What is Sandblasting?
Simply said, sandblasting involves using
pressured air to launch a specific medium (material) at a high rate of speed.
By using abrasive materials to physically blast a surface, you can smooth or
scrape the object you’re blasting.
Your purpose influences your
choice of medium, and the most typical factors to take into account while
making your decision are as follows:
●
Hardness
●
Grit Size Range
●
Speed
●
Safety
You’ll see that sandblasting can be used to
etch surfaces in some situations (we’ll address this later in this article).
You’ll need a medium with a very high hardness rating to do this, often Silicon
Carbide or Aluminum Oxide. You should use steel shot or another material with a
more mild hardness for smoothing.
The most popular sandblasting
medium are listed below along with their hardness:
●
Aluminum Oxide (8-9 Mohs)
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Glass Beads (5-6 Mohs)
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Crushed Glass Grit (5-6 Mohs)
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Plastic Abrasive (3-4 Mohs)
●
Walnut Shell (4.5-5 Mohs)
●
Com Cob (4.5-5 Mohs)
●
Steel Grit (42-50 RC)
●
Pumice (6 Mohs)
●
Silicone Carbide (9-10 Mohs)
●
Garnet (6.5-7.5 Mohs)
You can select a medium from the available
ones based on your particular project’s needs and objectives.
Introduction to Sandblasting
Sandblasting makes use of the abrasive
qualities of sand to produce surfaces that are smoother and have fewer physical
faults. It goes without saying that sand is abrasive and coarse. These
characteristics allow it to remove extra or undesired material from a surface
by wearing it away. For instance, sandpaper has a large number of tiny sand
particles in it. The sand smooths out the roughness of a surface by scraping
away part of the top-layer material. The only difference between sandblasting
and that process is the use of highly pressured sand.
How to Perform Sandblasting?
Pouring the sand into the sandblasting machine
is the initial stage in sandblasting. The sand is put into a chamber on top of
sandblasting equipment. When the air compressor is turned on, it connects to
the sandblasting machine and releases the sand through a handheld nozzle. Sand
pressure can range from 50 to 130 pounds per square inch depending on the
parameters (PSI).
The surface is subsequently
“blasted” with sand, which thanks to its abrasive qualities may
provide a smoother finish. For instance, concrete is frequently sandblasted.
The concrete is treated with sandblasting after it has been poured and given
time to cure.The procedure smoothes out the concrete by removing some of the extra
material.
What Is the Difference Between
Shot Blasting and Sandblasting?
One of the several procedures for
blasting-type surface finishing is sandblasting. Shot blasting is another much
more efficient option in smoothing typically stiff and rough surfaces. What
precisely distinguishes shot blasting from sandblasting?
Sand is propelled against a surface when
sandblasting is used. In contrast, tiny metal balls or beads are blasted
against a surface during shot blasting. Most frequently, stainless steel,
copper, aluminium, or zinc are used to create the balls or beads. Nevertheless,
because each of these metals is tougher than sand, shot blasting is even more
efficient than sandblasting.
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