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There are times when the item you need to abrasive blast cannot be moved into an industrial blasting booth for one reason or another. If this happens, you have to prepare an abrasive blasting area where you'll be able to achieve a good result with minimum environmental contamination.

Also, you have to think about people in the vicinity to make sure there are no health risks and that the noise will not be a problem in built-up areas.

The integrity of structural steel depends in part on how effectively it can be protected from rust. The standard way to achieve this is to cover the steel in a protective coating. However, it is crucial that the coating is applied on steel that is clean, otherwise corrosion may occur below the surface of the coating – creating bubbles over weakened parts of the metal.

As steel comes freshly rolled from the mill, it is already covered in mill scale, a thin layer of iron oxide. As soon as the mill scale layer is broken by handling, impact or friction, it allows corrosion of the base metal. To make matters worse, any paint applied over mill scale will be ineffective, as the corrosion will take place below the paint surface, damaging the metal itself. So it is imperative that mill scale is removed from structural steel before it is coated – for instance, by abrasive blasting.

The combination of salt water, sun and wind make the marine environment one of the toughest places to combat rust. Any steel surface that becomes exposed because the protective coating is chipped or worn away will start to corrode almost immediately. Once rust has started, it takes drastic measures to curb its spread.

Because of friction and the potential for even slight movement of parts relative to each other to wear away or crack coatings, moving parts and fasteners are usually most susceptible to rust. As soon as the metal is exposed to oxygen, it starts to rust.