Bead Blasting tips

[Hennessy]

I'm looking to get a cheap bead blaster at harbor frieght, what should i get and what type of medium? I will be blasting 80% lowers

[TygerAR]

Are you getting the cabinet and do you have a compressor? yes the 80 grit medium is fine. that's what I used to do the following.

[sffred]

For a 80% lower I would suggest 80grit glass bead or 180grit aluminum oxide media

[Hoagiem]

I started with the benchtop model and it is ok, not a very good setup. The doors leak media, the cabinet is not sealed very well and it isn't built very well all around, the light failed shortly after I got it so I modified a flourescent trouble light I picked up to use in it and it has been in there for about 6 years. I still use it but I resealed all the joints in the cabinet, replaced the door seals with foam tape weather stripping and machined a smaller tip for the gun. The other issue is that the hopper in the bottom is not very deep and without the thing being full of media, I mean right up to the screen it doesn't flow well to the intake port. It is just ok for a hobby/home setup.

However, the free standing unit is a far better unit, larger capacity, deep nice flowing hopper and the gun is a bit better. I added a light to the unit I had. The thing still leaks media but not piles like the other one used to. They are both air hogs and I have found that the smaller tip cuts back on air use. Check the air requirements for the units and try to get a compressor that comes close to the cfm required without breaking the bank, those things do drain a compressor in a hurry.

If I was going to do it over again I would go straight to the floor standing model and be done with it, install the smallest nozzle and go.

I have been using a mix of 80 grit alox and the glass that harbor freight sells, in a low air situation the 80 grit still works and in the case of full compressor it works faster and leaves a clean frosted finish ready for parkerizing or whatever else you want to do.

[SJgunguy24]

First off unless your trying to polish use aluminum oxide. Glass beads don't do much to blend, clean, or prep for park or spray coatings.
Also, whatever cabinet you get, make sure you can swap out the nozzle of the gun can be changed out with Tungston carbide tips. Do not balk at the price, you will go through 50 ceramic tips for the 1 tungston tip. It adds up.
Also, whatever the spec says for the compressor get bigger. If not your going to have that compressor running all the time..

You could also make a blaster with a hose, gun, metal garbage can, plexiglass and gloves.

[Hennessy]

I read to go with aluminum oxide and never use glass. I'm going to Duracoat after I finish.

[adamsreeftank]

I think Aluminum Oxide is best for Parkerizing or painting, but glass bead would be better before anodizing.

I have the standing harbor freight cabinet for oxide blasting and it works pretty well. I use an old shop vac attached to it as a filter. I also have a hand-held unit I use for touching up stainless bead-blasted parts like from a Kimber.

If you use glass bead, be very careful about the dust. It can give you silicosis, so you need a good filter on your cabinet.

[Barbarosa]

I tried the Harbor Freight route and wasn't happy at all. I got a Barrel Blaster and have been very happy. They are a small shop out of Texas and ship the units right to your door. Larger capacity and more sturdy than the HF model for not too much money.

http://www.barrelblaster.com/

[Skiddz]

The bench top HF unit is pretty bad, but can be made tolerable. Like was stated previously, the thing leaks like a sieve right outta the box. 30 minutes with a caulk gun and some silicone takes care of most of that. I fixed the doors by replacing the "gaskets" with good weatherstripping.

The gun is ok - right up until the nozzle wears out which won't take long if you're shooting anything other than glass bead. Home Depot sells a decent blast gun for about $25. I replaced the HF POS with the HD one and it's been chugging along for years.. Glass, alox, walnut shells, coal slag, it seems to work fine with each.

I added a fluorescent shop light to the interior of mine and built a "bong" out of a 5 gallon bucket to connect my Shop Vac to in order to keep the dust down. The water traps the dust and saves the Shop Vac's motor.. Shop Vac has to work a bit hard, but so far it's held up to the abuse.

Definitely get a big compressor, preferably not an oil-less unit. I picked up a 30 gallon 5HP unit from HD that will deliver more than enough air for a blast cabinet, even at 100% duty cycle.

Definitely wear a respirator when blasting. Even with all the caulk and new door gaskets, it leaks a bit and you don't want to be breathing all that dust.

Looking back, I should have picked up the big floor model, but for what it is, the bench top unit does ok.

[Zamble]

I bypassed all the HF junk. I bought a skatblast cabinet and an ingersol rand 14.7 cfm compressor.