Looks painful -- I hope you heal quickly and fully!

There are some good ideas above on general grinder safety -- let me add a few more...

Get into the habit of holding the grinder out away from you until the wheel comes up to speed, so that if the wheel were to come apart from centrifugal force (usually from a crack resulting from being dropped or otherwise grossly abused), you are out of the line of fire when the pieces fly out away from the spindle. Wheels generally only let go upon startup or if they dig in and bind.

Always check yourself for loose ends (can be long hair, scarves, loose sleeves, untied laces, etc.) before starting the motor. Any of these things can easily get sucked into the the grinder and wound up around the shaft, pulling you into the spinning wheel or vice versa. You short-haired folks may have less of a problem with that, but I am a hippy. <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/pfft.gif" alt="" />

There are two main trouble zones on a grinder:
* the sparks exhaust out one side of the guard
* friction against the rotating wheel pushes the grinder opposite the sparks
Keep both clear of body parts, obviously, but keep the former clear of flammables or windshields/painted surfaces which can be pitted/scratched/broken by flying metal. Perhaps less obvious, plan around the latter, as well, as that's the direction the grinder body will be deflected first if the blade digs in and jams (and keep ricochets in mind).

Don't even get me started on wire cup brush safety... I'm not certain such a thing exists without a full set of thick shop leather, and have simply resigned myself to extracting strands of wire from myself afterwards.

Randii

Fab shops are dangerous. Nothing to be taken lightly.

I'm glad i bought 1 thing from Harbor Freight though:


My new auto darkening welding helmet for just $50 they usually go for a lot more and i know someone who has one and said it works great. i'm even more glad about it cuz since it's not dark til you weld i can use it as a safety mask from now on too! It was a better investment than i thought. figured i put this up here incase anyone wants to go this rout instead. They are not 100% clear but you can see through when not welding. Should get mine in the mail any day now.

* LINK *

That's a whole lot less than I've ever seen one!


<img src="/forums/images/graemlins/cheers.gif" alt="" />
<img src="/forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

I would not use one of those for anything but welding. Grinding sparks set it off I tried a few times. It is awkward because your perception is so fuzzy and you look through such a tiny window. I have one, great helmet for the price and works great. Better than nothing for protection but the plastic face sheilds are so cheap anyways.

Do you have acess to a tool truck ?
I bought the same Uvex Bionic face Shield about 3 weeks ago from the Cornwell Tool guy.
I just called the guy I got it from and he has two on his truck they are a little over $30.00. I would be glad to send you one if you are interested.
Let me know.

I bought that exact helmet for a buddy of mine for a birthday present back in July. He used it quite a bit(works at Midas making exhausts) for 3 months.

He has to wear glasses now, because the helmet does not switch over fast enough to be safe. You may not notice it, but if you would talk to him and see how he has too squint to see anything, you would not use that helmet. Its pretty sad, and i feel really bad for basically ruining his eye sight.

I also bought a UVEX faceshield after all the face cutting. I got an extra number 5 shade shield insert for torching and plasma cutting.

Be careful with that welding helmet!!!

Peace

Joel

That's odd.

When I bought my helmet a couple of years ago, I did some
pretty extensive research on the helmets.
I compared several of the high dollar ($250+) helmets
along side of a couple of the harbor freight helmets and
I ended up going with harbor freight.
They darkening time for the harbor freight helmets
were MUCH faster than any of the high dollar helmets.
Without going back and looking, I think the expensive helmets were in the thousanths of a second delay and
harbors helmets were in the nanoseconds.

I've got a Lincoln helmet and a Harbor helmet and the Harbor
blows it away.

I think the problem was more likely that he is a constant
welder and those delay times add up over a period of time.
If you are a hobby welder or only weld on occassion, I think
the harbor or any other auto darkening helmet is ok.
But doing it day in and day out, I'd probably go with a
standard static dark helmet.

I'm sure that regardless of how often you weld, it will eventually add up over a lifetime. I was thinking of getting an auto darkening helmet when I first started, then decided not to for the above reason -- that and it wouldn't have made my welds better anyways.

I picked up a full face sheild because of this thread. My Dewalt cut off wheels frag just like my HF ones, can't tell any difference in performance otherwise.

All auto darkening helmets have UV protection before they darken. And they make a lot easier to start a weld right where you want to. I like my HF helmet.