|
Hi George, Most fluxs are made up of cellulose, titanium dioxide, ferro-manganese, silica flour, calcium carbonate, borates, ironpowder and other organic and minerals. The ingredients are bound together with sodium silicate. Depending on the sand blast media it really should not have a negitive effect for stick and Mig. With Tig it might be a slight problem beause of the process control of the molten puddle. I have Tig weld silica media blasted metals without to many problems. Every now and again you will find a pocket of junk that contaminates the tungsten but that also happens with with clean virgin base metals. If your welding "pealers" (where the flux peals of the weld on it's own) there's really no reason to sand blast between passes. Depending on electrode flux type, 2,3,4,7,8 then only light chipping if at all, would be required. With flux type 0,1,5,6, then slightly more chipping along with a wire brush is common among most weldors. Thats not to say thease fluxs can not peal but I'm saying the average weldor would have a difficult time getting a pealer. I'm not a big fan of using air tools with cleaning weldments. All air tools emit oil with the exhaust air. Oil is a carbon and when sprayed on a multipass weldment, it will make the weld brittle and can cause it too crack. Using air tools for final clean up is very useful on some weldments. Most pipe weldors I know would thump you in the head if you touched there welds with a air tool. There welds are a work of art! T_Bone
| 
