Tips for not hurting yourself with tools

Today, I did something that I figured would happen sooner or later . After finishing some simple soldering, I reached down and unplugged my iron.

Or at least I thought it was at the time

Quite some time later, I came back to my desk to clean up. I picked up the iron by the handle (as you should), then did a "heat test" by tapping it with my hand to make sure it was cool enough to put away. I've done this a 1000 times before without problems.

This time, I saw smoke rise from my hand!!

I had the iron plugged into a different spot than normal. I ended up unplugging my desk lamp, leavin the iron plenty hot

I managed to burn 4/5 fingers on my right hand - 2 with bad 2nd degree blisters (middle & thumb)

So, tip #1 - make sure your solderin iron is really unplugged!

feel free to add your own

-Darin

If you lube a chain on a moped with your fingers, make sure you don't slam a tool on the gear stick while the engine is running...

It cost me half a digit to learn...

Do close calls count? I rolled out from under the car I was working on just before the cinder blocks broke and it fell. That went straight to my list of THINGS NOT TO DO.

Ouch!

Not good guys I cringe just to think of them..

I've cut myself millions of times and ground away skin hundreds of times on belt sanders, drilled a hole literally 3/4 of the way through my hand once with a 3/8" bit and all the way through a fingertip with a .037 inch carbide bit another time, I figure that is what you get for giving sharp things and spinning things to an idiot but my two worst workshop related mishaps were:

Grinding away the tip of my index finger on a 600 grit diamond flat lap. I wasn't paying attention, and the lap is so fine you dont really feel any roughness on it, I had a flow of cold water running over it for cooling and to wash out the residue, so my fingers were numb anyway(just like my brain, huh?). Sitting there grinding and talking to my girl on the phone, staring off into space...

Didn't notice anything until I looked down and saw red... Skin and meat ground down to the bone and half my fingernail gone. It all grew back, but hurt like heck for a couple of months. It was my nose picking finger, so I was very inconvenienced.

The MOST painful was when I was refining some silver. I had about a pound of molten silver in a long narrow crucible, with about 4 ounces of borax flux in an open top electric furnace....

I was stirring it up trying to get all the oxides and flux to come to the top, leaving pure silver in the bottom....

Well, long story short.... I had put the hot end graphite rod I was using to stir with in a bucket of water for a moment when the phone rang..... came back a minute later and, not thinking, started stirring again.

Just enough water on the rod to build up a pocket of steam at the bottom of the crucible. It blew all the silver and flux (at about 2100 degrees F)out of the crucible like a mortar shot. The silver bounced off the ceiling and splattered all over the room, burning holes through the linoleum ... No big deal there, it was a rental house ....

Unfortunately, the flux, which was essentially a very gooey molten glass all stuck to my hand.... The next three months were a bit uncomfortable.

Fortunately, I had a couple of buckets of cold water there, one for my hand and one to put out the smoldering holes in the linoleum. Guess it could have been worse, I could have been "looking down the barrel when she blew".

don't try to move a peice of wood from a table saw blade with a stick:

(i think that is what happened...?)

don't try to sharpen a scraper with a disc sander:

(went right through entire nail and nailbed and some bone)

both pictures were taken tonight, thumb was done in shop class towards the middle of the school year, finger happend the same year at home, close the end of the school year.

on a positive note both grew back quite nicely!

(i don't know why the heck the stupid lines show up in the right images!!!)

Time, patience and attention to detail, good people. Time, patience and attention to detail.

Dan

ASE Master Mechanic 1982-2000

Rothrandir -- I've been wondering this since an earlier post describing how that happened. I use table saws, and moving the end of the wood through with a pusher stick has always been the accepted 'safe' method of getting it past the blade & fence when the two are pretty near each other.

Is that what you were doing and then something went very wrong?

Could you enlighten me a bit more on what goes wrong with that scenario? I sure want to learn if it's actually unsafe!

Interesting that *all* of these posts are about energy, potential or kinetic.

Understand the force! If something breaks loose that is supposed to be attached, or sticks that's supposed to slide, figure out a way that you're either protected by the force, or out of its way.

If you're loading ammo, wear safety glasses so you can survive a primer going off without losing your sight. Same with working with a grinder.

For things where the force is too strong to resist, like the blade of a circular saw flying off, make damn sure it's in good shape and attached well.

Common sense, and care. Make no assumptions. If something looks maybe not safe, then come up with a different plan.

If you're of the mindset that can't do this, don't work with these tools! Some people just don't have the focus, and probably everybody knows one of these guys.

"Time, patience and attention to detail, good people." Yep!!!

For complete information on what NOT to do, watch "Home Improvement." The show is an encyclopedia in that regard.

Don't put a hot soldering iron down where you can accidentally put your hand on the hot part. I did that once, long ago. I was building something from Heathkit, probably the HW-101 or oscilliscope.

