Soda Blasting

[brentwoodkris]

I'm curious to find out the pros and cons to soda blasting. I have spent many hours so far sanding on my fairings and have made little progress, even with two people and electric orbital sanders. By further investigation, I've found that there are in excess of 4 layers of THICK paint and primer on the plastics. I want it back down bare so I can repaint her. I had NO problems stripping the tank with aircraft stripper as suggested, but I'm a student and simply don't have the time to spend 100 hours sanding on these fairings. Seriously, the top coat of blue paint is over .5mm thick. Any advice would be much appreciated. I know I can pick up a soda blaster from harbor freight for like 100 bux. Thanks!

[ontariokatana]

Soda Blasting is a great way to remove old paint. I had the hull of my cruiser soda blasted, to remove the old anti foul paint, and it worked well. That said, I have also used a media blaster to take the paint off the side panels of my old VT500FT and it made a mess of them. I needed to cover the entire panel in spot putty in order to get rid of the marks.....

[brentwoodkris]

Soda Blasting is a great way to remove old paint. I had the hull of my cruiser soda blasted, to remove the old anti foul paint, and it worked well. That said, I have also used a media blaster to take the paint off the side panels of my old VT500FT and it made a mess of them. I needed to cover the entire panel in spot putty in order to get rid of the marks.....

So it worked fine on one and not the other? Also, were both of the projects plastic?

[hardlydangerous]

Honestly new paint bonds better to old paint then it does to bare plastics, not to mention its much harder to prtep plastics then it is a painted surface.

I don't like sanding or blasting plastics bare because one you get through the paint the plastic wears away very quickly compared to the paint around it and often leave an uneven wavy surface.

[brentwoodkris]

No one really answered my question...

How about blasting with glass beads?

[brooder]

http://katriders.com/vb/showthread.php?t=65940&highlight=blasting

[brentwoodkris]

http://katriders.com/vb/showthread.p...light=blasting

Thanks! I don't have a place to do any blasting, so I guess I'll be taking it to a local blast shop to get it done. Then off to work with rattle cans!

[steves]

A student with more money than time? Interesting.

[brentwoodkris]

A student with more money than time? Interesting.

I'm a double major and I work 30 hours a week and live in an apartment complex. Don't have a place to work other than a buddy's garage. Otherwise, I'd surely buy a sandblaster myself and get the job done. Oh well, I can afford to pay the $50/hr for a couple hours of sandblasting on fairings versus taking off work for 20+ hours to hand sand the stuff. Hopefully the sand blasting rates in Columbia are as cheap as STL like I know them to be.

[brooder]

Good luck finding a shop that will do the plastics. Most won't because of the ease of damaging the plastics.

[mrwhipper]

I'm curious to find out the pros and cons to soda blasting. I have spent many hours so far sanding on my fairings and have made little progress, even with two people and electric orbital sanders. By further investigation, I've found that there are in excess of 4 layers of THICK paint and primer on the plastics. I want it back down bare so I can repaint her. I had NO problems stripping the tank with aircraft stripper as suggested, but I'm a student and simply don't have the time to spend 100 hours sanding on these fairings. Seriously, the top coat of blue paint is over .5mm thick. Any advice would be much appreciated. I know I can pick up a soda blaster from harbor freight for like 100 bux. Thanks!

The soda blast material is VERY high in PH. You will need to neturalize it prior to coating it or the paint will not have good adheasion. The best way to do that is to was it with vinager and water mix. You do under stand that if you remove the factory coating, you will have to apply adheasion promoter to the plastic prior to applying an under coat. If the factorey coating is in good shape, I would leave it. Just sand it and top coat it. Good luck.

P.S. Sorry about the crappy spelling.

[brentwoodkris]

Thanks for the advice. I talked to a maaco in St. Louis and they'll low pressure sand blast the fairings for me for cheap. I actually plan on using the Krylon Fusion outdoor paints as they are made for plastic adhesion. Ya I know, rattle cans, but I did a decent job on the tank, and ANYTHING is better than the paint job I had before. I found that the Engine Enamel series of paints, most notably the Clear Coat that they make, is both gas and oil resistant, and went well over the Krylon paint that I threw on the tank.

[hardlydangerous]

the engine enamal paints are still not resistant to gas
I've heard of a hundrfed people using them and tried the dupli-color engine clear myself... gas will still destroy it

Alscorp or dupont make a 2 part clear in a spray can for $40