Shop Safety Supplies - Professional PPE Megathread, Reference, FAQ 🧯🥽⛑️👩‍🔬🦺

[CGarage]

I have been wanting to create a thread covering this for some time. I think it will be especially interesting because safety protocol is quite different in the U.S. compared to Europe, where it is often governed by the European Union, and each individual country generally has its own occupational safety and health requirements.

This is a serious discussion on professional products covering shop safety.

I can remember back as a young man and a ‘cowboy’, and regularly machining parts without wearing safety glasses, welding without gloves, and all other sorts of bad habits that were very foolish and stupid. I repeat here — if you catch yourself falling into this trap, STOP — You are given one body and one mind to make it through life, and you need to spend the few extra seconds to look after yourself.

We want to see:

• Eye Safety

• Ear Safety

• Face Safety

• Hand Safety

• Fire Suppression

• First Aid / Medical

• Accessible storage solutions for all of this

• Post manufacturer name and product names / model numbers please

 

[RTM]

Eye Safety

I am a big fan of Bolle safety glasses, especially the frameless varieties. Super comfortable, can wear them all day on the weekends, and my head does not hate me afterwards. Almost every year a pair or two gets ordered from HJE. I try to avoid the tinted / mirrored pairs, the scratches seem to show up worse. I have clear for indoor, smoke for outdoor, and a pair of someone else’s w bifocals for fine work like soldering.

https://www.harryepstein.com/collections/bolle

• Ear Safety

While I prefer the roll your foam plugs, they aren’t practical in the grime of some jobs. I have a pair of DeciBullz that come out for concerts, or when they will be in and out of my ears a lot. Had something similar in my brewery days, fantastic for the bottling floor

https://decibullz.com/products/custom-molded-earplugs-31db-nrr

Double those up with the David Clark headphone type for jobs like running the shredder. They recently discontinued the sound deadening only ones. I have the airport ground crew green ones.

Headset Communication Systems for High-Noise Environments | David Clark Company | Worcester, MA

Headset communication systems for high-noise environments.

www.davidclarkcompany.com

 

[Nobody-named-Olli]

I’ll only list the most, generally, used stuff, not going down the rabbit hole of unraveling everything.

- Eyes: Oakley M-Frame from the early ‘00s with clear and tinted poly lenses/screens & case. It’s days are numbered, sadly they have become somewhat of a ‘collectible’, when I last checked eBay for a spare pair to rob parts off it wasn’t a feasible ‘investment’ - so I will be hitting up suppliers to find a new pair.

- Face: Snap-On ‘Nightstalker’ face shield with clear screen and a #12 welding screen.

- Respirator: Dräger X-plore 3500 (P3 filters currently on it.)

- Ears: 3M Peltor Optime II

- Hands: Different type gloves from leather to fabric/ composite & Nitrile, mostly supplier (re-)brands. (Also “Glove in a bottle” type product and hand wash paste.)

- Knees: Klein Tradesman Pro hard face/ gel insert knee pads.

- Feet: S3 (EN ISO 20345) shoes and boots, that’s highly personal, doesn’t really make sense to list my choices.

- Fire prevention: Maintaining a powder extinguisher & fire blanket in a safe & easy to reach spot outside actual ‘risk area’.

- Electrical safety on site: Kopp brand PRCD-S extension, always with (Festool) PowerHub/ power distribution Systainer. Protects and also effectively prevents use of unsafe/ incorrectly wired outlets/ power sources as it won’t switch on then.

- First Aid: Maintaining a First Aid Kit in accordance with commercial/industrial standard and additional sterile eye wash, trauma bandages + Quikclot and high quality/professional shears that will actually cut. Additionally some tool boxes/kits have a couple of bandaids in them. First Aid Kit is in a Systainer as that is my #1 means of storage/transportation.

- Storage: Glasses, Face shield, Ear Protection, some Gloves are always within reach and go in one of the totes when working outside the shops. Respirator sits in a hard case and goes in the chest where I keep my work cloths, shoes, knee pads, (…). As already said, First Aid Kit is Systainer based as that is my main storage/transportation system.


Kind regards,
Olli

 

[YesIHaveAHammer]

Bolle Sphere face shield
Store brand cut resistant gloves (ISO cut level "E" )

Show your new tool arrivals

Kinda like a tool and they are Snap On Brand new, 1988 vintage, politically incorrect, girly coffee cups for the shop.

www.garagejournal.com

Bolle Rush+ glasses, I have a few clear pairs and the bronze ones. The bronze are 40% VLT and are good for when it's sunny but you still want a good view of colours/texture, or when you're moving between indoors and outdoors.

 

[IndyGarage]

The one thing I would recommend every shop and every work truck have on hand is some CELOX clot powder.

This is the stuff they use on battlefields to stop the bleeding of wounds.

It's not hard to cut yourself bad in the garage or in the shop. I busted my head open by banging it into my lift one day when I was there alone. it bled like a stuck pig. I went and got a package of Celox put it in a clean shop rag and stuck it to the cut - made a mess in my hair but I didn't bleed out.

 

[CGarage]

The one thing I would recommend every shop and every work truck have on hand is some CELOX clot powder.

This is the stuff they use on battlefields to stop the bleeding of wounds.

It's not hard to cut yourself bad in the garage or in the shop. I busted my head open by banging it into my lift one day when I was there alone. it bled like a stuck pig. I went and got a package of Celox put it in a clean shop rag and stuck it to the cut - made a mess in my hair but I didn't bleed out.

This is outdated thinking.

Quikclot combat gauze has replaced the powder / granular blood clotting agent due to the powder complicating wound treatment, especially around burned tissue.

