protect your eyes!!!

[jakeb]

This is just a PSA to tell everyone if you don't have ample safety equipment than go buy some. Especially eye protection. I am normally pretty good about wearing safety glasses but I was making a turbo manifold friday night and couldn't find the glasses and made a cut and got a metal fleck in my right eye.

When I woke up Sunday morning I could barley open my eye and it hurt. A trip to the ER and they pulled a fleck of metal out of my eye. Then I had to go to an on call DO for him to use a needle and a eye bur (small diamond tipped drill) to get the rest and rust out from under the cornea.

It is feeling much better now but the plan for today will be to go buy arm loads of extra eye protection.

 

[Jeff]

I'm surprised your ER didn't have an eye burr. We use them a couple times a month.

 

[jakeb]

The ER DOC looked for one but couldn't find it.

 

[ptschram]

The Uvex Bionic faceshield is the nicest I've ever used. Well worth the price of admission.

When it happened tome, the eye doctor told me that three of the four surgeries he does each week are for folks who were wearing their safety glasses and often, a faceshield.

I was wearing safety glasses with side shields when it happened to me.

 

[pacsguy]

I feel your pain. I was out fertilizing the lawn one day.. and somehow I got a microscopic piece of fertilizer wedged onto the back of my upper eye lid. Every time I blinked it scraped my eye.

It was pretty terrible.. ended up going to the eye specialist and they had to flip my eye lid over (was actually pretty quick and easy) and then use a huge magnifying device to actually see the piece of fertilizer to remove it. Instant relief. Then I had to go on a bevy of meds to fight off infection and promote the healing because my eye was pretty scraped up.

 

[Slip_Kid]

Don't mess with the eyes, always were the safety glasses. I was using my weed trimmer a few weeks ago and a rock flew up and cracked my safety glasses. My kid said I look funny wearing those glasses. I showed him the crack in the glasses and told him "better to look funny and still have two good eyes".

 

[Professur]

The ER DOC looked for one but couldn't find it.

It's probably with your glasses.

 

[soob]

I feel your pain. I was out fertilizing the lawn one day.. and somehow I got a microscopic piece of fertilizer wedged onto the back of my upper eye lid. Every time I blinked it scraped my eye.

It was pretty terrible.. ended up going to the eye specialist and they had to flip my eye lid over (was actually pretty quick and easy) and then use a huge magnifying device to actually see the piece of fertilizer to remove it. Instant relief. Then I had to go on a bevy of meds to fight off infection and promote the healing because my eye was pretty scraped up.

Been there, done that. I was making bird cages, grinding the edges off cut wire. Got a fleck stuck in my eyelid, thought there was something horribly wrong with my eye.

I'm pretty sure I was actually wearing saftey glasses at the time, though.

Now a days I wear eyeglasses which causes me to be way overconfident as far as eye protection goes. Used to be you could get prescription safety glasses for about $30 at wally world--I should go do that.

 

[Jack Olsen]

+1 on the Uvex face shield. Smartest $30 you can spend.

 

[jeffmoss26]

First day of my new job (network admin for a manufacturing company) I was issued safety glasses for when I am in the plant. I wear them all the time, over my glasses, because you just never know! There is metal EVERYWHERE in this place.

 

[Lump]

+1 on the Uvex face shield. Smartest $30 you can spend.

Thanks for the pic, Jack. That is the most thoroughly-protective face shield I have ever seen!

For many years, I was often in too much of a hurry, or "too tough" to need such things. But now, at age 57, I have been through too many injuries and trauma. Stitches, emergency rooms, breathing toxins....enough of that stuff for me. Today I wear leather gloves, safety glasses, and even use breathing masks when I can. I'll get one of those facemasks.

Biggest problem for me is keeping face shields and goggles clear. It seems that they are magnetized to dust particles, even inside a cabinet. And if you are in a hurry and wipe off that dust...the scratches begin. Soon, you have to pull it off to see what you're working on.

What do you guys do to keep your face shields and safety glasses nice and clear?
My brother is a dirt bike racer, and some of his helmets use face shields with layers of clear plastic. When the spinning tires on the track in front of you splatter your mask with mud, you just peel off a layer and keep going. But that is way too expensive for a hobbyist shop, I think.

 

[Altec]

I always keep a pair of safety glasses on my head, or scattered around the shop. My eyes are **** magnets (pardon the crude words).

