Dry Ice Blasting

pixelmonkey

pixelmonkey

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for the last couple years i've been looking at dry ice blasters.

*if you havent seen one, search for "dry ice blasting porsche" on youtube*

no secondary waste.
no dirty micro fiber towels.
no chemicals.

No fluff to it, the price is the scary part.
Been looking at a unit that has the physical size of a dish washer, holds around 30 lbs. of dry ice and has a 20 ft. hose.
unit price
$7000

Keep in mind, it's going to take a good sized and cfm air compressor to run one of these blasters. If you're not looking at a compressor above the $800 range, you're not in range for power needed to hook to the blaster.
unit price
$1000

and then lets talk about the dry ice. It's likely the local grocery store has large blocks, but these units require something that is in the size of sand. It's dependent on the drive to the dry ice mfg, price per lbs. and lbs. needed to complete the job. I feel fortunate to have a dry ice production business less than 10 miles from my garage. Checked the price, and can get the dry ice in the size the unit needs for around $.79 per lbs.

The amount of dry ice and time needed for a cars under carriage, suspension & exhaust is going to vary greatly. Lets do a rough estimate and under estimate. 30 lbs. to complete the job.
unit price
$ 23.70


So, you're looking at the numbers and thinking it's insane to buy one of these to clean a car. There are other opportunities for this, the key one being "mold removal". *youtube search for that one as well*

lets hear your thoughts after looking at a few of the videos.
chris<pixelmonkey>:D
 
looks like a waste of money and energy used to lug the extra stuff around.
 
Seems like a lot of money to spend...

I think that it would end up taking you years to work off the initial investment of this.
 
I've seen the units and some videos on YouTube. Seems like a great idea and it looks like it works well. I wonder if you can rent a unit to try out first.

It's a large expense to take on without trying first. What if you don't find it to do as good as you thought? What if it works even better?
 
A great friend of mine who owns this truck that I polish,

020-20.jpg


has one of these units. He told me that it makes a black moldy two by four look like a brand new one that you would see in the lumber section at Lowe's. I haven't seen it in action yet or thought of cleaning undercarriages with it but now that I read this thread I may need to have a discussion with him about it.
 
That is very neat to watch, but seems very expensive!
 
tuscarora dave said:
has one of these units. He told me that it makes a black moldy two by four look like a brand new one that you would see in the lumber section at Lowe's. I haven't seen it in action yet or thought of cleaning undercarriages with it but now that I read this thread I may need to have a discussion with him about it.
Click to expand...

and that is what got me started! I was looking for a mold removal method that would offer + 95% of the mold to be removed from our bathrooms. *long story short, the builder used regular sheet rock behind the tile*

the mold removal options i found came with a tremendous cost *greater than the purchase price of the blaster* and didnt offer a + 90% of mold removal. i researched this for quite some time.

that would be a great source to contact for cost and options.
chris<pixelmonkey>:D
 
How do I find someone in my area that has the equipment?

Chris my builder did the same in my bathroom. I'm working on getting it all fixed now
 
It does work well, but I agree with others that it is not worth the cost.
 
I've seen these machine used to remove mold on wooden surfaces of homes used as "grow ops", it removes a fine layer of wood fiber along with the mold to expose fresh uncontainminated wood surface.

I would be worried with soft materials such as drive belts or plastics under such pressure, but it will be good to clean caked on dried out oil and grease accumulations on hard metal surfaces such as shown on this link [ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrHchu1tNyc]Dry Ice Blasting- Engine Block - YouTube[/video]
 
The money to be made with a dry ice blaster is not in vehicles. It is not in mold removal. It is in grifitti removal. Check with you city, county and state highway department and see if you can bid on grifitti removal from concrete.

Insurance policies will no longer pay for mold removal so that market has mostly dried up. (some exceptions)
 
Dry ice blasting is absolutely amazing!

A girl I know had a pipe fail inside a wall on her second floor. Before it was discovered it had flooded inside walls, floors, ceilings all over the house.
The repairs cost almost 125K and all the drywall in the house had to be removed. Mold was growing on most of the wood. And the mold abatement company used a dry ice blaster to clean all the wood. It looked like a brand new framing job had just been completed. The foreman told her that the dry ice blaster saved him (and her insurance company) 30K in repair costs. They are incredible machines. And I never even thought of using them on graffitti or auto work either.
 
you question it being used on plastic???
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QqHwq6Fkr3U]Dry Ice Cleaning Porsche GT3 Supercup Car - YouTube[/video]

and

how about cleaning the bottom?
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCtHzTXYK1M&feature=plcp&context=C3043444UDOEgsToPDskJuxamSMzGRUPWxQUJ9BCbU]CryoDetail - Porsche 993 Carrera 4S Complete (TuneRS Motorsports) - YouTube[/video]

chris<pixelmonkey>:D
 
I used to run a large food peocessing and distribution plant and warehouse. We used dry ice blasting to clean out our insulated shipping containers and occassionally truck interiors. The unit was stationary and way bigger than anything referred to here. Co2 levels were a major issue and needed to be monitored constantly. When cleaning inside a trailer the operater needed to wear a Scott Air Pak. It would clean anything you could bring to it. Our Co2 cost was 12 cents a pound.
 
ive seen the vids on youtube and would love to have the machine, alas i would only have it if i was rich or won the lotto or made a ton of cash and planned on opening a business that would use it for most of its income. the thing is very gentile i have seen the dry ice blasters to remove smoke from old books and the book was brought back to great condition again.awesome machine for sure would love to use one on my undercarriage and engine.
 
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