Is being too comfortable with your power tools dangerous?

photo courtesy of -Snugg-

We recently blogged about some of the main ways we can get hurt using our power tools. One of those ways was inexperience and overconfidence. Here’s an example of what we mean. Click to see a photo of the guy’s hand (opens in a new window).

Sometimes you have an unpleasant day at work. This is a good example of that. I had been cutting metal pieces with a chop saw most of the day. I’m extremely comfortable with the chop saw. Then I had to change gears and switch to cutting panels of masonite and PVC on the portable table saw. Not my favorite, but I’m fairly competent with 1/8″ panels, especially when I have a spotter. Now when a 1/4″ piece came my way, I didn’t really think about the difference in thickness and just went about my business. That’s when the dang saw kicked back right as I was finishing the cut. Slammed the PVC into my hand, skidded up my arm, bounced off my shoulder and flew over me. Luckily, I was wearing gloves or this nasty swelling would probably be an exploded hand. It still makes me shudder when I look at this. Luckily, my hand is fine. Just severely bruised, with a little scar left on the tendon of the pointer finger. Don’t try this at home, kids…

Well, go ahead and try this at home, just hope that your table saw has a guard and you have more skills than I do!

Have fun with your power tools, do some great work with them, work efficiently, but please work safely.

(See also the Toolstop safety videos)

via toolstop.co.uk

Posted via web from Toolstop Power Tool Cook Book