Home Sand Blaster

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I have a 110 lb home sandblaster from Harbor Freight.  Does anyone use one to clean your small project before painting? If yes, what sand do you use and where do you get it?Thanks, Randy
Reply:DO NOT use sand.   use some sort of blasting media.  Starblast, Black Beauty, and others will work."sand' contains silica.....  there's several threads covering the dangers of it.Small projects  I'll clean / degrease  and maybe hit up with a wire brush  unless there's heavy rust.
Reply:My old man is an automotive painter and he'd choke me if I sandblasted something for prep.  The procedure that makes the best finish is this: blast to remove rust, scale, and junk, use 220 - 320 grit sandpaper, blow off with an air gun, tack cloth, degrease (don't touch without gloves on at this point), prime, if it's wet on wet prime, paint within 2 hours, if it's not wait until it's completely dry, sand with 400 - 600 grit, topcoat it.  Just like welding, painting is all about the preparation.Oh and yeah I agree with the above reply.  Plus sand generates a lot of heat from the friction that warps thinner metals.  I like plastic media or crushed walnut shells.  Always where a respirator.
Reply:I use glass beads myself. I used to do commercial sand blasting years ago and all we used was silica sand. We did handle it properly.Miller DVI2Lincoln Precision Tig 225Thermodynamics Cutmaster 38Everything else needed.