Safety safety safety........can't be stressed enough.

[Leigh Betsch]

I have to believe that the safety policies were pretty week. No one would ever be allowed to run machine shop equipment alone at the place I work. I do in my home shop like most of you I'm sure, but I'd be fired if I ever did it at work.

[Steve Ryan]

Sorry to dig this back up. My Mazak rep told a sim story to me. In that case the operator was not hurt but the hydraulic chuck actuator was completly wasted by the bar $$$. Sad thing but Mazatrol programs have a max rpm input on the first line of each program. I run 6' bars a lot in my SQT, but they are supported by a very stout spindle liner extension, and max rpm limits.

Another lathe safety thing that might not be obvious to everyone is the danger of stock sticking out the back of a lathe. I had a 1" brass bar sticking out of the back of my manual lathe a couple feet once and everything was fine when I was turning it until it suddenly bent at 90 degrees, and the whole lathe hopped across the room like an out of balance washing machine. If anyone happened to be near it, it could have been very bad.

When the Mazak people installed my CNC lathe, they were quite insistent that I NEVER stick stock out the back of the CNC. They relayed a story where someone was holding a bar centered while it was being cut, but they failed to take into account that the lathe automatically compensated for cutting speed, so while a bar was being faced, the RPMs quickly climbed to 7000 rpms as the cutter neared the center of the bar. Needless to say, the person holding the bar was cut in half by the bar which started flailing about.

[Ronald Blue]

It certainly sounds like training or a lack of was involved here. However even with training a moment of carelessness can be disastrous. Rotating equipment can be dangerous whether it a lathe, drill press, a pto shaft on a tractor, or the chuck on a hand held drill. Never assume it can't happen to you. I would never without knowing more assume this was caused from a lack of common sense or street smarts. We will never know exactly what happened most likely but it could be as simple as something falling in the tray and she reached for it without thinking of the danger. Sometimes we react by reflex like clamping your legs together to keep something from falling off your lap. If it happens to be a sharp object you may regret that. Long hair, loose clothing, and gloves can all be recipes for disastrous results.

[Dan Hintz]

Sometimes we react by reflex like clamping your legs together to keep something from falling off your lap. If it happens to be a sharp object you may regret that.

I've found that if I prepare myself mentally for what might happen, I react appropriately. For example, if I have my cell phone in hand and drop it, I immediately react by throwing my leg out at an angle... if I'm lucky, the phone rolls down my leg and it's saved form the worst of damage. If I'm holding a knife, a drop causes a reaction that gets my legs as far away from the knife's path as possible. The "danger of bodily harm" aspect of whatever I'm working with puts me into one of those two modes of reaction.

That said, it doesn't prevent me from doing stupid stuff from time to time, where reaction is irrelevant. For example, during my high school years I was attempting a build of Shakespeare's The Globe theater out of balsa. To cut a column deep inside the theater, I had to push against the column with my thumb while using my fingers to push the knife through it... needless to say, when the column finally gave way, the blade was headed straight for my thumb. Yeah, didn't come out of that one unscathed, and to this day have a ridge in my thumbprint from where the blade entered and hit bone. Lack of reaction time meant there was nothing I could do.