Thread: Have you used your wire wheel/bench grinder wo glasses?

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Likely the answer is yes, at least a few times everynow and then. Today I was cleaning a part with a 6 inch wire wheel using reading glasses. I felt a piece of debris whack my nose, and moved off to the side a little more and continued. When finished I went to take off the glasses and felt something, and it was a piece of the wire wheel STUCK in the side of my nose. Pulled it out, and after coming into the house there was the blood spot.
That easily could have been an eye .

Been there, done that. Walked around for three or four years with a visible spot just up and to the left of where I was looking.....A tiny bit of stone embedded in my left eyeball. A big ol' blood vessel grew across to it and it finally dissolved.
On a somewhat different note, my brother whacked a bearing to split it off a shaft on our combine, and a bit of steel went in his forearm. Months later, he got a nasty infected lump, 'way up his arm from the entry hole. That thing went at least four inches through skin and muscle! Good thing it wasn't going straight in toward something he needs!

Guilty! yeah it is real dangerous, its real fun getting the eye doctor to remove rust from your eye, i think that is worse then getting flash burn.

I have been to the emergency ward several times for that.......I learn REAL slow. Last time I was there, the Doctor told me I was about 24 hours from going blind in that eye because of the rust that was forming on the slivver. I have not been back since then, because I now keep goggles all over the shop so that they are always handy.

My Son had to have a piece of metal ground out of his eyeball. He now wears goggles religiously too.

Any tool that spins or turns has the ability to flip stuff at you, and guess where it always seems to go??

Don

I'm pretty good about it. I of course have been a bit slow on the other stuff, long sleeves etc. I still wear flip flops once in a while. the big thing I have added as habit is always wearing the damn fire resistant cloth hat. I hate taking a shower later and picking out pieces of spark material and what not out of my scalp (especially from welding).

In case you havent' found out already "stain resistant" = "fire inclined" I once caught the crotch of a pair of khakis on fire with a grinder. hearing me tell the story in person makes you laugh, I'll try to get it across in type.

Last minute I had to cut out the back of a thin metal (computer rack enclosure for those that know the item) cabinet. I was supposed to do night before but....already dressed for work, wearing my yellow safety glasses, because of the cut, size of it etc. the sparks were coming at me, low. Normally wouldn't have been a problem (read "wearing jeans). The pants I had on were "stain repellant". I feel warmth in my goodie basket, stop and look down and the pants are on fire right over my right nut!!! I pat it out real quick and it has burnt straight through and turned my whities black. I felt toasty all day.

Red

I plead guilty, but it's not my fault. Somebody is always sneaking into my shop and hiding my safety goggles.

My grinder has one of those little glass shields that you can fold down that supposedly gives you some protection but it's pretty old and beat up and you can't see through it anyway, and I usually have "just a little bit" of grinding to do .........

Okay. I'll admit it. I have had to go to the doctor to get junk out of my eyes.

And, 46yblock, I did exactly the same thing using a wire buffing wheel, and I didn't even know it happened. I walked into the house and my daughter advised me that there was a piece if wire sticking straight out of the end if my nose.

They say "Live and Learn", but evidently that doesn't apply in my case.

Jim

I was at the grinder/wire wheel and noticed my chin was itchy and I knew I hadn't shaved for a couple of days so no big deal. After I was done with the process, I decided to clean up and go to lunch. I noticed when I wiped under my chin, it felt painful so I went to the mirror and noticed a piece of wire wheel sticking through my scruffy growth. No problem, just pull it out and sanitize it. Found out in the emergency room that it was a whole strand that just missed the muscles that control the toung. Doc said I was lucky right after he asked if I had my safety glasses on. Hhmmmm......I didn't have the heart to reply that those glasses were not going to do a bit of good on my chin.

I don't use my bench grinder for much other than sharpening or cleaning tools, I have a belt grinder that I use and I wear a full face mask when I use it. the angle grinder is where I often just wear the glasses if it is going to be a short job, the other day I was using a cutoff wheel and had it come apart, a shard went by and hit my cheek (I had the glasses!) I was lucky it didn't cut me.

Red

I've had a VERY small steel splinter drilled from my eye once.
I didn't know exactly what it was for a day or two, until it created a rust ring

Not fun.
That was from grinding with sun glasses only.

Not a chance will I ever run a grinder or wire wheel w/o some sort of safety goggles or shield. I made a trip to the doctor to get a couple of pieces of non-magnetic steel out of my cornea - he used a drill device and it HURT. The week of an eye patch on my dominant eye was bad. This steel passed over the top of a full face shield, thru one of the holes in my goggles, past my safety glasses and lodged, evidently from heat, next to my contact lens that I was wearing at the time. It was while I was working in a manufacturing plant and was deburring a large rotor from a motor so was required to have this equipment - and it was investigated and charged as a lost time accident. Since that incident, I no longer wear the conventional goggles but wear the chemical style with a single covered vents. And I don't wear a face shield as I feel that the chem goggles provide me with enough eye protection - but do occasionally find a wire from my rotary brush sticking out of my forehead or nose - and the worst offenders are the DeWalt rotary brushes sold by HD or Lowes - even worse then the cheapy Harbor Freight junk

With all of the above experiences added to mine, I am going to find a couple good sets of safety glasses next time in town. Reading glasses wont cut it and the current safety glasses are too beat up to see through, especially if something can get through all the gear Dave was wearing.

Ill never forget once I got a piece of trim caught and rolled up in the bench grinder (totally wrecked the trim beyond recognition)....it jammed the grinder and it stopped spinning abruptly. The sudden stop caused the wheel nut on the other side to spin loose, and the opposite wheel (still spinning) came off and did a burnout off my bench and clear across the garage, missing my fender by about 3 inches, and landing a huge dent in the wall about 20 feet away it all happened it a split second. Those grinders have a ton of potentially lethal kinetic engery. So yes...always wear your goggles!

I've had so much stuff in my eyes, and stuck in various parts of my body, that I can't remember all of it - had a few minor and one major surgery to remove some of them. I have glasses, goggles, face shields and screens, but the safest thing I have is an old welding hood with a leather chin/throat flap. I replaced the shade lens with a tempered and a clear; still wear glasses under it.

I've grown really fond of my eyes over the years so I try to protect them. I've got some very comfortable safetyglasses that I got from Grainger, I put them on every time I work in the garage. I've got quite a bit of junk in my eyes during my short life, the worst was a drop of battery acid once. I have never felt any thing that burned like that. It's also a good idea to put some eyewash bottles in the shop, it's hard to run to the house when you can hardly see. Stay safe out there!



Adam