Undercoating removal and dry ice blasting.

I wanted to let anyone interested that undercoating removal just became much easier! I own a dry ice blasting company and have been in business for the last 17 years, mostly doing industrial cleaning and remediation work. In the last few years I've been getting calls about classic restoration work and have generally shied away from it because dry ice blasting isn't all that good for paint removal (which is what most of the calls were about) Now I know i'm not the first person to use DIB to remove undercoating, but I recently had an opportunity to work the the fine people at The Mustang Barn on a 65' Mustang resto and I wanted to share my results with all of you. From start to finish the job took me 7 hours, Dan Nolan at The Barn told me it was a 4 day job for them and about $3500. or so. I can tell you I was many hundreds less. He also said there was no way they could have reached all of the tight places we did with DIB.

I just wanted to share my story and a few pics, feel free to ask me any questions about this job or how the process works.

Thanks Dave Pickard

WOW!

Thanks, Most of the cleaning I perform involves some sort or grease,dirt, debris etc. but this process also works very well on rust too. It however will not profile, so solid media still has its place for sure.

We also left all of the original well bonded paint behind, and exposed how the paint was applied at the factory. The folks at The Mustang Barn were thrilled, not that they weren't still going to "sand blast" , but the fact that they could see all of the bleeds etc from Ford and they were going to replicate that as part of the restoration, those guys do so amazing work!

Just wanted to show some up closer pictures showing what the surface looked like when we were done.

Never heard of DIB.......and you get a WOW from me as well.

Unless further bodywork is needed you can prime immediately too!

It's funny how super cold can be used for restoration work when usually heat is what's used.

Dry ice blasting in general in a pretty cool process, no pun intended..... Basically pellets of dry ice are run through a machine where it meets up with compressed air, travels through a hose and comes out of the end of your gun with one of a dozen types of nozzles you can use. The dry ice hits the surface of what your try to clean and the impact causes the ice to convert back to a gas and it expands 400 times from solid to gaseous creating a flushing action. If it's a good application it moves the contaminant from the surface and leaves you with a clean undamaged substrate!

It's a well known method for cleaning injection molds. I would be careful not to blast any rubber suspension components - the dry ice can embrittle it

It's a well known method for cleaning injection molds. I would be careful not to blast any rubber suspension components - the dry ice can embrittle it

Its great at cleaning molds, you can get into some tight places and not degrade to surface of the expense mold!

The most important reason to not shoot rubber is it has a tendency to come right back at you!.. That being said when dry ice cleaning you don't generally dwell in a single spot to long and if you blast good rubber you won't do any damage, if you somehow were to do "damage" it would tell you that the rubber had failed and needed to be replaced regardless.

Pickard,

Very interesting process, I have never heard of this before. Are there any special safety precautions associated with the blasting? Isn't CO2 gas generated etc.?

We have a Chevelle that might benefit from this method.

Thanks for the info.

Pickard,

Very interesting process, I have never heard of this before. Are there any special safety precautions associated with the blasting? Isn't CO2 gas generated etc.?

We have a Chevelle that might benefit from this method.

Thanks for the info.

As far as any safety concerns goes, if you are working in a sealed room or below grade(grease monkey pit etc) you would just need some fans to move the air and some fresh air coming in, it's not that big of a deal. Are you doing a frame off on your chevelle?

I've been kicking around the idea of getting into working on old cars as a sideline and have considered offering some specialized services to people in the hobby. Does DIB require specialized equipment, or is that done with a normal sandblaster?

I would think this dry ice blasting would be ideal for things like differentials, where you would NOT want any media to remain afterward.

Pickard,

Not planning a frame off restoration at this time. I have a 22,000 mile, '69 SS convert that had a Ziebart undercoating applied by the dealership in late '68 when purchased. Inside body panels will be left alone, but the visible engine compartment and under carriage need stripping.

Thanks for your info, I will look into this next spring.

I've been kicking around the idea of getting into working on old cars as a sideline and have considered offering some specialized services to people in the hobby. Does DIB require specialized equipment, or is that done with a normal sandblaster?

It's a great technology, you can spend any where from $5000 for decent used blaster to $25000. For the blasters I use, specialized equipment only though..

I would think this dry ice blasting would be ideal for things like differentials, where you would NOT want any media to remain afterward.

It would be fine on the Ziebarting, I've done it to a latter model car that was protected.

After.

I've seen this system used in the food industry, it is impressive. And Pickard I've seen your Pickard and heard it run, VERY neat car.

Thank you, I do quite a bit of blasting in food production facilities, so many great applications for this technology.

So if it's not that hard on painted surfaces, would it be aggressive enough to clean up a differential that was all covered with rust?

So if it's not that hard on painted surfaces, would it be aggressive enough to clean up a differential that was all covered with rust?

Yes, I quite a bit of large scale( no pun intended ) rust removal cleaning, it will remove rust and leave only good metal behind, but it will NOT profile and this would not leave you with white metal, if that matters to you.

I just had the honor of using my process to remove the undercoating and expose the amazing perserved original conditon of a numbers matching Hemi powered 1971 cuda' one of 108 ever produced by Plymouth. I am just waiting for permission from the owner to post a few pictures of his automobile. Next up is the first ever produced 427 cu 1967 Yenko Camaro. The dry ice blasting process is going be the next innovation in the sympathetic style of restoration. I am truly a very lucky person to love what I do and make a living doing so. Pictures to come!

Just cleaned YS601 the first ever Yenko Camaro produced! Not under coating removal, but just to remove 50 years of "dirt" from the undercarriage and engine compartment. She has 15,000 miles! and is in amazing original condition and is being prepped for conservation not restoration.

In the pictures of the Pontiac above, it appears you did that blasting with the engine and all equipment right in place. If so, any special covering needed for electrical connections? Also, I do not understand what you mean by "profiling" in your comments. Can you expand on what that means?

Thank you

On carbureted cars covering the carb is a good idea, but the basic rule of dry ice cleaning is to be mindful of anything softer then dry ice (foam, hood insulation, brittle wires) short of that it's open season!

Profiling, which I can't do, would be like a post sandblasting surface where you actually can remove good metal.

You would have to use very coarse sand and plenty of pressure to remove metal by sandblasting. Carefully done, sandblasting is an effective and relatively inexpensive way to remove rust and general corrosion. We no longer do our own sandblasting but we did for 25+ years and sandblasted everything from Model T frames to Duesenberg sheet metal.

Yes, I agree with sandblasting is an excellent tool! And this process doesn't remotely replace sandblasting but certainly offers results that sand can not. I see more and more conservation and "sympathetic" restoration being utilized today, I'm sure you will agree, it's only original once! That being said some cars are just to far gone to be "preserved" and some version of restoration is the only way to proceed. Even if it is only microns sandblasting will profile, it wouldn't work so well if it didn't have that abrasive cutting power, as where dry ice blasting is a totally nonabrasive process. They are very much apples and oranges.

We are in agreement. We once had a customer bring us a set of 1908 wood wheels which he had had sandblasted with coarse sand, with predictable results. Would dry ice remove paint from hard wood without significantly damaging the wood?

paint on wood is can be a bad application, the paint would have to be failing in spades, wood I can profile! I clean wood surfaces all the time, but only for fire and mold restoration (homes, businesses etc)

One of the benefits of dry ice blasting is that the media does not add to the weight of the hazard waste and therefore reduces the cost or waste dispose.

One of the benefits of dry ice blasting is that the media does not add to the weight of the hazard waste and therefore reduces the cost or waste dispose.

your thoughts are always in my sales pitches !