Ask me what I did all weekend. I spent the entire time sandblasting the frame for the project Two-tone SR5 truck. The frame is in amazing condition for a 27 year old truck. After a trip to the car wash to remove the oil, grease, and dirt I found for the most part- original black paint. From the cab forward was almost like new. Under the box is where the most rust was. I tried working it with a hand grinder and a wire wheel. But the very back of the frame was pitted enough that each time I touched the sander to it new rust surfaced. Plus there were several brackets and other tight spots that were impossible to completely clean with a wire wheel. It was obvious that the only way to be sure that all of the rust was taken care of was to sandblast it.

I was lucky enough to be able to borrow a pressure pot sandblaster. Searching all over town, I finally found silica sand at a lumber yard. They sell 80 lb. bags for $5 each. I have a 5hp two stage air compressor with a 60 gallon tank, but even that was only enough for a few minutes of blasting at a time. Starting slow and making sure to cover every square inch, I managed to use up 3 bags of sand. Then I turned over the frame to take care of the bottom. The bottoms of the rails were even more rusty than the top, but luckily it was all surface rust. No holes anywhere on the frame. Another bag of sand cleaned up the bottom side of the frame.

Then on Sunday I used the fifth bag of sand to detail all of the brackets. I blasted inside and around each bracket and across each weld to clean out any voids in them. Finally the rust was gone from the frame. For as great of shape as this frame was in, there was a lot of rust.

To seal the deal, I bought some oil based primer made for tractors and trailers. I decided to brush the primer on to be sure to make contact with every square inch of the bare metal, instead of just spray it on the surface. Plus the brush can push the primer into all of the pits and voids in the welds to be absolutely sure that everything is covered so that the rust will not come back.

Next; lots of sanding, more primer (sprayed this time), and finally new shiny black paint for the project truck’s frame. It was a lot of work, but at least one truck frame was saved!