Does anyone have experience with soda blasting?

[jeryst]

There are no soda-blasters in my area, and I am thinking of investing in a setup do do blasting for myself, and perhaps making a part time business out of it to pay off the cost of the equipment. Does anyone have any experince in this area?

 There seems to be a lot of makers of the equipment, and each one says his is better than the others. Some only handle soda, so they say their equipment is more efficient, while others handle other media, so they say theirs is more versatile.

There are   some companies that say they will set you up in business, some offer turnkey equipment, some offer leasing, some just offer the actual blasting pots. Anyone know which companies are good, and which ones to stay away from? Which ones are affordable, and which ones are out to take you?

I've heard good and bad about soda. I know it is messy, but so is most blasting. They claim that the soda dissolves completely in water, yet I've read that you can't get it all off, and that it acts like a release agent and makes the paint fall off if it is not completely removed.

Then there's dry-ice blasting which some say is better than soda. I'm totally confused, and would like to hear from someone that does soda-blasting, as well as someone who has had it done for them.

[JS27N0B]

I have had it done and can tell you that the car still oozes some white goo out from behind panels at times.
 I have also heard that some people say that water will react with it afterwards and cause corrosion due to the chemical reaction, I'm no chemist but no my car doesn't go through rainstorms so I'm not worried about it.

[tactransman]

Have you looked at this one?:
 $1,800.00
General Specifications     Dimensions

    * ASME Pressure Vessel
    * 100 lb. Media Capacity
    * 25 ft. Heavy Duty Blast Hose
    * Water Rinse Off Capability
    * Interchangeable Nozzle Holder

   
OVERALL    
Height    48"
Width    21"
Depth    25"
Weight    135 lbs.
http://www.ace-sandblasting.com/soda-blasting.html

[jeryst]

Yes, I have looked at the ACE unit, but I don't know how it stacks up against others, especially when the others cost three to five times as much.

[highspeeddirt]

I work with printing.  We use whats called an anilox to tranfer ink to the printiing plates.  These anilox have millions of microscopic cells to hold and transfer the ink.  We have used soda blasting for these, and it does a great job but is very messy.  Our anilox rolls are ceramic, so we don't have to worry about the paint issue, but it is extremely hard to get it all cleaned up.  We also used a dry ice blaster for stripping paint and cleaning of parts and it did a great job without the mess.  Just the mess from what you blasted off.  Hope this helps.
                                                        HSD