New work hazards

5 February 2009

I have worked in cabinet shops on and off for about 5 years now. This
is not including the years i sent in school, or the hours spent in my
shop at home. It is an intrinsically dangerous job, the machines are
designed to cut wood apart, your fingers are even less resistance from
time to time. Looking around the shop I work at nearly everyone is
missing a piece of a finger or thumb.

I remember in school it was nearly the last day before summer break
and someone ran their fingers across the jointer. A jointer has three
blades spinning very fast which are parallel to a machined surface.
There is a table leading to the blades, and a table after the blades.
The premise is you set the infeed table lower than the outfeed table
so as you push a warped, or rough board over the blades it will take
off the amount from high areas so it flattens the board. The danger
is there is a guard in place but it is a string mudflap, basically
keeps your hands from falling in when there is not a board holding the
guard open.

As he is jointing a small piece of would he is holding down the board,
and has two fingers trailing behind the board, and yep lost the tips
of two fingers, and it happens in an instant. The blades are spinning
at something like 10,000 rpms (I could be wrong) so its quick. He
ended up being fine, meaning alive and well, but two fingers are a
little shorter.

While I was running a shop in Norwood, MA we had a small gas powered
go kart in the shop. It would get a little pep going and we would
race it around the shop. When you are sitting in the kart, all the
edges of all the machinery is right at eye level, which is a hazard in
itself. With this there is a light layer of sawdust all over the
floor which when you are cruising in the kart, and turn, you get a
killer slide going through turns. No one was ever hurt but it was a
ton of fun after a long day to blast through the shop and do quick
few laps to let off some carbon monoxide in a closed building.

I then took this to a new level this past week... in my current shop
on a nice day we have a large garage door which I will ride from my
bench, and out into the free world. There is constantly a layer of
dust all over the floor, and on my way out I will do a few skids since
you slide really well on the surface. Again there are machines,
carts, and screws everywhere. I have not gone down yet, but I really
want to get a good start from outside and skid through the entire shop
but it would require some great maneuvering I just do not possess in a
skid yet. I will keep you posted...