OUCH!

[LM14]

Well, just taking my time stripping the front suspension out of my '62 uni build so I can put in the Industrial Chassis Dakota kit. Everything was going great. Had the axle and springs out, most of the mount rivets cut off.

Starting on the steering box/column. A few of the screws on the floor plate were rusted/rounded off to the point that no wrench would fit them so I grabbed the angle grinder with a thin cutoff wheel for the last sheetmetal screw. Thing kicked back off the loosened screw and drove straight down my left thumb.

I have a really neat slice from the quick of my thumbnail to the tip and almost half the depth of my thumb. Same width notch as a 5/64 cutoff wheel. Nice drive 5 miles home, think the rain/sleet/wind coming in thru the open window actually kept me from passing out. Found a use for this crappy weather.

Doc says they can't stitch anything since it's right down the nail, went right beside the bone and came out the tip. Just for fun, it seemed to be packed full of grit, grease, cutoff wheel and steel dust. Nurse had fun scrubbing it out, me not so much. This will slow things down for a couple days. No pics will follow, I'll respect the squeamish. Ouch!

SPark

[jamesdfo]

Steve: That hurts just to think about!

Consider yourself lucky, last fall, a friend of a friend here had a zip disc kick back on him while he was working on his sprint car, cut clean through his kneecap!!.....he was walking with a cane, and turned over driving duties to my friend for the last race of the season.

[Alan Mclennan]

Steve I`m nearly spewing just reading this, hope it heels up real quick for you mate!

[ICEMAN6166]

i hate when that kind of thing happens.

last couple times i have super glued myself back together after cleaning the wound.

friend of mine blew up a 12" angle grinder wheel on his hand last year, he had one of the neighbor women sew him up.

hope it heals up ok but at our age the scars dont go away too easy anymore.

[64 f100]

I worked pipeline construction all my life. When I first started at 15, we didn't even use grinders, it was shoe handle and block brushes and ice pics. A year or two later we started using Dlack and Decker grinders with psuh on and push off buttons. These had a unique slide thru the handle button , push thru the handle for on and back for off. What was interesting, were these were 9,000 rpm grinders and discs were rated for less than 7,000 rpm. Big heavy units that were later incorporated with plastic handles and trigger switches and ddroped to 7,00 rpm. The early ones were a real beast to run all day. Try grinding about 100 40 inch joints in a day , bead pass only of course and only one side. When you got done at the end of a ten hour shift. Later yet, wer were using air grinders without regulators . Much lighter and faster, this lasted till one of the helpers doing the grinding blew one of the discs and it cut off the top of his head. They decided to check and see how many rpm the grinders were turning. 33,000 rpm. This is when regulators were finally installed. Some companies went back to the B+D grinders.. Can't tell you how many of those discs I had blow apart on me, along with one of thoseearly B+D shooting flame out of the handle where the wires went in. Flame would shoot out roughly three feet. Didn't take me long to drop the grinder when it did that. Problem with the early grinders with the push switch is when you ddropped it, it was still in the running position. I still have one of those grinders. Now, nearly everyone has gone to the little grinders. Those work but don't hold a cndle to those old ones as to grinding.

Rich

[Greg D]

I have superglued myself to models, the floor (I dripped some and stepped on it).
2" cut in a finger from an 11" prop at about 10,000 RPM - that got stitches. You know you cut it deep when the knuckle bone peeks out if you bend the finger.
Got myself with the grinder same as you.
I think the best one was the weld slag that dropped on a tennis shoe, it doesn't even slow down heading for your big toe and there is no humanly possible way to get the sock & shoe off fast enough - trust me on this.
Keep it bandaged for a few days + with triple anti biotic ointment (Neosoprin) - it will jump star the healing and keep it moist.
If it dries out it will take forever. I know some say let it breath, yep - a couple hours a day in the evening should do.
Hope it doesn't cause you too much more grief Steve.

[LM14]

This is pretty minor compared to some past "oops", but it still hurts like hell compared to most of them. I've broken toes, fingers, bad cuts x100, knocked myself out and probably one of the most helpless feeling was a blob of slag going down a coat sleeve and stopping on my inner elbow while lying on my back under a truck. That took a while to heal.

I'm most mad about the fact it was my last bolt before I had the entire front stripped and ready to start putting in the IC kit. Know how hard it is to do anything without using your thumb? I know now how we evolved above species that don't have a thumb like us!

Tomorrow it's back to working on it. Thumb be damned. Supposed to get my re-drilled axles and drums back and my 9" for the Maverick. Life goes on. Dianne is a nurse, she's in charge of recovery.

SPark

[Gritsngumbo]

Neosoprin is indeed a WONDER drug. I swear you can almost watch the wound heal.

[MadMaxetc]

Sorry about your "oops". Hope it heals soon.

I once got a wire cup attached to my angle grinder caught in my shirt. ripped the shirt off and was still going on the skin of my chest. That one hurt.

Also had a 1/2" bit catch on my cordless drill. the battery pack end swung around and hit me right in my temple. (I was pushing with my shoulder) It knocked me out and I needed 4 stitches for that one.

We all do dumb sh*t, but as long as we make it out alive and learn from each others f-ups...it's all good.

Stay Safe-ish!

[stronger66ratfink]

well,
I was going to ask,
once you get thru doing the swap,
come over and help me do mine on the 61

but I don't want blood all over that Teal and White paint job!

Ouch is right!

[foodstick]

I am still trying not to think about it.....

the CUT, Power tool scare me

[ICEMAN6166]

yet this guy gets away with tempting fate



http://ericpetersautos.com/2013/05/05/diy-donts/

[MadMaxetc]

How the hell did he get it up like that? if he lifted it up, then if it fell on him, he could just throw it off.

[Alan Mclennan]

Hey give him a break!, he has at least got the wheel chocked, and besides that little car wouldn`t hurt that much would it?

[f100jim]

yet this guy gets away with tempting fate



http://ericpetersautos.com/2013/05/05/diy-donts/

And it has a hitch? What could it pull!

[foodstick]

teeth !

[f100jim]

teeth !

They'd have to be rotten

[Alan Mclennan]

you guys!

[LM14]

Ouch 2.0, today was fun. This truck may kill me before we're done with it!

Today I decided to play with the new polisher I bought several months ago. Opened it up, mounted it on the bench and started to play with some aluminum trim that needed polishing. Since the piece I was playing with needed stripped still, I pulled off a turn signal trim ring from the '66 to work on (it has already had the anodizing stripped off). It was shinning up real nice...




until I didn't pay attention for a split second and it jerked the piece out of my hand and flipped it. Slapped my thumb and finger pretty hard and threw it into the corner (just as well, I would probably have thrown it if I had held on to it anyway). Made a nice dent across the thumb nail and a good slice/split on my finger.




Now I have a sore thumb, again, and a sliced finger plus I ruined the nice trim piece for the '66 (if you look at the first 2 pics you can kind of make out the huge dent/twist in the part). It's the same thumb I ran the grinder down! This thumb will not live thru the project at this rate. Sorry for the crappy pics but it's real hard to look thru the camera with tears in your eyes.

Have a good day,
SPark

[unibody madness]

Step away from the vehicle.
I REPEAT STEP AWAY FROM THE VEHICLE AND PUT THE POWER TOOLS DOWN
Been there, done that. . . Hope your string of bad luck comes to an end while you still have fingers left
I tend to leave things for a few days when that starts happening.
I agree with Ice we heal slower and scar easier with age