I am fairly new to bead/media blasting & have a couple of questions for you who have more experience, thus expertise! I bought a 'Dragway Tools Model 110 Sandblasting Cabinet & Built in Dust Collector LD-2420' a few months ago & have used it for 8 to 10 hours. What glass bead media do you find most effective? Or do you use some other 'media'?
My air compressor keeps up very well, but the glass beads often seem to surge out of the gun very effectively for a few seconds & then there is a lull of another few seconds when it seems to be blowing mostly air & not much beads until another surge of beads comes shooting out for a few seconds.
I really like the short few seconds when the surge of beads is going great guns, but wonder if there is something I am doing wrong to cause this inconsistent response.
Another question I have is how can I keep from sweating so badly in the gloves that after a few hours they stink & my hands/arms stink when I remove myself from the gloves. I washed them out once & it took a 'very long time' to get them completely dry, though they smelled OK.
I am in Sioux Falls, SD, where it is fairly humid which contributes to this problem I suppose.
Another issue is the water in the system. I have both the manufacturer recommended filter & desiccant valve installed, but it only takes a couple or three hours before the desiccant gets saturated & needs to be replaced/changed. The 'Campbell Hausfeld' service folks said that I have to have the bead blasting booth at least 10 to 15 feet downline from the compressor to mitigate this moisture issue. Even when I bleed the tank & filter every 15 minutes or so I still get an occasional burst of water pouring out of the gun in the booth. Any help will be appreciated! Thank you!

 

Your last question and fist, the gun working and not working are related, moister in the air.
You need to get the air drier / cooled for the water to fall out of the air and why they say compressor needs to be farther from the blast gun.

I don't know what set up you have for air but if you can cool the air, run it into another tank to catch the water and then use the air you will be a lot better off.
My system was made to not get any or vary little water at any of the 5 hose drops in my garage and it gets hot & humid here in NC!
Water and body work DO NOT MIX!
I have a 80 gallon 2 stage compressor that goes into a home made air cooler / dryer then to a loop around the top of my garage.
Each hose drop also has a drip leg to catch water before it makes it to a hose.
I have only seen a little water at a drip leg of a hose I use 98% of the time, never at the hose end.
Home made air cooler / dryer: base board fin tube and fittings. Air comes in on the left side, goes up and back down to the first drip leg, then back up and down to a 2nd drip leg.
Air goes out the fitting just above the drip leg so water will not be pulled into the system.

Here you can see the compressor a flex hose feeds air to the dryer mounted on the wall of my garage.
If I am using a lot of air like when I painted my truck a set up a box fan to blow across the fins tube as there is not a lot of air movement back in that corner.


You can see the blue piping is the loop run around the top of the garage. It can feed in either direction when it hits the loop.


Hose drip with drip leg. The hose connection is facing us and hard to see. I have 5 just like this.


The thing is you need to cool the air to get the water to drop out and a way to drain the water before you use it.
Some run long slated pipe down a wall as this gives time for the air to cool and put a drip leg at the end for water draining.
Others put a coil of hose or copper in a bucket of ice water then to a 2nd tank to collect the water before using the air.
Thing is you have to have air in and air out 90* or more from each other. If you put them across from each other the water will just shoot across and be pulled into the port calling for air.
That is why my air flow path fittings are 90* from where it needs to go with a drip leg at that 90* turn.

As you found out that dryer / filter does not work for high volume of air for a long time.
Make the run longer to cool the air, a way to collect the water before you use it and you will be good to go.
Dave ----

 

Thank you very much Dave G./FuzzFace2!!!
Any hints about the blasting medium of choice, or effectiveness of one brand over another?
Thank you again!

 

Sorry I cant help on that as I don't have a blast cab.
Son wants me to get one but I don't really have a place for it and something that makes dust in my garage / body shop is not a good thing LOL
I say "body shop" but I only do my own projects body work and not for anyone else as I hate doing it.

I think once you can get dry air what you are using now will be good if you like the job it is doing when it comes out the gun LOL
You using glass beads or black slag? I guess a lot also has to do with what you are blasting.
I have heard wall nut shell is good for some type of blasting but don't remember what it was now.
Yea I know just enough to be dangerous LOL
Dave ----