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I have been wanting a blast cabinet for years and I bought a HF bench top model due to space restrictions in my garage. I know, I’ve viewed the forum’s on Stovebolt, that say “buy the biggest you can”, but I just don’t have that floor space. My garage is only 24’ by 24’, with 8” thick concrete walls leaving me with 22’ 8” interior space and I share my garage with my wife’s pride and joy, a 2007 VW Eos, a sporty hard top convertible with a 2.0 turbo, so space is at a premium. The bench top model was really my only option.

On my first attempt to use my new HF blast cabinet, I hooked up my shop vac, turned it on it immediately created a dust storm inside the cabinet, to the point that I couldn’t see even before I pulled the trigger. Wanting to get some of my parts done, I improvised by cutting up a 1 liter soda bottle and placed it as a coupling and taped to the suction hose. I then cut some holes in it to allow some air to mix, thus reducing the amount of vacuum. This stopped the storm and I was able to blast some parts. After a couple of minutes, the pickup tube sucked up all the media available around the area of the tube. The hopper seems to be a bit too shallow to keep feeding the intake tube. Shaking the cabinet allowed me to continue. I later discovered by adding the whole bucket of media (full 40 lbs) it temporarily solved the issue. Previously I only added half the bucket. I do mean temporarily, because as you blast the level of the media drops so I eventually end up in the same predicament. I’ve seen some YouTube videos on adding a vibrator to solve this dilemma and will investigate this option.

The other issue I discovered was my vacuum was sucking in the media. After about an hour of the blasting , the media in my cabinet was disappearing and I discovered it was caked around the filter and in the vacuum itself. I solved this issue by buying a cyclone separator that clips to the top of a five gallon bucket saving the media for reuse. I found one at Home Depot for just over $40 that came with all of the attaching hoses and fittings. It claims 99% efficiently and has effectively extended my blast time out for days. I still find the filter with some media on it but that is after several days of intermittent blasting.

I have since added a 2” PVC Sanitary Tee, some short nipples and a coupling to replace my temporary plastic bottle to reduce the vacuum and direct the suction hose down to the cyclone bucket. I turned down the OD of the pipe to fit the ID Of the box and turned the ID of the coupling to fit the suction hose. I placed a spray can cap with a 1/2” hole to reduce the suction to the box as a temporary measure. I want to add a valve to fine tune the amount of suction.

The last issue is it needs a light inside. I haven’t figured a good solution to this as of yet. There is a limited amount of room inside so whatever the solution, it needs to be small. I’m leaning towards an LED light strip or a fluorescent tube in a protected plastic sleeve. Maybe some of our “Bolters” have some Ideas.

I paid just over 100 dollars for it with a 20% off coupon and the quality if this cabinet is amazingly good. I experienced no cabinet leakage during use. It was factory sealed and I used it as it came out of the box. If you have limited space and a limited budget like I do, I give it a thumbs up.

Links to the products:
HF Benchtop Blast Cabinet
Duststopper