Bead blasting

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Feb 10, 2013
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Anyone use a blasting cabinet and care to share any tips or tricks? They were on for a good price so I bought one and some glass beads.
 
Yep.
Before you do anything, or put the beads in the cabinet-seal every seam in the cabinet with Silicone.
 
Hey Bill, not sure if this is where I need to ask this. Can't seem to find a way to post a new thread.... what is the best medium to use to get a tumbled finish? Thank you in advance.
 
Something I learned from the pistol smiths who do custom 1911's. Keep separate batches of media for carbon steel and stainless steel. If you use media to blast carbon steel and then blast stainless steel with the same media there will be tiny microscopic bits of carbon steel embedded in the surface of the stainless steel that will soon turn into rust spots on the stainless blade.
 
McMaster-Carr has a combo glass bead/aluminum oxide grit which does a nice job on stainless. Have never tried it on carbon. I posted the part no. in a previous post about sandblasting.

Tim
 
Hey Bill, not sure if this is where I need to ask this. Can't seem to find a way to post a new thread.... what is the best medium to use to get a tumbled finish? Thank you in advance.

Use a tumbler! Blasting is not tumbling.
 
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