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Up Topic Welding Industry / Welding Safety / When will it end?
- - By ctacker (****) Date 06-06-2008 03:30
I believe in having a safe place to work but sometimes find it ridiculously hard to do a simple task because of the bureaucratic B.S. that is chasing american corporations to third world countries. for instance, today we were told we can no longer use any type of scissor lifts because of pinch points (a fold out ladder has pinch points also,how long before we cannot use them either?). we cannot use gloves when operating a bench type belt sander to sharpen tungsten for GTAW or do any sanding. (I dont know how many times gloves saved my hands when my hand slipped and brushed the sander,besides, metal gets hot when you sand it) when I heard that i asked the safety coordinater to hold the hot part while I took off my glove(think he would?)

We work in a dangerous environment and common sense should prevail, you can get hurt any way imaginable. soon our shears,punches,drills, press brakes and any other tool will be obsolete because it can hurt you.

If we are required to follow the "rules" , any country that trades with us should be required to follow the same rules, or they dont trade with us. simple as that.

I could go on & on but I won't. just need to vent a little. thanks for the place to do it!   
Parent - By RANDER (***) Date 06-06-2008 06:38
Where I currently work we have signs warning us not to walk under piping.  ITS a REFINERY!!       YEs I get it ---- keep your eyes open.   Yes common sense should prevail but in todays world people sue over a bumped head or a stubbed toe. 
Parent - By bozaktwo1 (***) Date 06-06-2008 17:00
Unfortunately, every one of those seemingly ridiculous restrictions is written in blood.  As the safety manager here, I have to deal with compliance in ways I never thought of, and it is crazy.  The whole thing is run by lawyers, for lawyers.  When you apply for a safety professional position anywhere, they want you to have a dang college degree so they know you can read lawyerese.  99% of safety is common sense, and can be enforced with nothing more than a little shove now and then.  However in this world it's probably better to have OSHA than not; just look at industry through the last half of the 19th century to see why.
Parent - By jrw159 (*****) Date 06-06-2008 18:50
It will never end, my good friend. :-)

Safety will not be going away anytime soon.

jrw159
Parent - - By jwright650 (*****) Date 06-06-2008 19:03
Safety isn't nearly as big of a hinderance to general industry as is the global warming hoax.....I hear of legislation working it's way through in the Washington Statepark Service prohibiting a camper from having a campfire due to the carbon emissions from these fires causing all of the global warming.

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/366025_bonfire06.html?source=mypi
Parent - - By js55 (*****) Date 06-23-2008 20:08
John,
30 years ago it was Global Cooling. Now its warming. Its not that they can't make up their mind or are having trouble interpreting the data. Its whatever works best to convince the 'garbanzos' they need to take more of our money to fix it. Oh, and the fact that the great majority of these garbanzos buying into it weren't old enough to be politically aware during the global cooling scare. Show em a few polar bears takin a swim and a few glaciers dropin calves, oh and Big Al Bore with his funny graphs and concerned countenance, just before he boards his huge ol jet.
So we have collective amnesia. And they vote too.
Weez gonna reduce green house gases with our lectric cars. Never mind where you plug em in.
Sorry. I'm done. Didn't mean to run a tangent.
Parent - - By DaveBoyer (*****) Date 06-24-2008 02:51
    There might actually be something to the global cooling and warming, just hear Me out.

     In the late 60's there was a great ammount of particulate air polution that might have actually caused enough shade to reduce the heating from the sun. Since those days, We have greatly reduced the particulates, but did little or nothing about "green house gasses", and now, suposedly the earth is getting warmer. Some scientist claims that the earth's temperature actually rose measurably following 9/11/01 due to the absence of jet vapor trails. Maybee?

     If all this is true, perhaps We need the proper ballance of particulates and greenhouse gasses to keep the earth at Big Al's prefered temperature. School kids learn that "pollution" causes global warming, but it can cause global cooling too.

      When global warming is so serious that Al Gore has to change His lifestyle to prevent it, I guess I will too.
Parent - - By bozaktwo1 (***) Date 06-26-2008 16:45
Yer killin' me!

Between acid rain and the POSSIBLE "threat" of GW or GCC or whatevah, I'll take my chances with the latter any day.  Or maybe that's any few thousand year cycle. ;)
Parent - - By DaveBoyer (*****) Date 06-27-2008 04:17
      The last major climate change was an ice age, and the world has been warming pretty much ever since. What the experts are arguing over is weather mankind's contribution to global warming is significant. 2,500 scintists take the stand that mankind's increases to global warming matter, 19,000 claim that it doesn't. That is acording to an article by William Russher.
   