Gloves are nice too for some jobs.

Ear protection doesn't hurt either... Unless you want a constant ring In your ears like me.

 

[devildog101]

As a teenager i was cutting some metal pipe and ended up with a bunch of **** in my eye. The doc pulled about 8 pieces of metal from my eye and ended up getting the rust ground out. It was a weird feeling when they take the rust out. I don't know what was worst the **** in my eye or the **** my mom gave me for being stupid. I have been religious in wearing eye protection since. Ill have to check out that uvex shield, it looks pretty good.

 

[Frank The Plumber]

6 times so far, still vomit every time I see the eye surgeon.

 

[Sr. WiNdTeCh]

A little PSA Picture of a wire wheel accident.... I also have a picture of a guys Testicles coming out of his sack from a fall from a turbine while not wearing his harness correctly...

 

[Altec]

A little PSA Picture of a wire wheel accident.... I also have a picture of a guys Testicles coming out of his sack from a fall from a turbine while not wearing his harness correctly...

Thank God for Adblock Plus...

 

[greybeard]

Reminds me of the time I stabbed myself in the eye with a long handled screwdriver.

 

[StinkyBunny]

I ALWAYS wear eye protection, usually a full face shield when running the mill. I couldn't even begin to guess at the number of times it's saved my eyes. Here's what happens when a 6" wire brush equipped whiz wheel gets away from you.

 

[mooman]

The Uvex Bionic faceshield is the nicest I've ever used. Well worth the price of admission.

When it happened tome, the eye doctor told me that three of the four surgeries he does each week are for folks who were wearing their safety glasses and often, a faceshield.

I was wearing safety glasses with side shields when it happened to me.

They were most likely Work Comp cases and that's what they told the doctor they were wearing.

 

[devildog101]

I ALWAYS wear eye protection, usually a full face shield when running the mill. I couldn't even begin to guess at the number of times it's saved my eyes. Here's what happens when a 6" wire brush equipped whiz wheel gets away from you.

Ouch, Ouch, Ouch.

 

[s14kev]

Thanks guys. I just threw up.

 

[autoclassicnut]

I ALWAYS wear eye protection, usually a full face shield when running the mill. I couldn't even begin to guess at the number of times it's saved my eyes. Here's what happens when a 6" wire brush equipped whiz wheel gets away from you.

I'm wondering why anyone would not be wearing long pants and coveralls while using a wire wheel ( and of course safety glasses... come on man! ???

 

[Stuey]

A little PSA Picture of a wire wheel accident.... I also have a picture of a guys Testicles coming out of his sack from a fall from a turbine while not wearing his harness correctly...

OMG! Was all sight lost in that eye?

Also, everyone should remember that face shields are designed to be worn with secondary glasses or goggles.

 

[Camshaftcarb]

Then I had to go to an on call DO for him to use a needle and a eye bur (small diamond tipped drill) to get the rest and rust out from under the cornea.

Dang, jakeb, your nearly exact scenario happened to me about a year or two ago. I had just broken the tip off of a pick and needed to stick it in the grinder for just a split second then BANG. 1 ER trip, 4 or 5 eyeball grinds with the doctor's fancy Dremel for the next week equaled a lifelong lesson learned.

The ironic part is before that I'd always remembered an instructor from tech school telling us his similar eye horror story and the one time I didn't don the safety glasses I got F-ed in the A (well, the eye actually).

 

[Camshaftcarb]

One thing I don't understand is how the handful of jerkoffs at my shop who NEVER wear glasses (one guy even cuts with the torch whilst unprotected!) don't ever have a problem. You'd think that my experience would have taught them something or time would have caught up with them, but no. I still end up slapping the lube boys on the back of the head throwing safety glasses at them all the time.

 

[cortez]

One thing I don't understand is how the handful of jerkoffs at my shop who NEVER wear glasses (one guy even cuts with the torch whilst unprotected!) don't ever have a problem. You'd think that my experience would have taught them something or time would have caught up with them, but no. I still end up slapping the lube boys on the back of the head throwing safety glasses at them all the time.

I'm a contractor and hear about these "lucky" types. They are so lucky that we started to call them "roaches" in the 70's. The term has been adapted widely around here.

We called them roaches because it was widely reported that after a Thermonuclear war only roaches would survive.

I wish I had this "roach" type of luck!

