Glass bead when used as abrasive media in blasting operations creates a brighter and smoother finish than angular abrasives. This type of abrasive offered by glass bead blasting media suppliers is also chemically inert and eco-friendly and are an effective type of media for metal cleaning and surface finishing. Glass beads are a safe media compared to silica as a blasting agent. The use of silica sand is regulated in many cases and is known as a source of potential health issues when breathed in, such as silicosis.
Blasting with glass beads produces a clean, satin finish without changing the dimensions of components. It is sometimes performed after steel shot peening in order to remove potential high peaks after the use of a larger shot for deeper surface penetration and decontaminate from any remaining ferrous material on the surface.
Benefits of Glass Bead Blasting
Glass beads offered by glass bead blasting media suppliers are available in a wide array of sizes and are often used in blasting cabinets for peening, honing, polishing, finishing, blending, removing light burrs and light foreign material. In blasting cabinets, the blast media is recoverable. The use of glass bead media in the peening process is beneficial for parts jointed with thin welds and thin-walled component parts. Glass bead media blasting can also provide stress-relief to materials.
Glass beads can clean a surface effectively without leaving a significant blast profile, which makes them ideal for removing dust and paint or coatings from the surfaces of parts.
Drawbacks of Glass Bead Blasting
Glass beads are not typically re-usable for as long as harder types of blast media, such as steel. Also, since glass bead is less hard than steel shot, steel grit, or coal slag, it also doesn’t clean surfaces as quickly as those harder media. If you need to produce a profile on a surface (for the adherence of paint to the surface, for instance) a media such as aluminum oxide or steel grit may be needed instead of glass bead.
Glass bead blasting media suppliers can help you determine the most effective glass bead media size you need for your application.