While growing environmental concerns and alternative methods continue displacing sandblasting in some areas, it retains importance across diverse industries able to manage the considerable dust and disposal challenges. What are the prominent applications still relying on sandblasting for critical surface preparation and finishing needs? Let’s examine these 7 major sandblasting applications that endure despite mounting pressures to move away from sand media.
Automotive
Sandblasting thoroughly cleans casted engine blocks, heads, intake manifolds and other oily automotive components prior to machining and reassembly. It strips paint down to bare metal for auto body repair and refinishing jobs. Wheels, axles and undercarriage parts also undergo sandblasting to remove rust and old coatings.
For high volume parts like engine castings and stamped body panels, automated rotary basket blasting machines provide consistent finishing. Manual blasting removes coatings as needed for weld repair and fabrication operations. While environmental concerns are transitioning some automotive applications to alternate media, sandblasting maintains widespread use tackling grease, carbon buildup, rust, paints and other stubborn contaminants.
Aviation and Aerospace
Aircraft exteriors undergo aggressive paint stripping in large walk-in sandblasting rooms to bare the primer beneath. The high-pressure abrasion removes multiple paint layers rapidly and thoroughly. Tightly adhered coatings resist other methods. Interior components like seats and galley equipment are refurbished using smaller sandblasting cabinets for removing corrosion, tarnish and superficial damage.
Sensitive turbine engine surfaces utilize micro-spherical glass bead blasting in place of sand’s angular media. But for exterior paint removal and cleaning tasks able to contain spent abrasive, sandblasting’s speed and low cost keep it entrenched. Bakery soda blasting also sees some usage for aircraft stripping applications able to justify the added material expense.
Marine Vessels
Sandblasting smoothes boat hulls and decks, removes marine growth from vessel exteriors, and profiles surfaces for new protective coatings. The roughened finish improves paint adhesion. Interior bilges and tanks also undergo abrasive blasting to remove old paints and rust in preparation for recoating. Portable mini-blasters clean tight corners and access points throughout the vessel.
Harsh ocean conditions demand maximal surface preparation. Sandblasting’s etching action secures protective coatings against premature peeling and corrosion. The process refurbishes everything from small pleasure craft to massive tanker ships and navy destroyers. Affordability and processing speed enable frequent maintenance cycles combating seawater’s constant degradation.
Construction and Infrastructure
Sandblasting control technology allows its use removing lead paint from bridges, storage tanks, pipes and structural steel during remediation projects. Portable blasters clean rebar inside concrete forms before pouring new segments. Floor coating removal in factories relies on walk-behind blasters to strip old paints down to the concrete substrate.
Building restoration makes light use of sand or glass beads for superficial grime removal from brick, granite and delicate stonework. But containment challenges generally rule out sand for large architectural work. Instead, soda blasting sees increased adoption for restoration needs able to justify the higher media costs.
Manufacturing
An endless range of manufacturing applications leverage sandblasting for surface preparation. Removing flash, bearding and light burrs from cast and forged parts with benchtop cabinets streamlines post-casting cleanup. Custom sandblasting rooms strip tooling grease from stamping dies and production equipment during maintenance. Deburring chambers automatically tumble small components to rapidly smooth edges.
Paint masking plugs, insert racks and programmable turntables allow high-mix sandblasting of various components on shared equipment. When paired with automated powder coating lines, abrasive blast cleaning provides reliable pretreatment for paint adhesion. Manufacturing process integration allows economical high-volume blasting.
Foundries
Sandblasting eliminates casting defects like veining marks, burrs and sprues following shakeout. Removing embedded sand and oxide films before machining saves tool life and prevents machine contamination. The process also eliminates heat scales from hot forgings prior to press quenching or heat treatment. Sand temperature tolerance and low cost make it ideal for heavy stock removal applications like castings.
Aluminum media grows increasingly common replacing silica sand for these applications due to environmental pressures. But sand retains usage at facilities able to manage containment. Adding magnets during media recovery pulls fine iron particles that may contaminate parts if blasted upstream of sensitive processes like anodizing or coating.
Power Generation Equipment
Portable sandblasting provides critical in-situ surface preparation on power plant components to stave off corrosion damage from fuels, steam and flue gases. Selective blasting cleans local spots of tube sheet corrosion, ash deposits and fuel residue buildup while the unit remains online. Complete blasting occurs during outages to fully restore large heat transfer areas.
Sandblasting thoroughly removes compacted ash, soot, salt and metal oxides from gas turbine hot section components like combustors, blades and vanes during tear downs. Restoring surface condition helps maintain operating clearances and performance. The process also cleans condenser tubing and coolers in steam plants along with boiler components to support heat rate and availability.
Conclusion
While the list of applications goes on, it’s clear sandblasting retains importance for industries able to manage its considerable hazards and environmental impact. As long as safety, containment and disposal practices keep pace with the abrasive process itself, sandblasting will continue serving irreplaceable roles across automotive, aviation, marine, infrastructure, manufacturing and other essential sectors.
