The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Paint and Body Shop Would a soda blaster be effective.

I see a lot of od restorations on youtube that could use a little rust removal but it is not done because of cost. My understanding of soda blasting that it is safe for the environment and easy to use outside in the driveway without any environmental impact.

As always, it depends. Depends are what level of rust. Soda is not aggressive. It will take off paint and surface rust. I'm speaking of DIY home equipment. You can use water with enough force. They cut metal with water. (@50,000 PSI)

As stated, soda is not good for rust removal. We have used walnut shells, plastic media, aluminum oxide, glass, soda, and I guess just about everything that will pass through a hose. All this was done because of the risk factor with sand and all were expensive. Now we do wet blasting which is sand with water injection. Way cheaper than any of the others plus almost zero warp due to the cooling water. It is VERY messy with at least a 2 hour cleanup time. Still use soda where paint removal is near glass or bright work on an otherwise finished car/truck. Also use water injection with soda to keep the dust down but it is easy to clean up with just water.

Keep in mind that soda blasting changes the PH of your sheet metal. Normal epoxy primer has a slight bit of acid so it will have some "bite" to attach to the metal. Try spraying epoxy primer directly over something that has been soda blasted and your primer will peel off in sheets as the soda (base) changes the PH where the primer no longer adheres/has any bite. If you must use soda, there is a process to neutralize the base PH so that primer will again adhere. Failure to do so is a guarantee of paint delamination.

Great description Mpandc, are there any specific preparation procedures for mobile eco blasting that you know of, my neighbor had a 57 Chevy done and contractor said nothing was necessary before priming?

Soda will also kill the grass it gets on and it stays dead for a while, found that out the hard way.

The bad part about using soda, it doesn't address any rust or scale, it doesn't leave an anchor for your primer, and it leaves the panel unsuitable/contaminated for application of primer. So if you are going to media blast, it should at least address SOME of those issues. For your neighbor, Dawn mixed in a clean bucket of water and apply with a scuff pad to one panel at a time and rinse with clean water ( a hose or another bucket with clean water and a rag) then dry. Anything washed that pools risks collecting soda residue, so repeated applications may be needed as deemed necessary.