Vapor hone media recharging procedure

Metal Shop
#1

Where do we keep instructions for recharging the vapor hone. It hasnt seemed to have any media the last few times I’ve tried to use it. There was plenty of media in the upper settling tank. I mistakenly thought the media was sucked out of the bottom settling tank so dumped upper tank into lower tank.

With help from someone who ive forgotten their name we found the machine manual on top of the machine and figured out the media should be in the bottom of blasting cabinet. It was empty according to my finger check. We discussed trying to change out water and clean settling tanks but got stuck at step 1.

So where do we dump the water, do we reuse any media in settling tanks, where is media and how much do we need, can anyone do this maintenance or do we keep the machine down until an experienced person is available. There are usage instructions but not maintenance instructions posted on the machine, could we post link to our internal instructions. I tried to find them on the wiki on my phone but failed if they are there.

So to get my little project done i scooped some of the overflow media out of the bottom settling tank and dumped it in the blast cabinet. I think the bottom tank should be dumped and cleaned.

Also we need a hanger to lift the drain hose going to upper settling tank off the bottom of the tank, it was stuck in the muck and not flowing till i lifted it last night.
Thanks
Randy

#2

@Team_Metal_Shop ??

#3

If the media is still ok, it can be dumped back into the vapor hone. Otherwise its a bit of a production to change the water & media. It takes about 45 minutes to change it on a good day. We drain the water(into the sink) & then throw the solids out.

1 Like
#4

Dumping the water looks like it would be tough for one person When i was done with blasting my tablesaw insert and rinsing it off and inside of blast cabinet, the pump started doing a double cycle once every 3-5 seconds, when i checked the lower settling tank it was nearly empty, and when i lifted the hose to upper settling tank it was stuck in muck and water came rushing out.

So my thoughts are:
Put a valve on drain hose or switch if the outlet from tank is a valve
Close it
Run blaster to pump most of the water into blast cabinet. If there is capacity dump 3/4 of water in upper settling tank into lower tank and keep spraying.
Stir up remaining water in upper tank, pour off the water and fine floating gunk into 5 gallon bucket
Pour and scrape the abrasive into blast tank.
Same for the bottom settling tank which should have a few inches of water.
Use fresh water to rinse the two settling tanks into 5 gallon bucket
Place 5 gallon buckets under drain hose and drain mucky water, might take two buckets.
Is there another drsin with a ball valve on the side of the tank? If so drsin as much as possible out.
Put settling tanks back in place and fill with fresh water.
Let the buckets of mucky water settle for a week, pour off most of the water into sink drain, but try not to dump muck into drain since it will settle there and have to be cleaned
Consolidate all the heavy muck into one bucket, rinse rest of buckets
Add fresh cat litter to muck bucket, let it set up
Dump in a bucket lined with heavy trash bag
Throw out the bag og semi dry muck.