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Residential · Miami, FL
Brick Surface Ice Blasting
When people call about brick surface, the constraint is usually the same. 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 grease, soot, mildew staining, old finish and garage grime. Household surfaces are usually softer than industrial ones, so the non-abrasive part matters more, not less.
We come to the house; the rig runs off the driveway. The people who call us about brick surface are usually homeowners and collectors, and the thing they are actually worried about is damage to something in your own home.
The method
Why dry ice and not the alternatives
- Non-abrasive
Tolerances stay where they were. Nothing hard hits the part, so a mold face or a bearing seat is not worn by the cleaning.
- Low moisture
Bearings and wiring hate water. The ice turns to gas instead of liquid, so there is none to work its way inside.
- 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
We clean most equipment where it stands. Taking things apart and putting them back is the expensive part of any cleaning job, and here it is usually skipped.
More residential work
Related jobs we get called for
Questions we get asked first
Will it damage the surface underneath?
Generally not. The pellet works by temperature rather than friction, so the surface underneath is left alone. If there is any doubt about a finish, we test it before anyone sees the result.
Do you have to take the equipment apart for brick surface?
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?
Your floor stays dry and the corners stay free of grit. What does come off is collected by us before we pack up the rig.
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?
Pictures get you an answer fastest. A few clear shots of the equipment and the buildup usually tell us enough to talk timing on the first call, before anyone drives out.
The comparison
What the alternatives actually do
- 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
It works by removing material, which is the problem. Acceptable on heavy steel, damaging on soft alloy, plating or a machined surface.
- Pressure washing
Water gets into everything and has to come out again before the equipment runs. Around electrics it is off the table entirely.
- Dry ice
Thermal contraction cracks the bond between deposit and surface, then the pellet gasses off. Nothing abrasive, nothing wet, nothing left.
What comes off
What this takes off
The method does not care much what the contaminant is, only that it sits on top of something. Here is the usual list.
- Adhesive and sealant
Cured sealant, old gasket, tape glue and sound deadening, the residue left when something was removed but its bond was not.
- Resin and mold release
Release agent and resin build-up on tooling, where a solvent fix trades one residue for another.
- Paint and coatings
Taken off in a controlled way when what is underneath matters more than speed.
- Salt and corrosion product
The year-round problem on the coast. The finish holding corrosion back has to survive the cleaning.
- Ink and printing residue
Dried ink and coating build-up on rollers and press components, where the surface texture is the product.
- Food residue
Carbonized product build-up in a plant where neither standing water nor a chemical film is acceptable.
- Grease and oil
The greasy base coat that traps grit and dust. It releases early and takes the loose material with it.
How a job runs
The sequence, start to finish
There is no mystery to how these jobs run, and no part of it we would rather you did not ask about.
- We blast, then clean up
There is no grit hiding in seams afterward, because the ice turns to gas. Our cleanup is the buildup itself, and we take care of it as part of the visit.
- You look before we pack up
The job is not finished because we say so. It is finished when you have looked at it.
- You describe the job
The machine, the deposit and the downtime you can afford. Those three things decide the whole job, and we would rather know all of them before quoting.
- We look at access and containment
Before the first pass, we decide what stays covered. Labels, seals and anything freshly painted get masked so the only thing exposed is the dirt.
- We test a small area
A test spot takes minutes and protects the whole job. It tells us how hard to push on this particular surface, which matters more than any rule of thumb.
Before we turn the rig on
Everything the rig needs arrives with it. No tap, no drain, no outlet.
Anything nearby that should not be touched gets masked before we start. That is quicker than explaining it afterward.
Solid CO2 leaves no film and nothing poisonous behind. In a sealed room, though, the gas it becomes takes the place of oxygen, and that is something we plan for ahead of time.
This is not a quiet method. Ear defenders are standard issue on site for anyone nearby.
Send us the job.
A short description and a location is enough to start. Add photos if you can. You will speak to an owner, not a scheduler.