I've watched many an episode of Home Improvement. I haven't hurt myself very much yet because the only tools I own are the aforementioned soldering iron, a cordless drill, and some files.

I do have a flyback transformer from a dead monitor. After building a 555-based driver circuit, I had 20,000V at my disposal. I found out the hard way how long a flyback stores energy.

Well, the burns are now in a managable state - After 5 hours in cold water, and some vicuprofen (mmmm...painkillers ), the pain is all gone.

I learned a valuable lesson today

-Darin

I ended up with 34 stiches in my left thumb from a table saw. I was cutting a small cherry board into a 12 inch square. On the last cut I hit a knot near the end of the cut. The wood spun back around and the corner laid open my thumb. Blade was set 1/8 inch above the wood, had a anti-kick back guard and was using a push stick. Every one thought I had cut my self on the blade untill someone picked up the board and found the big flap of skin on it. Best we can figure is when the wood kicked back the blade guard grabed on side making it spin. I was using a push stick so my hand was back aways and right in the path of the spinning wood. Some times evewn with saftey euipment acidents happen

Patrick Hayes

well, don't try to play catch with a knife (i.e. holding it, tossing it up into the air and trying to catch it by the handle). also, when cutting with a knife, push the blade away from yourself, not pull it towards you. anyone watched final destination?

My favorite tip - which Evan already covered, is to UNPLUG. My daughter can figure out how to turn ANYTHING on. I've had some close calls "I'll just be away from the miter saw for a minute" - EEEK. I now have double (and in some cases triple) switches for all tools that I use. And when I walk away, I completely unplug them.

Now, that's how to save OTHERS. I find that the tools aren't much use to me unless they're plugged back in - and then suddenly they're dangerous again.

Back in my miss-spent youth, I was helping a friend change shocks on a little car that had the shocks INSIDE coil springs. Took the tire off and proceeded to unbolt the shock. To stupid to realise that the shock was holding the coil spring in compression! The brake disk missed my foot by less than an inch!

Won't even talk about me and soldering irons!

Originally posted by Silviron:
The MOST painful was when I was refining some silver. I had about a pound of molten silver in a long narrow crucible, with about 4 ounces of borax flux in an open top electric furnace....

Click to expand...

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Silviron---Were you doing this in your house or are you a professional precious metals refiner?

For those of you that have had close calls with a table saw I absolutely recommend grip-tite magnetic featherboards. I have a pair and they are amazing. They hold the board in place when the saw is running. You can even let go and walk around the saw and the wood won't fly.
Featherboards are cheaper than emergency room visits. ---Marc

http://www.grip-tite.com

I have no commercial connection

Darell - They make key locking plug lockouts for industrial lock out/tag out. You put the big yellow thing on the plus, lock it, and kids can't plug it in.

Had my arm between the two ends of belt that went around a 8" motor pulley for some repair job that escapes my mind right now. Somehow or another the motor started running, belt caught my arm, and dragged it from one side of the pulley all the way around to the other end. 3/4" burn mark from the belt on one-side of the arm and two perfect red tracks from the pulley plus a broken arm on the other. Needless to say, I now make sure the motors off, unplugged from the wall and no-one even comes near me while I work.

OK, here is the short list from my 12 years of nearly living in theatres..

Never take 60 Mostly dead 9 volt batteries from your wireless mics and hook them all end to end so you can draw 4 foot arcs and light the booth an eerie blue. I spun around twice and fell to the floor unconcious drooling. Had burns inside my arms, and was numb for hours.

Choose the right screw when attatching a broken heal off a ladies shoe, otherwise your sickened friend has to unscrew it and the shoe from your hand.

And not me personally...

Hooking a 400 amp dimmer rack made for 120/208 three hase into 480 three phase causes a huge explosion and shuts off the entire building.

Don't lean your elbow into the solder pot.

Don't talk while rapidly cutting denal moulding on the table saw, less you spend the rest of your life with a split thumb.

12v dc power boards made by Strand that are 120 and 240 capable, when broken hold a capacitor charge at 368volts AC somehow. I saw it, the guys body made a crack when it happened. Metered out on ac on the meter.

Faulty equipment seems fine, but when you lean on the water pipe, you find out otherwise.

Jacob Javitz convetion center has a 108volt potential from the drywall to ground in thier building from a faulty transformer that no one can find to this day. I am suprised no one besides technicians has been shocked yet.

Never take 60 Mostly dead 9 volt batteries from your wireless mics and hook them all end to end so you can draw 4 foot arcs and light the booth an eerie blue. I spun around twice and fell to the floor unconcious drooling. Had burns inside my arms, and was numb for hours.

Click to expand...

<font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial">Ack! I pains me to think of how many ~50% dead 9Vs are thrown away in theatre every year. I need to invent a use for them or a recycling program or something.

Anyway I try and stick to 2 mostly dead 9Vs...don't do much more than keep my hands warm.