Clarke shot blasters

[Keeper96]

Hello, does anyone have any experience if the Clarke shot blasters and how effective they are? 

[Cynic-al]

A friend has the one that is the big orange drum but no cabinet. We used it to shot blast some cast iron radiators. Basically it worked, took a bit of fiddling with the valves to get it to flow how we wanted. We set up a tarp with two ladders to hold it up so that we could collect and sieve the media to get a few uses out of it. This took ages to sieve and pour back in. Used an awful lot of air so you need a big compressor. Got through loads of the masks, surprising how often you had to change the front. The tip wore out quite quickly too. It was a job that starting off being really satisfying, just rubbing out the layers of paint, but quickly became very tedious trying to get in between all the fins then having to scoop all the media up again. 

[Stellaghost]

I've got the bench top one should have got the one on the stand as it's bigger works ok but you need plenty of air takes me ages as have to stop to let comp catch up also can be bad to see I rigged up an old Hoover to extract the dust whilst blasting which improved things considerably regards Stephen 

[Keeper96]

I keep debating whether to get one or for the effort In waiting for compressors and setting up is it easier to just take to work, do you find you use yours quite often or just every now and then? 

[Stellaghost]

Only now and then as it stands at the moment not for a long time regards Stephen 

[Stellaghost]

I tend to use a needle scaler  ( Clarks one from machine mart ) most of the time as compressor will keep up with it ok not as good as blasting but good enough for a fair bit  regards Stephen

[smallfry]

I have a benchtop one that I have not used for years because the gauntlets have disintegrated with age.

It has a lamp in it, but all you can see after a short while is swirling dust, which is probably not helped by the speed in which the viewing screen is etched. This may be because on a benchtop model, the screen is quite close to the workpiece. On a freestanding model, this may be better.

As has been said, needs a lot of air. However, it was effective, but all things considered, IMO a lot of hassle.

I only used chilled iron grit, but I am told that crushed walnut shells are kinder to the screen and cause less dust. I have not tried it, but imagine it would be fine with alloys, but not on rusty iron or steel.

[Keeper96]

Hmm sounds like it’ll be easier just taking things to work rather than faffing about with my own 

[mickeyw]

I have one of the generic ones on a stand that you find for pretty cheap on eblag.

Yes, you need a good air supply. I have a 1.1kw Hydrovane that keeps up reasonably well as long as you don't blast continuously. I have another compressor that I had planned to run in tandem for blasting, but haven't felt the need.

As for visibility, if you don't run some kind of extraction you won't see a thing after a few moments 😎