 

[IndyGarage]

This is outdated thinking.

Quikclot combat gauze has replaced the powder / granular blood clotting agent due to the powder complicating wound treatment, especially around burned tissue.

Fair enough. but the point is still valid you should have one or the other in the shop.

 

[drokihazan]

I have been wanting to create a thread covering this for some time. I think it will be especially interesting because safety protocol is quite different in the U.S. compared to Europe, where it is often governed by the European Union, and each individual country generally has its own occupational safety and health requirements.

This is a serious discussion on professional products covering shop safety.

I can remember back as a young man and a ‘cowboy’, and regularly machining parts without wearing safety glasses, welding without gloves, and all other sorts of bad habits that were very foolish and stupid. I repeat here — if you catch yourself falling into this trap, STOP — You are given one body and one mind to make it through life, and you need to spend the few extra seconds to look after yourself.

We want to see:

• Eye Safety

• Ear Safety

• Face Safety

• Hand Safety

• Fire Suppression

• First Aid / Medical

• Accessible storage solutions for all of this

• Post manufacturer name and product names / model numbers please

• Eye Safety
Prescription Safety Glasses. I wear ArmouRX. Full wraparound coverage and comfort.

• Ear Safety
3M Peltor. I sometimes wear 3M foam in-ears underneath.

• Face Safety
UVEX Bionic faceshield or my ESAB Sentinel A60 welding helmet. The UVEX Bionic is incredibly comfortable, I wear it for long periods of time with no issues.

• Hand Safety
So many gloves. Miller MIG gloves and TIG gloves, diamond-grip 7mil gloves from Harbor Freight, leather work gloves when needed, and Snap-on nitrile-coated gloves for everything else, wear them all the time.

• Fire Suppression
Welding blankets are important. I keep a Kidde fire extinguisher around. I also keep all my flammables/solvents in an actual fire-rated 60gal corrosives cabinet from Eagle Mfg, and have a Justrite firesafe can with an auto-closing lid for my oily rags and painting consumables.

• First Aid / Medical
Really important to have a very complete first-aid kit. My partner is a nurse, so I let her put this together, and I keep it all in a large Toyo toolbox that stays readily accessible.

 

[Lassen Forge]

I have Rx safety glasses, dark glasses, and welding glasses. Otherwise I can't see what I'm doing, which can lead to kind of a bummer.... I have a coffee can nailed next to the door filled with ear plugs (Ballistols) because after losing most my hearing on the highway, your ears are like your eyes. And it's embarassing to have to cup your ears to hear someone across the table talking to you. Of course, Gloves to match the purpose, etc. Face shield by the grinder,

ALWAYS have a GOOD first aid kit in EACH of your vehicles, workstations, and toolboxes. Yeah, that's a lot of first aid, but when you're trying to bleed out, you don't want to have to go to wherever the one meager kit was stored... just to find out all the clotting gauze was used up. ALSO - when you get a kit, MAKE SURE it's actually a GOOD kit - a lot of them are filler and fluff... I started building my own, as some of the ones are between Meh and Uck. And then - KNOW HOW to use whats in the kit!!!

The one thing I would recommend every shop and every work truck have on hand is some CELOX clot powder.

Quikclot combat gauze has replaced the powder / granular blood clotting agent due to the powder complicating wound treatment, especially around burned tissue.

True this - I still have Celox powder just in case, but remember if you use it it WILL leave a scar, because the doctor will have to carve it out when they patch you up. I've gone over to the bandages, as you don't get wound contamination from them.

 

[KnurledNut]

I have been wanting to create a thread covering this for some time. I think it will be especially interesting because safety protocol is quite different in the U.S. compared to Europe, where it is often governed by the European Union, and each individual country generally has its own occupational safety and health requirements.

This is a serious discussion on professional products covering shop safety.

I can remember back as a young man and a ‘cowboy’, and regularly machining parts without wearing safety glasses, welding without gloves, and all other sorts of bad habits that were very foolish and stupid. I repeat here — if you catch yourself falling into this trap, STOP — You are given one body and one mind to make it through life, and you need to spend the few extra seconds to look after yourself.

We want to see:

• Eye Safety

• Ear Safety

• Face Safety

• Hand Safety

• Fire Suppression

• First Aid / Medical

• Accessible storage solutions for all of this

• Post manufacturer name and product names / model numbers please

This list is missing several critical PPE components:
-Respiratory safety - particulate management, vapors/fumes/gases control
-Temperature safety - heat stress, extreme cold
-Head safety - hard hats, safety helmets, bump caps, hoods, socks
-Foot safety
-Body safety - fall protection and arrest
-Workwear - High visibility, flame resistant, arc flash, etc

 

[mazdeuce]

• Face Safety
UVEX Bionic faceshield or my ESAB Sentinel A60 welding helmet. The UVEX Bionic is incredibly comfortable, I wear it for long periods of time with no issues.

Thanks for this. I've known I need a face shield for a while since I started wearing reading glasses for fine work. I'll have one early next week.

 

[drokihazan]

Thanks for this. I've known I need a face shield for a while since I started wearing reading glasses for fine work. I'll have one early next week.

I don't touch a grinder without either the UVEX Bionic or my welding helmet on. I also use it for all kinds of other stuff - metal cutting saws, using a sawzall in most scenarios, cutting with an air hammer, working with my hydraulic press. Pretty much anything where I already know my face and neck are at risk, or I've experienced getting hit in the face, I use a face shield - often over safety glasses. It's not uncomfortable, doesn't obstruct my view, and I don't want scars on my face.