I had someting happen to me today which got me thinking about a new thread. Sharing your (safety wise), close calls or worse, might save someone else.
I have a Delta Unisaw in my shop. It has the standard magnetic switch on it with the recessed area for the start button. I was cleaning off my outfeed table of a little clutter when I noticed some glue drops so I grabbed a razor blade to scrape them off. I then went on to the saw table, scouring the top with the razor blade to get a few drops of sap, etc. when suddenly, with my fingers inches from the blade, the saw started. Scared the #$^% out of me. On my key chain I have a 1″ diameter billiard ball fob, that when I unknowingly leaned into the switch the key fob, which was in my front pants pocket, went right into the switch recess. I think I am going to put a little hinged door in front of the start button being careful not to impede access to the stop switch.
I am 49 years old and have been doing this summers and saturdays since I was 12 and fulltime since I was 20. And I still have all ten and God willing I’ll keep them.
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Last January while finishing a kitchen I had to make a small piece to cover and odd area. Kind of a free hand piece for appearance only. Using the slide miter I am whittling this piece of oak down and make about 4 cuts in a row. The piece is about 1x1x5 with a groove in it so I am close to the blade.
At some point I have a dumb a$$ attack and am going to fast and the best I can tell I didn't get the piece back fully against the fence. BANG! It catches and snaps my finger. Humbling moment, glad I still have the finger. Am mutch more carful now. DanT
I have thought about this for years. I have several friends that have either lost a finger or have been badly cut. Then there are the falls and near falls. Then you throw in the shocks. I pay attention when someone tells me about their mistakes. I want to die with all of my parts and I do not want to die too soon.
Edited 11/28/2004 9:02 am ET by catfish25
I'll share the most memorable one here.
As a youngter (meebe 18) I worked in a Pallet mill. Was running a 'champher' machine..basically ya stack a bunch of 1x6's 42" long about 20 or so high, a chain driven dog, grabs the bottom board and feeds into a 2 sided head that cuts the skipped champhers on the bottom pallet boards, to allow the wheels of a pallet jack to roll over them.
This machine was bolted to the floor, about the size of a big jointer. It was notorious for jamming, a chain dog would skip under the board, cocking it up and jamming the cutter..SOP was to shut her down, unstack the wood, clear the jam, and restart..(here is where I add we worked on Pc. rate) the machine took awhile to wind back up to speed..lost time=lost $
When it did it to me, I just reached under the stack and lifted the whole pile up to remove the extra wood ,thinking the weight off would allow the next dog to catch the bottom board..
In a flash, the next dog came along and grabbed the board, along with all four fingers on my left hand, and started to feed it into the head..The only way out was to lift UP as the gap was getting smaller...I remember a big BANG as the oak 1x6 SNAPPED and a cloud of dust..
I had picked up the entire machine, yanked the bolts outta the concrete...broke the dust collector pipe, and saved my hand.
Adreneline is good stuff...that machine hadda weigh 500 lbs.
I still have some nasty scars but all digits are accounted for.
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I removed my right thumb in a similar circumstance. I was changing blades on a 16" joiner. I had shut the power off on the buss bar but needed some new bolts for the gibb. When I returned from the hardware store, someone had turned the power back on. The power indicator light was burned out and my mind was occupied with too many other things. The on button actually stood proud of the shroud. I think my knee hit the button. I was able to get the mushed thumb sewn back together. Just seconds before all eight of my fingers had hold of the blade. I was rolling the cutter head to the next slot with my thumb when the machine came on.
I instituted a lock out, tag out program, placed convenient plugs on the previously hard wired equipment and changed all the switches in the shop to those large emergency stop switches. The orthopedic surgeon signed up for my woodworking class. He figured I would be especially attentive to safety issues.
Whatever it takes, make sure there is no power to the equipment when you change cutters and do other set ups. Sewn on fingers don't really work that well, if they can be sewn at all, most can't.
Beat it to fit / Paint it to match
It certainly makes a lot of sense to have plugs instead of hard wired machines. It is second nature for me when changing router bits, etc. to always glance over at the plug even when i know 100% that it is unpluged.
The table saw incident really shook me up though. I am going to try and get into the habit of dropping the blade or moving the fence up close when I am done using it. Definatly dropping the blade when doing any non sawing tasks around it.
