Cleaning Through Dry Ice

DRY ICE BLASTING MACHINE

Today cleaning is so much important in all industries. Industries from all over the world emphasise on

importance of cleaning. One of the most famous methods of cleaning is from dry ice. That machine is called CO₂ blasting machine. The temperature of that dry ice is -109.3⁰F or -78.5⁰C. A number of pellets of dry ice came out from the nozzle with high compressed air from the machine and strike on the material in order to make it shrink and loose adhesion from subsurface. Some of the pellets penetrate into underlying surface of that material. Those pellets were converted into CO₂ gas when strike on subsurface which makes them warm.  The volume of that gas was 800 times greater and penetrates below the material that increases speed of removal. The materials that machine removes are paint, oil, tar, signs, smoke, asphalts, ink, dirt, resins and adhesives. Only the removed material is disposed and the ice sublimes into the atmosphere when converted into CO₂.

In order to paint the corrode part of iron then it is not a best idea to repaint it. The better option is to use dry ice blasting as it removes all corroded part and make it new for repainting. You don’t have to waste your time of using solvents to extrude it from surface.

There are some reasons of using dry ice blasting instead of other techniques.

Substituting Sand blasting:

The dry ice blasting method is the preferred one than sand blasting because the ice used is so much soft that it does not damage underlying surface and only the residue left, will be easily disposed of. There are two main reasons of using dry ice blasting rather than sand blasting. The first one is that it does not grind down the targeted surface as done by abrasive Medias. So the equipment is safe and you do not have to replace it that is most demanding desire of every industrialist. The second one is that you don’t have to transit your equipment for cleaning as the dry blasting machine is designed in such a way that it cleans at equipment’s place. So no damages will be occurred to that equipment. That’s why it is considered as a substitute of sand blasting machine.

Substituting Steam or Water Blasting:

There are many reasons of substituting steam or water blasting as compared to dry ice blasting.

• The electrical equipment’s and generators have to put back to service without waiting for them to dry.
• Removal of fungus and moulds has less chance to regenerate as with water or steam blasting.
• Mussels, sea slime and algae are easily removed from dry ice blasting from boat hulls as compared to water blasting that allows them to reconnect soon.

Substitutions of Ecologically Hazardous Solvents:

There are some chemicals that are not Eco-friendly such as tri-chloro-ethane, methylene chloride, cresylic acid, perchlorethylene, ortho-dichlorobenzene and caustic solutions. The dry ice only vaporises into gas and only left behind the waste that will be disposed of.      

Demerits:

• The noise is too much intense that a person has to wear earplugs during work. The new machines are now developed that are low in noise.
• The cleaning is only possible in the line of sight so there are some places that are congested so you have to disassemble some equipment’s.
• Proper ventilation is needed because enough amount of CO₂ is released during work.