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Automotive · Miami, FL
Fleet Vehicle Ice Blasting
Fleet Vehicle comes to us when the usual cleaning methods are too harsh for the part. We clean it without water, without chemicals and without anything abrasive touching the surface.
What builds up, and why it matters
On this kind of work the problem is baked grease, road film, undercoating, sound deadening, adhesive and brake dust. Media blasting will cut into aluminum and pit a frame. Pressure washing drives water into looms and bearings. Solvent strips the finishes you wanted to keep. Dry ice takes the contamination and leaves the part.
Engine bays, frames and undercarriages are cleaned on a lift, on stands or in your driveway. The people who call us about fleet vehicle are usually restorers, shops and owners who actually care about the vehicle, and the thing they are actually worried about is damage to a car that took years to put together.
The method
Why dry ice and not the alternatives
- Non-abrasive
The pellet is soft and sublimates on impact, so the work is thermal rather than mechanical. Machined faces, plating, paint and gaskets survive it.
- Low moisture
No standing water in a harness, a bearing or a cabinet, and no dry time before the equipment goes back into service.
- No secondary waste
Sand, soda and walnut shell all have to be swept and hauled. Dry ice leaves only the contaminant it removed.
- Often no teardown
Much of this work is done in place, which is usually where the real saving is. The labor is in the disassembly, not the cleaning.
More automotive work
Related jobs we get called for
Questions we get asked first
Will it damage the surface underneath?
On most substrates, no. The pellet is soft and sublimates on impact, so it does thermal work rather than mechanical work. We still test an inconspicuous spot first on anything unusual.
Do you have to take the equipment apart for fleet vehicle?
Usually far less than you would expect, and often not at all. Cleaning in place is where most of the saving comes from, because the labor is normally in the teardown and reassembly.
How much mess does it make?
Far less than the alternatives, because the blasting media disappears. What is left is the contaminant itself, which we contain and clean up.
Do you come to us?
Yes. The whole rig is mobile. Compressor, hose and operator arrive at your shop, plant, driveway or dock, anywhere across South Florida from Miami out to roughly a hundred miles.
What does a job cost?
It depends on the equipment, the contaminant and the access, so we will not throw a number at you over the phone without understanding the work. Describe the job and we will give you a real figure.
How soon can you look at it?
Send photos and a short description and one of the owners gets back to you. If you have a shutdown or a deadline, say so up front and we will tell you honestly whether we can hit it.
The comparison
Why not just pressure wash it
- Solvent and degreaser
It dissolves the deposit and often the finish underneath, then leaves a film behind either way.
- Hand scraping
Slow, inconsistent, and the tool marks the surface. Fine for a small area, unworkable across a machine.
- Media blasting
Abrasive by definition. Anything with a tolerance or a finish worth keeping comes out changed.
- Pressure washing
Forces water where water should not go, looms, bearings, seams, and then the job stops while it dries.
- Dry ice
The pellet is soft and the mechanism is temperature, not abrasion. It turns to gas on impact, so the only thing left to sweep up is what came off.
What comes off
The deposits we see most
Most calls involve one of the following. The common factor is a bond between two things that should not be bonded.
- Ink and printing residue
Dried ink on precision roller faces, cleaned without altering the cell structure that does the work.
- Food residue
Burnt-on product, fat and sugar on processing gear, with no chemical residue left on a contact surface.
- Grease and oil
Oil film is the layer everything else sticks to. Remove it and half the job is already done.
- Carbon and soot
The hard black crust on a housing, an oven or a weld cell. Bonded by heat, and the first thing to release under thermal shock.
- Adhesive and sealant
Bonded material that outlived whatever it was bonding, usually harder to shift than the part it is on.
- Resin and mold release
Cured process residue on a mold or fixture. The surface has to come out dimensionally unchanged, which rules out anything abrasive.
- Paint and coatings
Selective removal, layer by layer, on parts where media blasting would cut into the substrate.
How a job runs
What happens once you call
If you have not seen this done before, the process is worth reading once. Nothing below is hidden in a footnote.
- We look at access and containment
The layout decides the method more often than the contaminant does. We work out reach and containment before quoting anything.
- We test a small area
Settings get proven somewhere nobody looks before they get used somewhere everybody does. What is correct on cast iron will mark aluminum, so the test is not a formality.
- We blast, then clean up
The media disappears on contact; the contaminant does not. Gathering what came off is included, not a line added afterward.
- You look before we pack up
Walk it with us before the hose goes away. A second pass while the compressor is still running costs nothing; a return visit costs us both.
- You describe the job
We start with what it is and what is on it. Whether it can come offline matters as much as the contaminant, and a wrong-tool answer is one we give up front rather than after the invoice.
What happens in your space
Surfaces come out cold. On some jobs that means waiting a few minutes before handling, and on others it means condensation as the part returns to ambient temperature.
The rig needs compressed air, which the truck supplies. There is no hookup to find and nothing of yours to plug into.
Masking happens first. Whatever is adjacent and vulnerable gets covered before the hose is picked up.
The media is solid CO2, nothing toxic and nothing left behind, but it pushes oxygen out of a closed room. Ventilation gets planned before the hose is connected.
Tell us what needs cleaning.
Tell us what the machine is, where it is and what is on it. A photo or two speeds it up. One of the owners calls you back.