What builds up, and why it matters
On this kind of work the problem is fine dust and particulate loading on switchgear, busway, fans and mechanical plant. A data hall cannot take water and cannot take downtime. Cleaning has to be dry, contained, and finished inside the window you were given.
Work is planned around the maintenance window and the containment the facility requires. The people who call us about data center infrastructure are usually critical facility and data center operations teams, and the thing they are actually worried about is particulate migrating somewhere it should not, or a window overrunning.
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 data 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 data center infrastructure?
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 loosens the mess and leaves its own behind, along with fumes and something to dispose of.
- Hand scraping
Labor-intensive and uneven, and whatever you scrape with eventually marks what you are scraping.
- Media blasting
It works by removing material, which is the problem. Acceptable on heavy steel, damaging on soft alloy, plating or a machined surface.
- Pressure washing
The water has to go somewhere, and on most equipment that somewhere is inside it.
- Dry ice
It is the only one on this list where the media stops existing the moment it has worked.
What comes off
What dry ice actually removes
The rule of thumb is simple: anything stuck on rather than built in. These are the deposits we see most.
- Ink and printing residue
Dried ink on precision roller faces, cleaned without altering the cell structure that does the work.
- Food residue
Carbonized product build-up in a plant where neither standing water nor a chemical film is acceptable.
- 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
Sound deadening, tape residue, gasket material and sealant that has cured onto a face it was never meant to stay on.
- Resin and mold release
Release agent and resin build-up on tooling, where a solvent fix trades one residue for another.
- Paint and coatings
Removed selectively where the substrate underneath has to survive, which rules out most abrasive approaches.
How a job runs
How a job actually runs
Most people have never watched dry ice blasting happen and are not sure what they are agreeing to. Here is the whole sequence, start to finish.
- 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
There is no spent media to recover, only the deposit, which we collect before packing up.
- You look before we pack up
We would rather you find the missed spot while we are standing there than a week later. Another pass on the day is the cheapest fix available.
- You describe the job
What it is, what is on it and whether it can stop. If the answer is that dry ice is wrong for it, you get that answer first, not last.
What the job is like to stand next to
Cold surfaces are the one aftereffect. Depending on the piece that is either a few minutes of patience or some condensation while it returns to room temperature.
The rig needs compressed air, which the truck supplies. There is no hookup to find and nothing of yours to plug into.
Anything nearby that should not be touched gets masked before we start. That is quicker than explaining it afterward.
Dry ice is carbon dioxide in solid form. It is non-toxic and leaves no residue, but it does displace oxygen in an enclosed space, so ventilation is part of the setup rather than an afterthought.
Send us the job.
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.