Why you don’t wear gloves with rotating machinery

[minimutly]

Is this what you mean by "a changed personality?"

Sorry, should read my tripe before posting. Fixed it.

 

[mike os]

One of the first lessons in machine use… there is a reason you don’t wear gloves, loose clothing or jewellery …

 

[Parm]

I know two people in the pto club. Neighbours daughter’s boyfriend running a potato or something mangle, unguarded pto, caught his overalls, pulled him in. He went round a few times before someone stopped it. Survived with multiple fractures and a changed personality. Speaking to him about it, he reckoned he could hear (as well as feel) his bones breaking.
Alastair Dent, local pub landlord (and Midget/ Cooper 500 racer), when he was younger, leant off the back of the tractor to adjust the linkage, jumper caught, pulled him out of the seat. Made a mess of him, but he survived.
Lastly, one guy up the road, pto to the slurry tanker caught his jumper, ripped his arm off and threw it into the slurry pit....

I’m aware of an accident where a farmer got mangled up in a potato harvester. He was found after several hours

 

[Ali]

Workplaces I have no quibble with, it’s the schools situation I was talking specifically about. The case in point I think highlights just how dangerous machines like this are, and I can well understand why schools have gone away from allowing pupils access.

I wouldn’t hesitate for a moment if my kids wanted to use my gear under my supervision - I’m not entirely sure I’d be happy about them using them in a school environment if the opportunity ever arose.

The guarding is pretty good on any high risk machines in schools these days and most lean towards either a low powered machine (Boxford size) or a fully enclosed CNC unit anyway.

 

[mtt.tr]

I know of a guy that used a ratchet to pivot a motor up to remove the driver belt.

The rachet slipped and he trapped his hand with his mobile out of reach, think it was 45mins till he was found. Nothing major just the pain and embarrassment

 

[8ob]

I’m aware of an accident where a farmer got mangled up in a potato harvester. He was found after several hours

Chips for him then Parmster

On a serious note, how can anyone be stopped from breaching basic safe working practices, especially when they are no longer with us.

Bob

 

[Parm]

Chips for him then Parmster

On a serious note, how can anyone be stopped from breaching basic safe working practices, especially when they are no longer with us.

Bob

It happened right next to the poultry farm ......

it requires monitorin. If you know you have numpties on site they require even more monitoring.

 

[addjunkie]

There again I’ve experienced elf n safety trying to force me into wearing gloves on a lathe because gloves must be worn whilst working..

and this is a prime example of where site blanket policies fail. I too have been through this argument!

 

[8ob]

It happened right next to the poultry farm ......

it requires monitorin. If you know you have numpties on site they require even more monitoring.

There is the problem, it`s occasionally only brought to the powers that be attention after a fatality/serious injury. You can talk to them all you like after the damage is done and it makes no difference, nor could a difference have been made.

Bob

 

[Parm]

There is the problem, it`s occasionally only brought to the powers that be attention after a fatality/serious injury. You can talk to them all you like after the damage is done and it makes no difference, nor could a difference have been made.

Bob

It should happen before any accident, requires an ear to the ground in old fashioned parlance

All to often we hear that folk knew Joe Bloggs always did it like that ....

H&S isnt a bunch of paperwork, it’s a system and culture where the documents record the decisions

 

[jimbo84]

Probably not only the fines but the realisation that rotating machinery is actually dangerous. To be honest if I was headmaster I don’t think I would have a lathe anywhere near my school, I’m sure that sounds very nanny state but when you see things like this then you can maybe have a bit of sympathy for them?

What happened 30 years ago and was ok then isn’t really acceptable now. Could you imagine the uproar if this happened to a 14-15 year old kid in a classroom? You can say there’s a loss of skills but I’ll be honest I never touched a lathe/milling machine until my apprenticeship and while I’m certainly no machinist i don’t think it exactly hampered me during my training.

Now colleges, where you have more mature (maybe debatable?) students and possibly more supervision is a different matter.

it's a difficult one, you don't want to knowingly put anyone in danger, child or otherwise, but at the same time we're running out of cotton wool to wrap everything in? which is worse, making everyone scared of anything that has a danger to it, or educating them correctly so they have a healthy respect for it and can evaluate for themselves the potential dangers, because at some point everything can become dangerous.... You can only create so many procedures and signs etc, at somepoint they'll be left un chaperoned, I'd prefer someone who's aware that they're dangerous, but have to be used correctly...

No way would I say the old ways were better, far from it, but we're supposedly an intelligent race and capable of learning from errors, yet we default to stopping everything, because it's easier... I'm more for the education side than the avoiding everything, but agreed there's some that should never be allowed anywhere near anything dangerous ever... the difficulty is finding that line of what's enough, and what's too much.... your idea of mature is good, but how do you define that, age? mental ability? It's different in everyone, left to the judgement of the teacher / instructor etc, could be a good option, but what about the rest, sorry mate you're just not up to it yet, come back next year?..... not so easy to define, or put in place...

