Over the top saftey advice

[jugs]

post 12

Frank Carson "It's the way I tell 'em!"



I've had (much more than) my say on the topic!

Bawjaws evidently read everyone's responses and drew his own conclusions - ones I happen to agree with including his realistic assessment of how he will end up using his shiny new PPE. I wouldn't do that, but he knows exactly the risks he's running.

We inhabit this weird Forum-Land where very few of us actually know each other. We have to make judgements about each other based on our responses to issues that are somewhat specialised and not everyday common sense ones. We don't have the benefit of face to face conversations.

If the manner in which I responded has offended then I apologise unreservedly.

If the intent offended, then I do not, and perhaps should retreat to just lurking in the Brew Room.



'nuff said?

Now don't get started on underqualified inexperienced jobs'-worth HSE Inspectors who have never untaken a real world task, or I'll tell you tale of the Sea Empress!

Since the politicians in the 1980s decided to stop manufacturing & move to the “safer & more lucrative” banking & service industries, training has stopped, At the same time much more potentially dangerous equipment is available to a larger diy market, recipe for disaster or what ?

You can’t expect people who work on a keyboard all day to be aware of the dangers before it’s too late, so I feel it’s up to us to try & pass on some of the survival techniques we have learned thro experience.
I’ve seen too many dead & injured, mainly thro stupidity (it wont happen to me / I thought it would be ok for a min).

To do something silly or dangerous out of ignorance is forgivable, BUT to do the same thing, knowing the dangers, is IMO, stupid & irresponsible and could be seen as criminally negligent, particularly if the action involves someone else.

Trouble is we now live in a world where the stupid can’t be told they are, as it may hurt their feelings & criminals are treated better than their victims. Even on this site if you criticise foolish or criminal behaviour you can be moderated (which is why I don’t bother to participate as much now)

Personal Protection Equipment is exactly that – Personal, use it & be safe or don’t & suffer the consequences.

I remember a sign near a works entrance “The person below is responsible for your safety today” over a mirror. How true.

Now - Tell us the tale of the Sea Empress

 

[Jake SS]

The following 3 posts moved from danger sip mods thread
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The forum seems to have taken on a bit of a holier-than-thou attitude recently. First there was George's thread about wiring, then the safety specs and now this.

At no point am I going to claim safety is unimportant. That would be idiotic but it does appear that there is a lot of advice being meted out that I wouldn't expect most people to follow themselves.

Previous to George's thread I can remember several on the topic of wiring in a plug in the garage for a welder and no one complained back then. Hell, how many of us haven't wired in a socket, light or an extension for the shed or garage? But suddenly it's bordering on a life sentence for George to wire up his plug! For something this simple we take the best advice available with regards to how to do it an get on with it.

The next thing I know there's a barrage of advice queuing up to tell me my safety specs are inadequate and I shouldn't so much as look at a grinder without a full face mask. Now I'm no Civil Servant with half the alphabet after my name and qualifications coming out of my ears but surely specs are better than nought? And surely for all but the most intensive grinding and other specific applications specs are going to be good enough? How many of us are following the advice we so vehemently give others? Who can honestly say they've worn a face mask every single time they've picked up a grinder for 2 seconds grinding? I can't. And even having had rust removed from my eye I can't say I won't do it again either because in all likelihood, I will!

So now we come to the welder. Yes I can see that grommets would be a good plan and MKs mention of eddy currents makes sense (though at the power levels indicated this seems like a bit of overkill). It even makes sense to keep all live components to one side of the welder but all this talk of immediate action and frying the next door's kids is a bit premature, don't you think. There is no evidence that these modifications have caused any issues. Who hasn't tinkered with some bit of kit either for convenience or to make it work again with the result that it's probably not as safe as it once was? You know, sticking in a slightly bigger fuse 'cos you're ****** off it keeps blowing.

I guess what I'm trying to say is none of us are perfect. We should certainly continue to give good, safe advice but we should try not to go overboard on the legalities etc. In most cases a good dose of common sense is all that's needed to keep us on the straight and narrow.

I suppose I should say that the above represents my humble opinion! Hopefully no one will take exception to me expressing it...

"So now we come to the welder. Yes I can see that grommets would be a good plan and MKs mention of eddy currents makes sense (though at the power levels indicated this seems like a bit of overkill). It even makes sense to keep all live components to one side of the welder but all this talk of immediate action and frying the next door's kids is a bit premature, don't you think. There is no evidence that these modifications have caused any issues. Who hasn't tinkered with some bit of kit either for convenience or to make it work again with the result that it's probably not as safe as it once was? You know, sticking in a slightly bigger fuse 'cos you're ****** off it keeps blowing."

I agree and disagree. There may well be no evidence yet, so do we wait for something to happen and then rectify the problem or change it now so there is no chance of it happening? All that I have stated elsewhere is true. I have seen these incidents actually occur. I dont make statements just to upset people. People have worried too much about what I have said rather than the serious dangers involved. I dont care if someone says "Jake you are out of line, but yes I can see there is a safety concern, and lets fix it" but no there was not one person that was the slightest bit interested in the safety factor, I find that astonishing, blind freddy would see that there was a problem. It is an easy fix.

I make no apologies to anyone for what I have said elsewhere, also would do it again if I see something as serious as that, maybe not so much of the truth as to what could happen, wouldnt want to frighten anyone too much, sometimes you need a hammer to get your point across.

Common sense should have prevailed but I could not see any.
Which is what everything boils down to.

We have a department over here called "Workcover" who are a law unto themselves, they can walk into any building anywhere anytime and check everything that is in there whether it be electrical, gas, furniture, slings, forklifts, you name it they can check it, now they may know f...all about what they are checking but they can close your doors and severe fines until the "problem" in there eyes is fixed. You cant even argue the point with them, they are hated by everyone, including myself. I also hate lawyers and people that want to sue you for spilling hot coffee over them.