I'll share another, not quite as dangerous but pretty stupid. I was ripping a piece of 2x on a 45 degree and had it trapped between the blade and fence. well I don't have to tell you how that 10 inch blade and three hp motor did with that. There is a nice triangular dent in the steel door behind me. Now for the STUPID part. If you look close there are two identical dents about 2 inches apart. Brain Freeze i guess.
> suddenly, with my fingers inches from the blade, the saw started.
I have the same Unisaw that my father and grandfather had. The first thing I was taught was always to crank the blade all the way down when the saw wasn't in use.
-- J.S.
In the past, I have always felt pretty confident about working small and close to blades that are stationary...like a table saw or brick saw... I guess what I am saying is that you know where the blade path will always be.
This summer I was painting the outside of a 150 year old farmhouse of a nationally known woodworker and I asked him what injury he had to lose his finger. He told me that he was working on a tablesaw with his hand about 5-6 inches from the blade when his piece spun around and took his hand into the blade. They couldnt find most of his finger and it also mangled the rest of his hand. Now I am more cautious than ever because I never thought of the material curling your hand closer into the danger zone.
I was working some steal in a small cold shop one winter. I had a peice in a tablevice and I am kind of tall. I was going at it with an older heavy large grinder. I was good about wearing my safety equipment and it was cold so I had a tee shirt, pullover, button up, and an old army shirt that I would throw on to weld. With all the training I had had, I didnt think about the tails on the shirt because they were protecting me from sparks and heat. I leaned over the steal piece to grind around the other side, and the grinding wheel caught the tail and before I knew what even happened the shirt spun around the wheel then the grinder towed in toward me and kept spinning impaling me in the gut. The wheel got so full of shirts that it bound and I finally let go of the trigger. After I got over the gut punch I started to unwind the grinder. It had shredded through 2 of the shirts and bound the third. Man was I lucky it was cold out.
I still wear that army shirt to remind me when I work metal, only now I tuck the front tails in my pants. And when my tails are out with similar equiptment... you never forget.
Edited 11/29/2004 8:16 pm ET by zendo
You really were behind the eight ball you almost got snookered but came out of it without a scratch take a cue from me and put that key chain in a rack and chaulk this up as experience.
Amazingly I have never been hurt by a tool in many years of using them almost daily. A couple of minor slices from the utility knife and a few pokes with the awl... that's about it. But I did almost lose my face once. I had a small Inca tablesaw with an unusual cord cap, and I decided to hardwire it to a j-box on my shop wall. I got distracted doing this brief task and a week or more later I decided to finish. When I was done I could not find the flat, square metal cover plate for the j-box anywhere.... but... when I turned the saw on, the cover plate came shooting out of the blade slot like a Chinese Death Star and buried itself in the wall behind me. It had somehow fallen down thru the blade slot, and since that particular saw had a shroud around the blade below the table, it didn't make it to the floor. Now I always lean to the side when I switch a tablesaw on, and I never put anything on the saw that isn't a board about to be cut.
I had the same kind of scare once when I switched on my DW portable table saaw. The arbor nut shattered into five pieces, with some going out the dust ejection shute, some to the floor, and some lifting the blade insert flat top.
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Plugs aren't always so great...my first job on a trim crew, we had a Buffalo table saw with no fence. Well, ok the fence was a 4x4 that we c- clamped to the table. This saw didn't have a switch, either. When you were ready to cut, you plugged it in.The fence was much easier to align and clamp with two people. I had my tape out on the infeed end and another crew member had his out on the outfeed. We had the blade up to cutting height...whang the saw comes on! After I count all my fingers,and check my pants, I see my tape's been cut...I also see an electrician's helper running away...he was trying to help out by plugging us in!Nobody hurt, that was a lucky day<G>
Don't worry, we can fix that later!
Whoever provided that saw was... a criminal. Reminds me of a guy I used to trim for, he had a Hitachi 15" chop saw with no blade guard and no brake. Man, that thing scared everyone. Finally one of the guys took it to another job but left it sitting in the back of his truck in the grocery store parking lot while he picked up lunch. In San Francisco, a chop saw unattended in the back of a truck lasts about 15 seconds. So, the contractor had to buy another and everyone just smiled at him.
In my former life I was a machinest. I was walking in to work one morning when I passed the boss and a few of his kiss-a$$'s trying to free up the tines of a snow-blower.
I said you guys ought to pull the spark plug wire so it dont kick and take off yer hand. I got the old "whatta you know?" and they continued on.
A few minutes later there was a lot of yelling and commotion. Guess what.... I guess they were right, he only lost a finger