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Sandblasting a water tower..WOW

19K views 24 replies 13 participants last post by  plazaman 
#1 ·
A group from Texas is here in my Hoosier home town sandblasting a water tower. I stopped by and talked with a them for a bit. They let me go under the curtain and take a peek. All I can say is WOW..What a set up!! They are using #8's and coal slag. They told me that they have an empty hose if I wanted to blast some but I quickly passed as they were blasting the under side of the tank 400 feet up. I'm gonna stop buy and talk with them again and try to soak in some of there knowledge. It seems like the tent set up alone would be worse than the blasting.
 

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#4 ·
I have a friend (and neighbor) who is a millwright----I was lucky enough to work with him ,off and on, over a four year period.

The work was fascinating---moving and installing tanks larger than a semi--lifting silos and hoppers--
Huge pumps and pipes---It's just amazing work---Mike---
 
#8 ·
That was funny Glenn. The tarps are made generally by Eagle down in New Orleans, LA. The rest is usally fabbed by the contractor. The top "The Bonnet is attached to the top at the outriggers. The outriggers is where all the cables come up from the ground to guide the ring that the main tarp is attached to. Then the ring is attached to other cables that pulls the main tarp up to the top by a winch, usually a air tugger. Very simple and useful. Used to contain all blast materials and over spray when painting. When blasting the containment is under negative air pressure from a dust collector. Usually a 30,000 - 40,000CFM unit. All of the containment air is filtered at the dust collector and the filters are purged of dust by air blast that goes in synquece to blow the dust off the filters every few minutes to keep the air flowing. I've been on a number of these jobs over the years myself. As a painter/blaster and also as Inspector. Letting dust escape during lead paint removal is a BIG NO-NO.
 
#10 ·
Here is one of the tanks that we done in Ashland, Ohio about seven year ago. We done the interior of the tank and the main contractor done the exterior. The exterior recieved a full SSPC-SP6 Commercial Blast and a Three Coat paint system and the Interior recieved a SSPC-SP5 White Metal Blast and Metallized"Thermal Arc Spray" application of Zinc.
 

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#13 ·
I've heard that its more in the $50,000.00 range. It only takes about 6 weeks to do one and that's with set backs. The guys doing my local tower are battling high winds so they have been grinding welds without the tent up. They are at the point where they need to blast and paint and are at the mercy of the weather.
 
#14 ·
I'm going to guess that $50,000 is maybe enough to cover just the pay for the workers. At $1,000 a week say even just eight guys being ground people blasters and who ever is in charge for six weeks is already $50,000. That's before the Painting. Blasting has to be way high six figures?
 
#15 ·
$50,000 would just cover the containment set-up. That job there with the interior and the exterior would go around $250,000 and up. And if you go past the completion date then your paying the utility board each day to work the job until completed in Liquidated Damages which to range in a few hundred dollars a day to several thousand dollars a day. It's a very competetive business and I would tell anyone that is thinking about starting to do this type of work to think about it long and hard. The dollar figures look good, but the profit margin is low to none. It is a real cut throat business.
 
#24 ·
And if you go past the completion date then your paying the utility board each day to work the job until completed in Liquidated Damages which to range in a few hundred dollars a day to several thousand dollars a day.
I'd think the bonding and insurance would prevent most from trying to enter this type of scale. I've wondered how many bulk pots on the market were there due to them being kicked off a site.
 
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