Sadly there is no answer, your damned if you do, and damned if you don't, but if you stop them doing everything that's ok, because they're safe? your right I'm sympathetic to the education syystem, they get crapped on from all sides, but if the default answer is where's the cotton wool again, I can't see how we'll ever move forward.........
Again, stopping everything and procedures etc, don't seem to work either, there's still accidents....maybe less, but any is too many, so what's the answer???

difficult one indeed.....

Remember being let loose on lathes at school with virtually no supervision and only very basic instruction. They were big machines as I remember. I remember a lot of tom foolery in the class. Luckily myself nor any of my class mates were injured. When I think back it could very easily have been different.

With today's lack of common sense and the (very sweeping here) general blame culture and stupidity of a lot of people I would not like to be the guy signing off on anything to do with machinery that could easily seriously injure a student.

 

[Kayos]

There is the problem, it`s occasionally only brought to the powers that be attention after a fatality/serious injury. You can talk to them all you like after the damage is done and it makes no difference, nor could a difference have been made.

Bob

I disagree with that, a decent firm knows what is going on

 

[8ob]

I disagree with that, a decent firm knows what is going on

They may well do but you cant watch all of them all of the time. Going back to the original post about getting a hand ripped off, there is no way in the world that company could have anticipated the guy would do what he did, I dont see how they could possibly be liable. Its like that tractor driver throwing himself in the potato machine, short of having sombody employed to look over the shoulder of every working man there is no way of stopping random indiscretions. You can learn from these and adjust working practices but as the saying goes , make something idiot proof and along comes a better idiot. Then another paragraph gets added to the gazzillion page HSE references.

Bob

 

[pressbrake1]

They may well do but you cant watch all of them all of the time. Going back to the original post about getting a hand ripped off, there is no way in the world that company could have anticipated the guy would do what he did, I dont see how they could possibly be liable. Its like that tractor driver throwing himself in the potato machine, short of having sombody employed to look over the shoulder of every working man there is no way of stopping random indiscretions. You can learn from these and adjust working practices but as the saying goes , make something idiot proof and along comes a better idiot. Then another paragraph gets added to the gazzillion page HSE references.

Bob

That was my original point, a person who actually did know better made a mistake of judgment or had been getting away with it for years like our Japanese friend. We will never know
Having been a machineshop foreman I’ve never encountered anyone daft enough to wear gloves in the machine shop but I’ve found welders are prone to it but watching everyone is a nightmare

Now if it had been a case like I encountered where he had been told to wear gloves or get off site that’s another level where company is at fault

 

[daleyd]

I’m guessing it’s because the procedures they did have in place were deemed inadequate in this instance? If they were up to scratch then they wouldn’t have got fined, as they had done everything they practically could to stop it

If he managed to do it despite having proper procedures in place then there would be little/no come back on the company.

Without knowing the exact circumstances it would be impossible to say whether having proper procedures in place would have stopped it or not - but the fact they appeared to be a bit shoddy leaves the company wide open.

 

[8ob]

You could train ten guys on how to use a hammer and bolster, if you set them all off knocking holes in walls I could guarantee one of them will bludgeon their hand.

Bob

 

[sako243]

I could guarantee the ones that did work will bludgeon their hand

Fixed that for you

 

[brightspark]

You could train ten guys on how to use a hammer and bolster, if you set them all off knocking holes in walls I could guarantee one of them will bludgeon their hand.

Bob

never hit your hand havent we wish i had a quid every time i wish id been wearing a glove when it happens

 

[Pete.]

The main point is that because everyone on the tools has different levels of competence and risk-awareness you can't leave it up to the individual to decide what's safe and what isn't. You can TELL people what's safe and what isn't but when that person decides that they know better/couldn't give a damn/doesn't like you so deliberately does the opposite/comes into work ****** etc and tears a limb off how are you going to prove you did that except for play a game of he said/she said.

That's the basis of H&S law and your defence to it - proving that you did what you were supposed to do and told people how to do their job safely. The only way of doing that is to have it written down.

Ibstock had no defence. Using emery on a lathe is a well-known hazard as is loose clothing and long hair. Many people killed or maimed and plenty of video examples on the net. If it's one of those things that 'everyone knows' then then there's no excuse for not considering it in a risk assessment.

 

[redlig]

Its going to get to the point where machine operators have to sign declarations stating they fully understand the consequences of machinery misuse/bad working practice and accept full liability for the injuries/damages to themselves or others incurred by said malpractice.

Bob

Problem with that is that come the day it probably wouldn't stand up in court against a good solicitor.