Can any of the Smiths here recommend a small and affordable bead blast setup for an amature gun smith?

Google, CYCLONE BLAST CABINETS.   I've got one of there benchtop models at the house.  It's a good little setup.

Do go for the little larger version it's well worth the extra few bucks.

I've been looking at theirs.  What all would I need to buy aside from the cabinet?  Air compressor, dust collector, media tank?  I've never used one before and have no idea what I'm doing.  Thanks

Compressor, cabinet, glass beads, breathing and eye protection.  Thats about all.
The extra money for the dust collector is well worth it but you can get by without it.  It will just be a little messy.

Great!  Thanks for the info.  Can a shopvac with a filter bag be used as a dust collector?

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Good deal...Appreciated

Quoted: Great!  Thanks for the info.  Can a shopvac with a filter bag be used as a dust collector?

You will end up clogging the bag in the shop vac way too fast.

Instead, use a 5 gallon bucket with sealed lid to pull the air in the cabinet down into the bucket (half full of water), then the water filter air into the shop vac.  This scrubs the cabinet dust into the water to collect the dust, and the vac stays dust free.  Also, you use a light switch dimmer in line to adjust the speed of the shop vac (read with the cabinet closed, there is too much of a vacuum in the cabinet with it running full blast, and you end up sucking the gloves off the seals.

Low down is a 90* fitting off the cabinet at the supplied scrubber vent hole, tubing, straight fitting into top of the bucket lid, connection fitting threw the lid for a seal, more tubing off the bottom of the seal fitting with a piece of wire inside the tubing to keep it straight down into the bottom of the water, then on the top of the lid for the vac side, a standard female fitting that will accept the vac hose end.
Note: all the fitting are just standard PVC fittings with the fitting off the cabinet using an electrical fitting star nut.

On the electrical side, standard cord into a steel junction box (single outlet, single switch combo cover plate) with the stinger side (black wire) wired threw the dimmer switch. This allows you to just plug the vac into the dimmered outlet.

I have been using this type of scrubber for over a year now, and the only dust that I get out of the cabinet is when I open the door without the scrubber/vac on.

Man I love this forum.  More knowledge in this place than you could find in a library.  Thank you for the great info!!

Save up some money to get the whole deal. Cabnet, colecter, media. You'll be glad you did a year from your purchase. You'll want to upgrade soon. Also remember to get a compressor that has a greater CFM rating than what your cabnet recomends. I have a TP 960 cabnet and it's great. They also have tabletops that look well made. The good thing about TP is that you can buy all your supplies from one source. Media, gloves, nozzels, and glass covers.

TP TOOLS

My 2 Cents