , focused on the bodies . Then hot tanked them .Lots of work , probably should have powder coated them while I was at it .

[Spike]

My experience with soda has been that it does less and takes more time that I had originally thought.  It is meant to be a light duty cleaning as the media is relatively soft in contrast to glass beads or mica (sand).  The beauty is that it wont destroy the surface any more than it is already deteriorated.  If pits and craters have been created time and oxidation, then soda will get the surface debris out of the way but it won't "polish the surface".

[BLUE71TURBO]

Soda blasting will take quite awhile if you don't have real high air pressure. Also it depends on what condition and what type of material you are trying to strip. Soda blasting is used mostly to strip paint off of metal so that the blasting doesn't heat up, warp and pit the metal. The next step used is walnut shell blasting. This is used in heavier stripping like in car, boat and airplane restorations. Walnut shells are way more aggressive but still doesn't heat up the metal to warp it. Next for way more aggressive stripping is ( mild to wild )  is glass beads, sand, aluminum oxide, coal slag, silicon carbide, aluminum or steel pellets.'
    Which ever method you use always do a trial run on a piece of scrap of the same material you want to strip.   

[lrutt]

I would use nothing but soda on motor parts. Anything else could destroy a motor. And it is not really intended to remove a lot of paint etc. Just not hard enough as mentioned. I'd never use sand or glass beads on heads, cases, etc. You'll never get it clean enoug afterwards. However, if you have a totally sealed and assembled motor, then you can at least bead or sand blast the outside, that would be safe. I've done that a few times. but it's got to be sealed well.

I'll be soda blasting my 2 smoker cylinder and head this weekend along with wheel hubs. But then I run 2 big 2 stage 5hp compressors in parallel. I never run out of air .

[markb]

Do you have any pics of the air box?

I'll dig it out and take some.  Like I said the soda was really hard on the plastic but didn't do much on the aluminum.  I looked again but still didn't find the thread where the poster had such good results on the plastic covers.  Anyone seen it?

[DJ_AX]

Steel pellet blasting... that would be interesting.

I soda blasted my carbs with A&H... great for getting the crud out of the nooks and crannies.
well... pretty good anyway.

[CycleRanger]

What kind of soda blasting did you have done?  Wet? Dry? What type of soda? What pressure? Etc.
For plastic I'd use very fine soda, like laundry soda, and shoot it dry at around ~80 psi or so to start.
But I'm just guessing, I've only done aluminum & steel with soda.
As always, try it out on a test piece before the real thing.

[Bailgang]

Steel pellet blasting... that would be interesting.

I soda blasted my carbs with A&H... great for getting the crud out of the nooks and crannies.
well... pretty good anyway.

We use steel shot where I work, you better watch your step if you spill some on the floor because those tiny steel shots act like ball bearings when you step in it kinda like trying to walk on ice.

[lone*X]

Arm and Hammer from the grocery store is not blasting soda and as such will be much less aggressive than most jobs require.  Commercial blast media comes in different grades, or crystal sizes.  The large and even the medium grade blasting soda does a much better job of cleaning or stripping than grocery store soda. 

Just one example, and where I have purchased soda and shell media in the past:   http://www.harborfreight.com/catalogsearch/result?q=blasting+media

[bollingball]

http://atozsodablasting.com/Media.htm

[Jerry E.]

Yes, check out Harbor Freight-  they sell a couple different grades(coarseness) of soda, plus walnut shell, plastic, etc. My soda blaster worked fine for me, just need good air pressure, and make sure the soda blaster feed tube is clean. It will plug if it gets damp soda thru it.