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Injury in a shop right next to mine.

Trboatworks

Diamond
Joined
Oct 23, 2010
Location
Maryland- USA
A general mechanics shop in the marine trades.
The guy was chopping a bronze thru hull (short piece of pipe) on a band saw with a 4TPI wood blade on it holding by hand.
The piece grabbed and took his finger into the blade and sawed about half way through the bone.
No ideal how bad the injury is- tendons etc as he is off at the emergency room.

Poor work holding, wrong blade.

Sucks- band saws can rotate rounds in a instant and tube is even worse.
 
you know, I wasn't going to click on this thinking it was just going to be "rubbernecking" but that is a useful cautionary tale. bronze is grabby to begin with, and a 4TPI is going to be really grabby!

HOLDING SHORT PIECES OF TUBE OR PIPE BY HAND ON THE BANDSAW IS A BAD IDEA!

a piece of wood and a couple of Kant-Twist clamps comes to mind, and for smaller diameters, a tapered dowel. (a tapered chair back spindle is a handy mandrel to have around for all kinds of things.)


IMG_0770.jpg
 
I've had that exact thing happen to me in a wood cutting bandsaw with about 3" pvc. No injury in my incident but I never forgot it and never did it again.
 
I once caught an engineer trying to use an approximately 8TPI blade on a vertical bandsaw to cut a piece of .100"Øish stock... What's amazing is that after he got it caught in the gullet, bent the stock, and probably ripped a few teeth off the blade... He went to try again, until I took it from him and cut it on the lathe for him. But at least he had his safety glasses on.
 
I almost got bit last weekend cutting the end off a new tube of Castrol stick-wax metalcutting lube. It grabbed and spun surprisingly quick and hard for a glorified toilet paper tube. I know not to cut rounds freehand on a bandsaw, but thought a lousy piece of cardboard would be no problem. Oops.
 
Got bit by this once though not badly just a minor cut .Since then I keep a small palmgren vise for cutting rounds. I just turn it upside down and clamp the part to cut it . Bill
 
I received this float lock band saw clamp for Christmas after I did the very same thing. My kiss didn't get a Doc.
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I'm thinking that if you don't have someone to beat it into you, that this is a mistake that a lot of us make. Hopefully it only happens once and it doesn't result in a trip to the ER. Mine was 1 1/4" PVC pipe, just a minor cut from the pipe end, that was enough to make sure that rounds always get held in a vice or clamp when cutting on horizontal or vertical bandsaws...
 
One way to avoid this type injury is to use the correct piece of gear for the job (no the apprentice). If you must cut round stock on a vertical bandsaw use one of those small vices. Place the stock in the vise then invert it, hold the vise in your dominate hand and proceed CAREFULLY. Also is a good idea to tell the clipboard crew that their is a kitten stuck in a tree on fire out in the parking lot as well.
But in all seriousness I hope he recovers quickly and IMHO just don't cut round stock on a vertical saw, clamp it proper like in a horizontal. But if you must, and lets be honest sometime ya have to try the above and Christ sake use the correct blade.
 
my bride's brother quit his job at the university to get into construction work. he is now short three fingers due to free handing cutting something on a table saw (from the back side)
 
I have to admit I did this one time- 6” piece of thin wall aluminum tube on a 3tpi carbide blade.

Wham!
Stock spun and trashed the $200 blade.
Lesson learned...
It’s right up there with helicoptering a bit of stock in the drill press- gets real exciting and will lay you open if you get nicked..
 
...If you must cut round stock on a vertical bandsaw use one of those small vices. Place the stock in the vise then invert it, hold the vise in your dominate hand and proceed CAREFULLY...

I use a machinist's vise all the time to cut stock in a vertical bandsaw. Inverting the vise is the correct way to do
it but the trick is to place the stock on the table, flip the vise over and then clamp it. That way the stock stays flat
on the table. if you clamp the stock in the vise first it will be suspended above the table whether you invert the
vise or not...
 
my bride's brother quit his job at the university to get into construction work. he is now short three fingers due to free handing cutting something on a table saw (from the back side)


I did carpentry before I got into machining. When I was basically an apprentice at that, I had a 24" square piece with very sharp corners kick back on the table saw, and go winging about 15 feet down the driveway right past me... I was a lot more respectful of the table saw after that...
 
So the blow by blow..

I just talked to the guy- he’s fine with no tendon damage.
He told me the blade was dull so he was pushing like hell to make the cut.
It just keeps getting better and better- dull 4TPI wood blade forced through a piece of bronze pipe..

There is a line somewhere between a guy without the training to know about hazards and one who doesn’t stop when he can tell something is not safe..

Maybe the most important upside of no employees.. I don’t have to chase safety issues with someone else running equipment.
 
So the blow by blow..

I just talked to the guy- he’s fine with no tendon damage.
He told me the blade was dull so he was pushing like hell to make the cut.
It just keeps getting better and better- dull 4TPI wood blade forced through a piece of bronze pipe..

There is a line somewhere between a guy without the training to know about hazards and one who doesn’t stop when he can tell something is not safe..

Yup, should have used a sawzall....or a quicke saw....
 
my mother worked as an engineer investigating accidents at a very large factory ...

When we were required to do special shop class days at teaching factory, instructor spent almost a whole day describing every way tendons getting pulled from arms when hand gets wrapped around a chuck on a machine the size of that classroom.

People get complacent working with less powerful tools, getting into habit of stopping drill chuck with hands on a tabletop model then trying that crap on a factory machine.

Big driving factor is rushing, using subpar tools for the job, because you need done something quick.
 








 
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