 

[ncfh]

Added a new eye procedure to my collection today! Corneal laser surgery!

A transformer blew up at work yesterday morning, blew the glasses and helmet off my head. Escaped almost totally unscathed, or so I thought. Left eye was a little blurry, got worse, then got way worse. Something sliced a sideways Y shape into my cornea, about halfway through. The little flap of tissue made by the Y shape was driving my eye nuts, so they decided to shave it down with the laser and then cover it with a bandage contact lens.

Feels much better now. I got to see a little of the video of the procedure afterward, wow.

 

[Benji]

I was working with a guy who was grinding something on a loader with safety glasses with no side shields and I'll never forget looking in his eye to tell him abought the little peice of metal in it. Everyone needs a full face shield. He was allright after a trip to the ER to get it drilled out. If you keep your shield where you grind you will use it that's true in my case annyway.

 

[APEowner]

eye bur (small diamond tipped drill)

The eyeball die grinder! I'll be very happy if I never experience that again!

 

[ev2mopar]

I have been wearing safety glasses since my school days. Our shop teacher would fail you.instantly if you were in the shop with out them. I passed.
Even with safety's on, I have had eye injuries before...a bit of rust or dirt usually maneuvers itself around the "safety" part of my glasses and lands in the eye. Safety glasses wont completely eliminate, but rather greatly reduce injuries.
In my days as a firefighter, I witnessed many eye injuries during the "once in a while" moments of carelessness. ****, no one plans for it to happen. Someone conjured up Murphy's law for a reason.
Last and final babble...my father in law used to be a truck driver, cross country mostly. He managed to have many breakdowns and nearly as many injuries because of them. And thus, spent many an hour on his back fixing his rig to deliver his load before getting treatment. To this day, he has 50% vision in his "good" eye! He says he wishes he had worn safety glasses back then.

 

[Plombob]

I learned to wear eye protection from a tree surgeon we knew. He never wore safety glasses because they would fog up on him. Then one day he woke up with two detached retinas. This was back before they could fix that. The life changes he went through - losing his business and income was enough to convince me.

The thing that pisses me off the most, and to this day, was that some people would short change my friend. They'd give him singles and tell him they were fives or tens.

I was wearing glasses while using a Dremel cut-off disc. It shattered and cut a big gouge out of my glasses. Would have lost an eye. I'm not without them, especially now that I need reading glasses. I keep nagging the guys on the racing team too.

 

[toolfreak]

I worked with a mechanic this winter that was hitting a pin with a hammer. The pin had a piece of metal fly off and hit him in the eye. He was off work almost 6 months, if I understood it right they removed the lens on his eye and later reattached it. Last I heard, he has vision in that I again but it was a little blurry. I use to be horrible about not wearing glasses but over the last few years I have been better about it.

 

[Camshaftcarb]

Just my luck...

Yesterday I walked into a long piece of oak baseboard I had sticking out of the back of my truck at home. I somehow managed to land my eyeball perfectly on the piece of wood and ended up back at the ER. Same eyeball I injured years ago... <sigh>...

Vision is back to normal today, so far I've ended up with a mild "corneal abrasion" according to the ER doc. I guess I should just start wearing safety glasses all the time considering my right eye seems to be taking a beating.

 

[hickmlg09]

Thanks guys. I just threw up.

Me to! Lol.

 

[bartels_metal_works]

+1 on the Uvex face shield. Smartest $30 you can spend.

I have two of the Uvex Bionics, one with a clear lens and the other is a shade 5 lens. The shade 5 lens is a little pricey, but since I wear glasses, I prefer the shield over goggles.

 

[kyles974]

Back when I had employees, (first day) I would tell them this:

"this is your first and only warning, if I ever see you using the bench grinder/wire wheel with out saftys on, you will be fired, PERIOD."

"You can't argue with safety"

 

[yjWrangler]

Better wear that face mask when fishing too

 

[SeattleKent]

Wow. I read this and literally two minutes later was placing my order for the Uvex face shield on Amazon. Thanks for taking the time to warn and educate idiots like me.

 

[bmwpower]

OMG! Was all sight lost in that eye?

Also, everyone should remember that face shields are designed to be worn with secondary glasses or goggles.

Even the one Jack posted?

 

[G1GRANDEUR]

Damn it those pictures need to be removed.

Ones I had battery acid went into one of my eye. Still not wear safety glasses