Sandblaster, What To Get?

 I'm thinging about getting a snadblaster to do big jobs like tractor frames and wagons. I already have a cabinent type for small stuff. What do you guys recommond?

The wind maker is more important than the blaster.Make sure you have enough cfm's and dry air. Tracy

I did some rear wheels with a TS blaster. It worked well. I also bought their blastng media.

I have a 10 gallon pressure tank style blaster from Harbor Freight. It works quite well. A pressure tank blaster will be more aggressive than a siphon type. Tracy's right about the air source. Sandblasters use LOTS of air. I have a pair of 3hp 60 gal compressors and they will run my cabinet blaster or the tank blaster as long as I want. Having clean dry sand is a must too. The only gripe I have about the tank blaster is it won't work with Black Beauty blasting crystals. They just don't flow as well as white sand requiring constant agitation of the tank to work.

Getting enough air is a problem. I just can't get enough to really do a fast enough job. I think you would need a big compressor. I have tried using my average size compressor and I think I could use two or three of them hooked together! I have thought it would be nice to have something I could hook a tractor up to that would move lots of air!

I get mine at Lowe's. Black beauty

We use a pressure pot, 200 lb capacity and a diesel powered air pump for doing all types of jobs, even works ok on tin parts like hoods if not get too close. I think the brand is clemco. Takes a lot of dry air like the other guys say, we also use a fresh air mask for better viability and safety. Just the blaster is few thousand tho.......

I think I got mine at tractor supply also. I also use black beauty. I sweep it up and put it through an old window screen and reuse it several times. Like others have said gotta have the airflow. I'm in the middle of blasting my WC right now. Bought mine few years ago when I restored my G started out with a wire wheel on a grinder didn't take long to figure out I needed a blaster.

I have the siphon feed, pressure tank, and power washer attachment. I like using the power washing attachment. It does a great job, and is more healthy (you don't breathe the dust). I think I got it from Northern tools.

silica sand grows wild in northern Saskatchewan

Here is a little tip to kill the water in air from a hot compressor. Take  a 5 gallon bucket, fill it with cold water, coil 50 ft. of air hose into it. hang water separator over edge of bucket on end of hose . Hook up and use, no more water in air.  Dave. Father of poor necessity.

I've got three small compressors all connected together.  I think they are two 20 gallon and one 30 gallon tank.  They work good as a team.  Go team!

I run the air through an air/water seperator and then through a desiccant to dry the air.

In the cooler weather, I blast and coat condenser tube-sheets on HVAC chillers.  My set-up is a 1.5 cu. ft. Schmidt blast pot and a 185 CFM Joy air-compressor.  The media is Black Beauty 12/40 grit.  The result I am after is a near white 3 mil finish.

DonDittmar,
VEry nice outfit you made there. Where did you get the compressor cyliner part of it?

Two parts, to just the air side; volume and air quality. Whatever you have for an air compressor, go with the biggest tank you can. You will need a compressor to fill it, without the compressor hurting itself by running constantly. CFM does the work so unless you are doing very small jobs, you will be waiting on a compressor that is running itself to death. Lower volume/pressure to work with and you will get frustrated when you "outrun" the compressor. Tanks are cheap and set up with the right compressor, they make all the difference in the world.
Tanks are also a large separator; impact separation and to an extent, a larger area to cool the air, allowing the liquid entrained in the air to fall out.
Compressor sized to the job.
Tank sized to the compressor/max output of what you want to do.
Auto drains; both on the receiver tank and water/particulate/oil removal filters, essential if you want very clean dry air.
If you are running a recip compressor, expect 100ppm oil carryover and this only increases as the compressor ages. No aftercooler on the recip unit, expect hot, water laden air that must be "treated" for quality. With an aftercooler (not intercooler), you can get the "approach temp" of the air down to within 100 degrees of ambient; this is the air temp as it leaves the compressor. A refrigeration unit will drop the air temp which allows more water to be able to be removed. I set up many air systems in factories, body shops, etc. and it all depends on what you want to do with the air; 10 - 1000+HP, you still have to set it up to do what you want efficiently.
The old rule of thumb; a 100HP compressor, set at 100 psi, running at 100 degrees ambient and near 100% relative humidity will make over 20 gallons of water a day.
Many times I received a call to come out and quote a new compressor only to add up the required cfm to find the compressor unit still had 20-30%+ capacity that just was not being used properly. By tieing the dead ended piping together, installing a 240 or 400 gallon receiver tank furthest away from the compressor source and showing the customer how to install proper drip legs at points of use, they quickly realized they did not need another compressor. When they did expand operations, I got the call and they had the luxury of already having the air piping/storage in-place.
If you want to do plenty of pieces constantly, and even bigger jobs if you are seriously getting into blasting, hard to beat a pull behind 180-200 cfm diesel unit as it can also be used to do many other things. It will typically be a rotary screw (low oil carryover compared to a recip), have a separator and designed to run flat out.