      Acording to a book written by Lord Nigel Lawson, the earth is actually cooling.  In 2005 it was .45 deg C above the 1961-1990 global average, 2006 it was .42 above and 2007.41 above.
Parent - - By js55 (*****) Date 06-29-2008 17:30
The other fact that is left out of the reporting on the global warming debate is that the great majority (if not total exclusivity) of those minority scientists that do believe that mankind are contributing to global warming are in disciplines other than climatology. Such as geology, biology, ecology, hydrology, etc. There is a very good book out called the Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming. I highly recommend it for anyone interested in the subject. Quite sobering.
And I would mildly disagree with one statement of yours. There isn't much expert arguing going on over anything. Those that have political, financial and career agendas for global warming refuse to take on the dissent in public open debate. When is the last time you heard of an open forum on Global Warming. I mean one with real and sincere professional and expert dissenters. And the mass media is without doubt complicitous in trying to convince us the debate is over and there is expert unanymity.
And from what I've read its even worse. People who dissent from the Global Warmiac agenda have been fired, refused tenure, and been ignored in publication. There is alot of money and reputations riding on this issue and people are gettin nasty about it.
Parent - - By DaveBoyer (*****) Date 06-30-2008 04:34
True enough, I used the word "experts" too loosely.
Parent - - By js55 (*****) Date 06-30-2008 13:22
I will say, as a clarification on my part, that some climatologists believe that a warming is possibly happening. I think this is a prudent approach. but you don't spend trillions on 'possibly'. The true debate is IMO (even though they don't want us to hear any of it), is it actually happening, which is far from conclusive no matter how they wish to lie to us, and the second part as you accurately put, is how much would be a contribution from man made GHG's (Green house gases). Many climatologists have reported that given a very sensitive reaction of the oceans to temp changes at producing CO2, it may very well be impossible to segregate man made from that which is naturally produced by the oceans even if the world is warming (or cooling-I wish they'd make up their minds).
Not to mention the vast problems with accurate temp measurement itself, which is hotly debated by climatologists. For example, the thousands of temp stations that went off line in the 90's in the cold cold Soviet Union when it fell because maintenance of weather stations was the least of their problems.
Parent - - By Metarinka (****) Date 06-30-2008 17:17
as to my understanding there was little debate about the empirical evidence that the planet itself is warming. I.E the yearly average temperature etc etc, however the big debate and speculation is if and how much are caused by man made conditions. This together with the mini ice age and and midevil warm period lead some to believe that  some other forces are at work raising or lowering the temperature.

I'm still on the fence on this wholle thing
However it's not wise to think that the billions of pounds of carbon we've released over a relatively small time period can't go without some impact. It took millions of years for plants to sequester that carbon then fall over and die and turn into coal, by putting all that coal and oil back in the atmosphere we are reversing their hardwork

there are unchecked coal fires in china and other areas that output more co2 than the entire US auto fleet. Food for thought
Parent - By hogan (****) Date 06-30-2008 19:58
How many times has the Delaware river frozen in the last 230 years? It seemed to drop in frequency prior to the widespread use of the internal combustion engine
Parent - - By sbcmweb (****) Date 06-07-2008 00:39
I can understand not wearing gloves on a lathe (it will rip your fingers off!) But, a sander? Yeah, I bet the safety coordinator wouldn't touch that tungsten. I polished metal professionally & on guns for several years, and wouldn't DREAM of running a 12"-14" buffer WITHOUT gloves. Yep, the guys that make the rules aren't always the brightest, but for the most part, every shop I worked in protected Labor's safety interest in a positive way.

When I was working as a kitchen steward in Las Vegas, my boss wanted me to pressure wash a dishroom that had recently had the dishwasher removed & had large electrical lines dangling from the ceiling. Needless to say, I refused. Glad the security department came to my rescue & stood up for me. The chef's dept wanted to crucify me for not doing it. Go figure. :-( S.W.

"Viva, Viagra!" (Pharmaceutical commercial)
Parent - - By jrw159 (*****) Date 06-07-2008 02:25
"And STAY OUT OF WOOLWORTHS!!"  (You name it, if you can.)
Parent - - By sbcmweb (****) Date 06-07-2008 02:42
You got me on that one. Give. :-) S.W.
Parent - - By jrw159 (*****) Date 06-07-2008 02:43
OH brother where art thow?

"We thought you was a toad!"

jrw159
Parent - - By sbcmweb (****) Date 06-07-2008 02:47
Hate to say it, I never saw it. I heard it was really good though. :-)

"How'ja like that, dickface?" (Moochie Welch to Dennis Guilder, Christine)
Parent - By jrw159 (*****) Date 06-07-2008 03:03
NICE!!
Parent - - By Metarinka (****) Date 07-08-2008 14:25
http://safetycenter.navy.mil/photo/archive/archive_151-200/photo186p.htm

I guess that's why you're not supposed to wear gloves. I stopped wearing gloves grinding my tungsten I just dip it in the cup-o water to prevent hot hand syndrome
Parent - - By jrw159 (*****) Date 07-08-2008 15:25
That was a close one!

