soda blasting

[Larry Huntley]

Has anyone tried soda blasting on aluminum parts? I am wondering how it would work to clean up a piper wing. Larry Huntley

[Gilbert Pierce]

Larry,
I was involved with soda blasting of aluminum about 20 years ago in an industrial environment. It worked great and was easy to clean up the blasted part. We just washed them in water. NO residue. The down side was it took enormous amounts of soda. Sand and glass can make multiple passes thru the blaster before the sharp edges that do the work wear off. We were only able to get one or two passes out of the soda. Due two the enormous amount of soda required we abandoned it and went with plastic. We bought the residue from button manufactures. It was the little piece punched out of the holes in buttons. It was very gentle on aluminum. It would take off anything loose but would leave firmly attached paint but would feather the edges.

[snellbob]

Standby for some info Larry, I know someone that did some wings a few years ago.

[Bob Mac]

I used soda blasting on a PA-22 that I recovered about 20 years a go. My best word to describe the results is marvelous.

I intend doing it again on the PA-22/20 I currently am restoring,

Bob

[Hillbilly]

Any of you fellas ever heard of blasting with dry ice pellets for media? I guess the only clean up would be sweeping the floor.
I'm sure you cant just use any old blaster tho? experience anyone?

[stevesaircraft(Bri)]

Know of a UH-1 Huey that was soda blasted, damn soda got into everything on that thing, they were cleaning soda out of all the electronic connections for a week........It did look good though, and I would probably use it if it was available...nobody around here does it anymore.

[Steve Pierce]

Brian, I remember a P47 that was the same way. Came out of the seams for years. Wouldn't be too much of a problem on a fuselage frame though. I guess it takes a special rig to shoot soda?

[Jason Gerard]

I've seen soda blasting damage skins on an airframe. They got overheated and stretched. They oil-can'd badly after the paint was gone. You got to make sure the guy doing the work knows what he's doing. I'd consider it for the spars, but not ribs. Leading and trailing edge skins are cheaper to replace than clean/repair most of the time. I've got access to a plastic media cabinet. That stuff works great but you still have to be careful on soft metal.

Jason