I'm looking to buy a bead blaster so I can strip a reciever before coating it.   A couple of questions:

What's the best material to use?  Grit/type of beads/how many pounds of abrasive do I need?

How many PSI do I want to use and how many passes do I want to make?

When I go to recoat can I apply/bake and then apply another coat and bake?  Or is this bad?

Thanks.

Offer anything else you see fit.

"WHAT'S THE BEST METHOD TO STRIP A WEAPON  "
Get it drunk first.

What type of reciever are you stripping? If its an AR reciever, don't strip it, just degrease and paint. Beadblasting would take the anodizing off.

For general blasting, use aluminum oxide or glass beads. They both come in many different grits. Try for 120. AO will leave a rougher surface, which will hold paints/parkerizing better. Glass bead blasting will be smoother and less holding of material, but will still do a good job. I believe Norrells doesnt advocate glass bead finishing before using thier Moly Coat.

The most important part of doing any of this is prep. You get out what you put in. After blasting and before painting use acetone or MEK to get all traces of oil and fingerprint residue off the metal. USE GLOVES.

For blasting steel, use 90 psi. Use 40 psi if you need to blast any soft metals.


If you use Duracoat you don't need to bake it to let it cure, but it speeds up the process and makes the finish more even IMO.  If you are going to put more than one coat on, take it easy on rubbing parts, ie frame rails.

If you want more info on the Moly Coat process, go check out Stickman's threads in the AR discussion. That guy is a wealth of knowledge.

Depending on what you have for other equipment, you may also be interested in parkerizing. It's fairly simple. You can do it in your kitchen if need be, and is an excellent base coat for spray on coatings such as Duracoat. Check out Allehgany Arsenal for a basic parkerizing kit.

Here's my Kimber TLE II glass blasted with 80 grit and painted with DuraCoat Swedish K. This was my first attempt at the whole process and it came out looking professionally done.