"let common sense prevail"

Cheers

Jake

 

[Archie]

Hi Jugs. Your presence (humour) has been sorely missed!! There's little point going over old ground but re moderation, the reason for that was not so much for the criticisms expressed but the manner in which they were expressed. I (and others) made a couple of comments on said issue which, on reflection, really were not in the least helpful.

Jake, I'm not disagreeing with your suggested modifications. They all made perfect sense (though I maintain the issue of eddy currents is unlikely to have much importance in this case). Perhaps the reason I chose to comment was the recent rash of somewhat zealous safety-related posts of which yours was the latest. I agree that for anyone attempting the mods in the future it would be wise to install grommets and keep all electricals to one side of the machine. These are simple measures that make the mods safer. As for measuring voltages all over the place before and after, well for the relative size of the mod that seems like overkill to me. You're welcome to suggest it and people are welcome to follow your advice but it seems like the equivalent of recalculating all the wiring in your house when you're just adding one plug (and no one comment on the potential legality/illegality of this, please! ). There's an inherent safety factor in all designs that should allow for small alterations to be made quite safely.

I guess it all comes down to what we each view as an acceptable risk....

 

[Pete.]

Get this, my sister in law is a civil engineer, she's being involved in many large projects including renovating Austria's railway stations and boring of the tunnel at CERN. In europe you are only an engineer when you have a degree and the correct training. Same with any job, you are only a welder when you possess the correct qualfactions. She come to this country and they want a full written procedure for pouring concrete! Her answer was 'these are correctly trained personel, they know how to do their job, stop wasting my time with this rubbish'.

Good point that, we use 'use of trained and experienced operatives' a lot at work as risk-reducing measures in our risk assessments but a lot of main contractors frown upon it. Some say it should not be used at all.

 

[Tungsten Sharpener]

You need a certain amount of knowledge to make a decision, people die because they do not have that information. If asked for advice with regards to H&S the only responce are the formal procedures which assume no knowledge.

I have seen electrical fires caused by sloppy work.

I have had to rescue a bloke from a boiler casing because he knew better than to take an escape set with him.

I have........................................................

On and on

OTT safety advice does not exist.

TS

 

[Weldingartisan]

How many times have traffic cops said 'if you had seen some of the incidents I've seen......' Of course they've seen a lot of incidents - it's their job - the same as all the other emergency services. It doesn't make the risk any greater. I've seen a lot of dodgy welding in my time, because I'm a welder (and no I wasn't responsible for all of 'em!).
Archie, you are spot on mate. W/A

 

[Glyn]

Can someone do a risk assessment on this for me please?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cgAThGrCV4A

 

[malcolm]

The people in companies who are made responsible for safety can't be expected to know everything about the subject so they tend to play it safe - that can make them irritating to people who do have the knowledge and experience to carry out the job.

Enforcement is another issue. If H&S really wanted to make a difference they would offer a free site visits where a friendly person would pop in from time to time and offer friendly advice, rather than have the same guy visit as an inspector carrying a nasty letter. I suspect they don't work this was because of a risk of moving liability from the companies to themselves.

Onto the forum, folk are keen to do things well. The original point raised was about a "holier than thou" approach. This might arise when people recognise the lack of knowledge and start calling people stupid. It could also arise when the letter of the law is laid down in capital letters and bold (like the H&S inspector rather than the helpful H&S chap). Worse still when others jump on the bandwagon and repeat the same point again and again until the thread is finally dead and the original poster has gone away to do his own thing.

It is for that reason we decided not to have a dedicated safety section on the forum. As a forum we don't seem to have found a way of discussing the information without everyone becoming upset.

We have the chance on the forum to help people out in a friendly and constructive way, and seem to manage this well in other respects. Most will offer safety advice in the same spirit, and safety advise offered in that spirit is much more likely to be accepted and debated for everyone's benefit than the letter of the law posts which people will not respond to for fear of a safety troll flame war.

That's my thought anyway. It's how I feel learning and information will be passed on with a higher success rate, and that fits with my motivation for the forum. It would be interesting to hear views on what other approaches people feel might work better.

 

[TechnicAl]

I think the HSE people are stretched, there simply isnt enough of them so they dont have time to be proactive.

http://www.hse.gov.uk/welding/index.htm

I think with welding the main hazard is the fume. Keep your head out of the fume. Remember mild steel fume is bad, stainless is worse and galvanised will make you ill, short term.

 

[Jake SS]

Think I will stay out of this thread, dont want to upset anyone
Cheers
Jake

 

[Tungsten Sharpener]

No danger at all mate, tis a con. Do you really think that you can plug a cable into the mains and put it under water whilst holding bare connectors.....even chinese electrickery hurts lol

TS

 

[Wozzaaah]

I assume that's in reply to Glyn's youtube post TS.
We had a thread about those welders on here a while ago, someone noticed they were for sale on ebay!

 

[madkayaker]

there was a thread on here about them

 

[Wozzaaah]

We had a thread about those welders on here a while ago

there was a thread on here about them

Come on MK, you're only Freddy Fivefingers today, catch up lad!

 

[madkayaker]

its because I'm at work with a slower PC and half asleep

 

[simon718]

 

[Archie]

I'm warning you, you two...

 

[Wozzaaah]

It's ok Archie, I think they'd got a bit lost so I moved them back into Sparkey's boudoir .

 

[snowcat]

Come on MK, you're only Freddy Fivefingers today, catch up lad!

does he "enforce" sorry moderate too then?

 

[madkayaker]