is glass bead dagerous to the human body? i plan on wearing a full resperator while blasting, but what are the effects of breathing it, are there any enviromental concerns i should know about?

btw i was thinking of buying this one
http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/Displayitem.taf?itemnumber=44762

think it can handle crushed walnut shells? those sound safer and biodegradable

I'll bet that glass beads can mess you up! We have them in our cabinet, but it is sealed and I still wear goggles and a mask. Walmut shells are great for removing paint and for use on aluminum, but they won't touch rust.

well, i wont be doing rust on this car, just primer and old paint. so walnut shells it is.

there are siphon feed and pressurized sand blasters, whats the big difference between then and which one should i buy for for basic blasting of parts and this one car im painting

a pressure blaster uses much less air than a siphon blaster to accomplish the same paint removal. I have a pressure blaster. Did my frame and lots of other parts outside using sand. I'm can't afford glass beads for outside where they will be lost. I have a cabinet blaster setup inside my shop. There I use glass beads. It uses a siphon feed. That is typical. I built my cabinet out of plywood using TIP Tools plans. Works great. To do a car you will probably end up needing both, but you should start with a pressure blaster. But be sure you have a good compressor and about a 60 gallon tank, otherwise you won't get far before you loose too much pressure to continue. Another option, is to rent a pressure blaster and/or compressor for a day or two. You'll get the feel of what you may need in future.

As for the health factor, sand is worse the glass bead when inhaling the dust. Both are bad but the sila in the sand (play sand from the hardware store) causes more damage. When blasting with sand outside a sealed booth,wait till the dust clears befor removeing the resperator.

Your not going to blast a whole car with glass beads are ya? That stuff is expensive. For the money you spend you could have it media blasted.
Roger

Use a DA for big panels, but use the glass beads for the jams and crevises. DA with the right paper will accomplish the job a lot faster than that small pressurized blaster you are looking at. Remember that blasting gets particals everywhere and I have seen the stuff in a lot of paint jobs because it was hiding in a crevis and the paint gun kicked it up. Mask everything you can if blasting.