Me verses the angle grinder

Subaman · Post by **Subaman** » Sat Aug 01, 2009 11:10 am

Approx 40 stitches later and doctors visits every second day, all is now ok. Somehow managed to miss all the important bits by mm, so no permanat damage, just a few nice scars.

Angle Grinder -1:)
Me - Nill

Cheers
Grant

subybrumby · Post by **subybrumby** » Sat Aug 01, 2009 11:39 am

oouuucchhhhh!

rafnics · Post by **rafnics** » Sat Aug 01, 2009 1:24 pm

what happened?
Any particular cautionary tale?
I know better, but still play a little loose with the angle grinder at times...

Subaman · Post by **Subaman** » Sat Aug 01, 2009 1:53 pm

Things are a little hazy as it litterally all happened in a split second so I can only guess as to exactly what happend, basically I was sitting under the work truck cutting throught the exhaust pipe using one of those micro blades, I had cut nearly all the way through when the exhaust pinched the blade, this inturn through the grinder straight into my lap( and cut the under side of my leg), as this was a little too close to the family jewels for comfort, natural reaction was to get it out of there real quick, all I can figure is I must have grabbed the out of control and still running grinder by the cord and this inturn allowed it to attack my arm. The stoopid part is I had my welding gloves out ready to wear like I normally do when griding but was interupted by a visitor before I had put them on, once the visitor left and running behind time I stoopidly got under the car and started grinding and forgot to put them on.

The dangerous thing with grinders is they continue running even when they leave your hand.

Cheers
Grant

rafnics · Post by **rafnics** » Sat Aug 01, 2009 3:53 pm

Got as far as "one of those micro blades" and a shiver went right through me...

You're gonna have some high quality scars there!

I was on a mine in Qld a few years back and on the safety notice board they had an alert about an incident that had happened somewhere - mostly a picture of a full face clear mask with half a grinding blade embedded in it. Just broke by some freak bad luck apparently - and the guy using it was fine - thanks to a thirty dollar mask.

shuffbag · Post by **shuffbag** » Sat Aug 01, 2009 6:18 pm

yeah grinders, prob the most scary of the home power tools.
just the other day a brand new grinding disk exploded on me as soon as it touched the metal. sent crap flying every where, my reaction was to throw the grinder down. luckily the trigger wasn't locked on.

Post by **TOONGA** » Sat Aug 01, 2009 7:06 pm

ouch that first one looks like a shark got ahold of your arm

I hate how the wound is also a burn at the same time Ive been nicked afew times but never that bad

TOONGA

AlpineRaven · Post by **AlpineRaven** » Sat Aug 01, 2009 7:43 pm

shit me.... oh gee... I use angle grinders nearly everyday and the one i use (both 120mm & 230mm you have to hold the button down, if you let it go it stops so its a better feeling) but ouch...

I still reckon chainsaws & circler saws are the worst for my point of view..
Cheers
AP

rtcb65 · Post by **rtcb65** » Sat Aug 01, 2009 9:29 pm

Holy crap, that is starting to make me think of different ways of taking paint off the cars. When using a tool for long periods of time , it is so easy to become complacent and forget about the dangers they can course.

Xtreme_RX · Post by **Xtreme_RX** » Sat Aug 01, 2009 9:32 pm

Seen thoes photos somewhere before......

Hope your healing well...

tony · Post by **tony** » Sat Aug 01, 2009 11:25 pm

makes ya fink don't it.
I am always buffing skin off at least the angle grinder is not as bad as a saw blade.
the ones that really terrify me are those wood grinding things, those blades would tear a lot of skin off.
I once ran a 9" drop saw through my knee cap, I use it for cutting steel and wood, and the hot steel had weakened the return spring on the saw guard, I was cutting firewood and my wife distracted me, I let go of the trigger and the blade was winding down and i let it catch my trouser leg, it went through the trouser leg and dragged down across my kneecap.
Sat in the emergency ward at the hospital for about 5 hours with this huge gash and blood everywhere while the nurses looked after the footballers and sports people with sprained ankles and sore fingers. I think they get priority because of the status of sports.
the burn from angles grinder blades is really painful, like oxy burns.

D3V1L · Post by **D3V1L** » Sun Aug 02, 2009 1:07 am

your a very lucky man. recently at my work, one of the fabricators had a slim 4" cutting disk shatter on him,,, it exploded and went straight through his right arm. through the bone AND the artery.

me and a collegue raced him to hospital where he spent all night in microsurgery, putting his arm back together. we are actually still waiting to see if his body is now going to reject the rest of his limb.

you lucky very lucky, and i hope u bought a lotto ticket..lol

dave

Subaman · Post by **Subaman** » Sun Aug 02, 2009 9:25 am

Every time I visited the doctor, both he and the nurses were forever telling me how lucky I was, (I was feeling pretty unlucky myself), however after reading that last post I see why they kept saying that. This accident certainly wont stop me from using a grinder again, but I will definately treat it with a lot more respect now thats for sure. You only have to do a quick search for " grinder accidents" in google images to see how dangerous these things really are.

Cheers
Grant

YouTube · Post by **El_Freddo** » Tue Aug 04, 2009 12:50 pm

Shit man! This reminds me of my two grinder incidents - one of them I some how cut into my left index finger's "middle" knuckle a few mm, resulted in 3 stitches.

The other one was when I was cutting a grove in a clutch pedal for a new cable to fit, I had the grinder with one hand, bent knee with my other hand supporting my weight so I could see how the cut was going. The grinder (and thankfully it was a grinding disc, not a cutting disc) wedged in the groove and spat itself out at my face where the disc touch me across my mouth, at that point i'd reached and pulled the grinder away from me. I felt like I'd sliced open my lips top and bottom. After running to the house and viewing in a mirror I was very lucky - I had grazed my upper lip, chin and had a deep graze just under my lower lip - this has now scarred, I probabily should have got stitches but I didn't go to casualty and now sport a larger scar than I would've had if I got stitches...

I still use a gringer but with two hands when I can, and I remind myself of this incident when I can only use one.

Cheers

Bennie

AndrewT · Post by **AndrewT** » Tue Aug 04, 2009 1:29 pm

Wow a narrow escape indeed. Unlucky it happened, lucky it wasn't worse.
ElFreddo that is very scary, it came at your face!
I havn't had any incidents with the grinder like that but occasionally it has grabbed etc. Over the last year or so I've had huuge amounts of use out of my various grinders. From doing up my house to all the bits and pieces of monsterwagon, I've done heaps of grinding. This thread makes me think, I'll be alot more careful myself from now on anyway.

vincentvega · Post by **vincentvega** » Tue Aug 04, 2009 2:42 pm

Not that I own one.. but i reckon a full face shield is the only way to go when using a grinder.

I have been lucky with the grinder, but did have a dremel cutting wheel explode and hit me in the face once. that was bad enough..

rubisubi · Post by **rubisubi** » Tue Aug 04, 2009 2:54 pm

Dude those scars are gonna look awsome, well ya gotta look at the positives

Subaman · Post by **Subaman** » Tue Aug 04, 2009 6:36 pm

They are more dangerous than most people think, luckily I lasted 40 years before my first incident, hopefully I will make another 40, my brother in law had a disc explode on himself, cut him from the bottom of his nose, straight down and through the top lip, another mate of mine was using a larger one at work one day for cutting concrete and had it kick back and cut right through tendons in his arm etc, which resulted in 6 months out of work, I have and use a full face mask 99% of the time, some jobs it is just a pain in the arse so then I atleast wear goggles.

Cheers
Grant