I know a gentleman that ground the whole top of his thumb off on a machine very similar to that one. NASTY

Thanks for the link. If one ever needs a wake up call, that will do it. :-)

jr159
Parent - - By sbcmweb (****) Date 07-08-2008 15:30
I use a belt grinder to grind tungstens & always wear gloves. Those wheel grinders are freakin' dangerous though! I do have a very small one from harbor freight I used to use. It would most likely stall out before taking anything off. Still, never can be too careful!! S.W.
Parent - - By Jenn (***) Date 07-08-2008 15:54
When I ran printing presses, pressmen/women, always were missing fingertips, if not whole fingers. 99% of the time it was from wiping the press with a rag while it was still running to save time from turning the press off , and turning it with the hand crank and wiping that way. I never did that - EVER. Never lost any fingertips either!!  Same concept, no rags near running machines that spin fast, no sirreee.

They would think it was "cool" battle scars, I would look at them like they were dumb, saving five seconds to lose a finger. Some of those presses can take off lots more than your finger.

I was always the one who put the safety guards back on the machines too after some idiot took them off, maybe I'm a nerd like that. I'm a safe nerd. *shrug*
Parent - - By sbcmweb (****) Date 07-08-2008 16:11
Yeah, some of those big Miller, MAN multi color machines could rip off your hand in a second. A Rotogravure press would be a nightmare if you got caught in it. Kinda like a roller coaster from hell! I had printing in high school, really enjoyed it. S.W.
Parent - By swnorris (****) Date 07-08-2008 16:28
Jenn,

If you weren't being such a safe nerd, you might be typing out responses with your elbows, and *shrugging* with only God knows what.
Parent - - By jwright650 (*****) Date 07-08-2008 19:30
...and that is why OSHA is so hard on the gap between the wheel and the tool rest. People forget that the wheels wear down as you use them and don't think to keep adjusting the rest up close to keep the gap at a minimum and that is what happens, not to mention things can get jerked outta your hands and thrown across the room at break neck speeds.
Parent - By Metarinka (****) Date 07-08-2008 20:02
so true, especially with the bigger heavy duty wheels you see in foundries and other places that work with jumbo sections. One company I was at bought special tungsten grinders, it was essentially a pencil sharpener for tungsten. At first I didn't like it, but it cleans the tungsten fast without thought to having to figure out the grinding angle.
Parent - - By jrw159 (*****) Date 07-08-2008 20:17
John,
  Thank you for that tidbit of info. I was not aware that OSHA addressed the "gap" between the wheel and the rest.

Can you referance a CFR # ?

If not, I can find it, just if you have it handy to save me a search. :-)

jrw159
Parent - - By jwright650 (*****) Date 07-08-2008 22:20
I'm pretty sure it is in 29 CFR 1910...but I don't know the reference off the top of my head....I do know that it is one of the top items on OSHA's hit list when they make thier surprise visits.
Parent - - By jrw159 (*****) Date 07-08-2008 23:26
Thanks buddy, I will check it out. :-)

jrw159
Parent - - By jwright650 (*****) Date 07-08-2008 23:51
http://www.thehartford.com/corporate/losscontrol/SBA/TIPS/849-009.pdf

Here is a pdf from Hartford Insurance's about the subject of bench/pedestal grinders.
Parent - By jrw159 (*****) Date 07-09-2008 00:10
John,
  Thanks for that. I guess this was something that in my experiance was always a must for operation and I was always taught to adjust acording to wheel wear.

I was not aware until now that OSHA adressed it specifically. This is something I will need to keep an eye on. :-)

jrw159
Parent - - By jrw159 (*****) Date 07-08-2008 20:13
This also reminds me of something that happened when I was very young. We lived in Worland WY and we lived out in the country. I had a little job feeding horses for some people that lived across the road from us. Next door to them was a friend of mine and his dad had a workshop that they would use to work on go-karts and motorcycles. Well one day when I was feeding the horses, I happened to look over and see my friend carrying a small bench grinder out towards the field his dad was working with a tractor. This struck me as odd to say the least. Then it got even more odd when I noticed that every ten steps or so, my friend would stop and set the grinder down while apparently holding it down like it was going to run off on him while waving at his dad. this went on for about fifty feet or so before his dad finally noticed him. Dad runs to him whips out a pair pf pliers and works at it for a minute. Then picks up the grinder an runs for the truck with my friend "holding on" to the grinder. Wierd, I thought, until I found out that while grinding on a piece of angle iron for the go-kart it sucked in the piece as well as three of his fingers. It cut and pinched him pretty good and his dad had to mess with it for about five minutes to free him. No loss of digits, just loss of some feeling in two fingers stitches, and some nasty scars. AND a lesson for BOTH of us at a very young age.

Grinders are tough!!

jrw159
Up Topic Welding Industry / Welding Safety / When will it end?

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