I dislike the smell of metal

KevinDS · Oct 17, 2016

Until a short while ago I thought I was interested in machining and the technology behind it. I'm pretty confident that I still am but one thing turns me off is the actual environment of a shop floor. I dislike the smell of touching metal and small chips and dust invariably still gets everywhere. And when dealing with lubricants you throw in getting greasy as well.

I was wondering if it takes a certain disposition to not be bothered by things like this or is it something some of you have had to learn to deal with and over time it wasn't an issue to you anymore?

JH-Q · Oct 17, 2016

...A machine shop isn't a place for fine ladies, like those guys in suits who run the EU bureaucracy in Brussels...

It's just the nature of the work. If you work with metal and lubricants, what would you expect them to smell?
Just get used to it and don't complain. Every machinist will laugh at you and tell you being a wuss.
Some metal alloys actually smell quite nice when cut or heated, and coolant smells like money to me. Your experience may vary.

However, modern CNC shops with mist extraction are really clean to work in, but still can be a bit noisy.

kgize · Oct 17, 2016

Metals are odorless - metal(s) as a solid with high melting temperatures have vapor pressure so extremely low as to not emit enough molecules for even the finest human noses to detect...You are smelling something else in the shop - perhaps cooling fluids or oils burning, or rotting, or who knows what. I find my machine shop collects less dust than my house - but not the welding or grinding or wood working areas - which are dusty and filthy most girls would say...
Regarding welding and grinding - yes - you accept and grow accustomed to getting very dirty...
Do not see why that needs to be so in a machine shop...

KevinDS · Oct 17, 2016

It's the contact of metal-to-skin that causes a chemical reaction with the natural oils on your hand, it's the same when handling coins. Also I forgot about the noise, you're right that too! Maybe it seems like a silly question but it gives me a better idea of whether I should pursue machining or not. It's a myth that only girls don't like getting dirty.

Limy Sami · Oct 17, 2016

Could it be machining isn't for you?

TedinNorfolk · Oct 17, 2016

OK here's a question which is reasonably germane to this thread. True,a piece of metal sitting around does not have a smell-but if you handle copper or its alloys your hands smell,well,coppery! Now I have a really old apothecarys mortar and after handling it my hands smell of garlic. I have the theory the bronze contains arsenic,as the copper and tin mines in Cornwall had silver and arsenic deposits close by. There's a useless bit of information for you. Is the garlic smell arsenic?

jlrii · Oct 17, 2016

Troll

Nuff said...

KevinDS · Oct 17, 2016

Why must people who assume any question that doesn't fit into the ordinary must automatically be a troll? You are worse than the trolls themselves.
I guess machining isn't for me then.

Mike1974 · Oct 17, 2016

KevinDS said:
Why must people who assume any question that doesn't fit into the ordinary must automatically be a troll? You are worse than the trolls themselves.
I guess machining isn't for me then.

Yep! If you are concerned with the 'feel' of "metal" (steel, aluminum, copper, bronze..?) touching your hands.... :nutter:

BUT, I will add I hate the smell of tapmagic! I worked with a guy who used the stuff like flood coolant. :vomit:

tnmgcarbide · Oct 17, 2016

kgize said:
Metals are odorless - metal(s) as a solid with high melting temperatures have vapor pressure so extremely low as to not emit enough molecules for even the finest human noses to detect...You are smelling something else in the shop - perhaps cooling fluids or oils burning, or rotting, or who knows what. I find my machine shop collects less dust than my house - but not the welding or grinding or wood working areas - which are dusty and filthy most girls would say...
Regarding welding and grinding - yes - you accept and grow accustomed to getting very dirty...
Do not see why that needs to be so in a machine shop...

odorless? i don't think so . perhaps the laws of physics cease to exist in your machine shop..... what a dumbshit thing to say.

something wrong with your nose? steel, aluminum ,brass , even stainless i can smell, and know what it is.

sounds like you read that bullshit somewhere.

onecut · Oct 17, 2016

I Love the smell of a machine shop and have to say after a while you will not notice it.In the past if I was away from this enviroment for say a year when I came back the smell would be more powerful and the noise seemed from a level I could not remember it being.A few weeks down the line and both have reduced in my little brain as it gets used to it again.When I was a young lad courting the wife she says she hated the smell of oil on my work clothes after we tied the knot she changed her mind saying she liked it as it meant the money was coming in

adama · Oct 17, 2016

Yeah find another occupation, probably best to avoid any thing in agriculture, mechanics and electrics, print, chemical processing etc.

IMHO i love getting dirty, but thats me, if im not covered in something that makes me itch, laying in a uncomfortable position and in some kind pain - bleeding a bit it just don't feal like work!

jscpm · Oct 17, 2016

You have made a grand total of 3 one-line posts to the forum, the general tenor of which is to announce what a pussy you are. :cryin:

Congratulations. You have explained the European Commission.

Remind me never to go to Belgium.

This has something to do with how Germany made you their bitch in 1914, doesn't it?

Mechanola · Oct 17, 2016

I am so glad about the smell of metal oxides and hot carbides and oils and grease because it’s not onions and fish and cauliflower. If it were the other way round, I’d be a cook.

Tyrone Shoelaces · Oct 17, 2016

At the school I worked at before I retired we also had kids from other schools for classes in engineering.

The other schools always sent a classroom assistant to liaise with our staff and the kids in the workshop.

One school sent a female assistant who promptly announced to us that she was allergic to metal !

One of our staff had an allergy to the round brass bar we used. It made him really itchy. He had to wear gloves when he handled the bar.

Regards Tyrone.

KevinDS · Oct 17, 2016

adama said:
i love getting dirty, but thats me, if im not covered in something that makes me itch, laying in a uncomfortable position and in some kind pain - bleeding a bit it just don't feal like work!

I'm trying to figure out whether it's something you get used to or not. Did you always love getting dirty?

onecut said:
have to say after a while you will not notice it.

That's what I would assume and it's what keeps me guessing whether to pursue it.

Tyrone Shoelaces said:
One of our staff had an allergy to the round brass bar we used. It made him really itchy. He had to wear gloves when he handled the bar.

Interesting, for me it's not that bad.

gadget73 · Oct 17, 2016

Have to agree with the above. I don't mind veggies but handling raw meat bothers me. Not enough to go veggie since dead pig is yummy, I just don't really much like cooking the stuff. I'm also not planning to become a butcher.

I wear gloves when working with messy stuff, a shop apron when doing stuff on the lathe or drill press, and crappy clothes that can get dirty as needed. I wash my hands as needed through the day and get a shower when done for the day.

gbent · Oct 17, 2016

Go to work on an animal farm for 6 months. Hogs, cattle, dairy, chickens, it just doesn't matter. You will think a machine shop smells just fine and is amazingly clean.

JNieman · Oct 17, 2016

I dislike the smell of shit but I still use public restrooms to drop a deuce.

Life's rough.

slnielsen · Oct 17, 2016

I used to hate the feeling of rusty metal.. It could even give me goosebumps.
No problem with that anymore.. Have a 1972 FIAT.

When working in production with coolant all over me, more than once, even a shower, I just couldn't smell it.
Now when I enter production sites, the smell of coolant brings back memories.

I dislike the smell of metal

Plastic

Aluminum

Cast Iron

Plastic

Diamond

Stainless

Hot Rolled

Plastic

Diamond

Diamond

Hot Rolled

Diamond

Titanium

Stainless

Diamond

Plastic

Hot Rolled

Diamond

Titanium

Hot Rolled

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