Has This Taken The Place Of Paint Stripper ??

[JoeLee]

And these methods are supposed to be SAFER than paint stripper?

I guess I am missing something.

Safer...... in some respects but the method also introduces new hazards that you didn't have with the chemical stripper.

JL.............

[Paul Alciatore]

And these methods are supposed to be SAFER than paint stripper?

I guess I am missing something.

[RancherBill]

I've seen these for a while. There are the cheap 20euro ones that Back Forest sees and then there are the others. The cheapest from unknown company in China is 10K cad, there's several in Canada at 20-50K cad. I have even seen a promo on Tiktok for a guy around Calgary selling them.

They have interested me for a couple of projects and as a potential business. I would pay $2-400 for a project garden tractor that I am restoring down to bare metal.

[wierdscience]

So is there ANYTHING locally available that will strip powder coat? It seems the situation has gotten crazy with all the actually effective strippers off the market.

Find somebody in your locale that does dustless blasting.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=32SbR8CgmBY

I found a guy where I live that does it. It's very reasonable cost wise and pretty much the only effective way to get rid of powder coat. Regular paint goes away really fast and a plus is it leaves a blended consistent surface finish, so your new coating goes on nice.

[Bob Engelhardt]

I asked this exact question on RCM 19 years ago. Here's the thread: https://groups.google.com/g/rec.craf...cJ?hl=en&hl=en

In the end I used the propane burner from my foundry furnace & burned it off. Outside & up wind.

[gellfex]

So is there ANYTHING locally available that will strip powder coat? It seems the situation has gotten crazy with all the actually effective strippers off the market.

[psomero]

That looks totally real using a diode in the 100W+ range with some beam redirection. The artifacting is video crud.

It likely /would not/ be safe to have a laser like that out in the open. You could get reflections that could light stuff on fire or blow out eyeballs.

Not to mention the fumes generated, depending on coating and substrate material...

[psomero]

The cheapest laser system like that starts at $50K, with the more common ones $80 to $100K, so no, it's not going to take the place of a can of paint stripper anytime soon.

Doc.

Laser system, yes. You can buy a 100 or 150W laser diode array for like $1/W on the surplus market, though 😁

[JoeLee]

No doubt the laser method will be required by law, eventually, with other methods "too dangerous". Special training, and high prices from specialist companies will likely follow..... Such is OSHA, who clearly have too much time on their hands.

Perhaps they would end up being regulated after they hit the consumer market. The one video showed the used passing it over his hand and it did nothing. I wouldn't want to look into it.

JL..................

[J Tiers]

No doubt the laser method will be required by law, eventually, with other methods "too dangerous". Special training, and high prices from specialist companies will likely follow..... Such is OSHA, who clearly have too much time on their hands.

[JoeLee]

You buy them as pellets. They get fed into a hopper.

Yes, understood but they have to be kept frozen during shipping and in the hopper at what ever temperature is needed to keep them from turning into a gas. So, that's going to require some special refrigeration equipment. Small pellets will disappear pretty fast as compared to a big chunk of dry ice.

JL............

[Black Forest]

I've heard of this method but what special equipment is needed to pulverize the ice into particles small enough to be use as blast media ? Probably almost as far out of the average persons price range as the laser stripper. Those small particles of dry ice would have to be kept pretty cold right up until they hit the part.

JL..............

You buy them as pellets. They get fed into a hopper.

[Steve Steven]

For a while I had a recurring job making blasting nozzles for a dry ice blasting company. Neat business, they would buy dry ice in pellets 1/8 inch in diameter, feed them into a hopper with a large rotating cylinder (12 inch dia IIRC) with pockets to receive the round pellets, blast them with air from a LARGE compressor, and direct them with hoses into the nozzle and onto the area to be cleaned. I personally watched them clean extraction ducts above Navy ship hot oil cooking units the ducts had a layer of congealed grease 2 to 3 inches thick. The CO2 would strike the grease, the cold would make the grease a hard solid and the impact of the pellets would knock the grease loose, the air would carry the grease through the duct to the ships hull, where it would be trapped by a large cloth filter. They had to put Co2 meters along the duct to warn of leaks.
Neat business. https://www.emsice.com/
Steve

[JoeLee]

Dry ice blasting is the method of choice for airplanes. There is no infiltration of the blasting media. The only clean-up is was ever coating you are removing. When the ice hits the surface it returns to it's gaseous state. Dry ice is jjust CO². We used it when we had an environmentally sensitive location. We bought dry ice by the truck load sometimes.

I've heard of this method but what special equipment is needed to pulverize the ice into particles small enough to be use as blast media ? Probably almost as far out of the average persons price range as the laser stripper. Those small particles of dry ice would have to be kept pretty cold right up until they hit the part.

JL..............

[tom_d]

Dry ice blasting is the method of choice for airplanes. There is no infiltration of the blasting media. The only clean-up is was ever coating you are removing. When the ice hits the surface it returns to it's gaseous state. Dry ice is jjust CO². We used it when we had an environmentally sensitive location. We bought dry ice by the truck load sometimes.

I've seen that used to remove paint built up over the years on the support beams in old mill buildings that are being renovated into apartments and condos. End result is clean, dry wood with a bit of three dimensional texture added to the grain. Impressive results.