BWCA injury that blind-sided me Boundary Waters Group Forum: Boat Builders and Repair
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      injury that blind-sided me     

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HighPlainsDrifter
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03/27/2011 09:47PM   (Thread Older Than 3 Years)

i cut my left hand pretty bad today working on my black walnut decks. 3 hours in the emergency room.

i am very conscious of safe practices in my shop..... but, this accident blind-sided me because i did not think about the tool bit that i put in my high speed router !

i put a rotary drum rasp (fine for low rpm) in my router (table) to clean up the saw marks left after the band saw. these little saw dings were being followed by the bearing on my round over bit and producing dings in my edge....... so, i grabbed a drum rasp and put it in the router without a thought of what could happen.

every thing was great. i finished my thwarts and carry handles. i was brushing up a tiny spot on my bow deck when the drum disintegrated....... the drum and the wood did a serious number on my hand. fortunately no tendons were cut........ some muscle, a couple veins, and lots of skin.

something to think about besides keeping hands clear of tools......... all drum rasps are not designed for high speed.

i got back on the horse right after the e-room. took a little courage to face my shop. my daughter and i went out to the shop to see just what i did wrong. in a way i was relieved to see the drum and shrapnel over the work bench. i realized what went wrong and also realized some of those pieces could have hit me in the face rather than the wall.

my canoe still looks sweet........ no blood on her.
 
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Cedarboy
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03/27/2011 11:49PM  
Nice to here it wasnt as bad as it could have been. Now you will have a story to go along with that nice new hand crafted canoe. Hopefully it wont keep you out of the shop for too long.
CB
 
03/28/2011 07:42AM  
Ouch! Glad to hear that you're on the mend and glad to hear you did not get any blood on your bare wood canoe! Thanks for sharing your lesson. Shop safety issues are not always easy to identify.
 
03/28/2011 09:45AM  
Always good to get right back on the horse but also to step back and figure out what happened. In my case I was in a hurry, I did something stupid, and I got really lucky to come out of it with just some stitches and a finger that's a bit shorter than the others. I had to wipe a bone fragment off the fence before I could get back to business!

JD
 
03/28/2011 01:10PM  
Glad to hear that you are ok. There is a thread on the General Discussion Page wondering about you.
 
HighPlainsDrifter
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03/28/2011 02:03PM  

here is what I did ...... used a tool designed for low rpm in a high rpm router


I was done with my decks but decided to change the white ash deck with black walnut. you will note that the walnut deck has a piece of rasp sticking in it. the tool basically had had enough and separated at the seam

but she will look sweet when I get back to her
 
03/28/2011 02:44PM  
I forgot once and tried to put the chainsaw in my back pants pocket. Good thing I had Carhartts on.

Where did you find your ash?
 
HighPlainsDrifter
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03/28/2011 08:22PM  

GSP
I bought my ash from Renneberg Hardwoods. They have a store in Brandon, SD which was a 60 mile drive for me.

They had random lengths (about 9 footers) of 13/16 FAS/SEL. Beautiful wood. I ripped my gunwale stock to 5/8 and then used a scarf joint (1:8) to get the length I wanted.

 
buffalodick
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03/28/2011 09:16PM  
HighPlainsDrifter,
Sorry to here about your injury. Heal up soon.
By the way; your deck and inwales look awsome!
Dick
 
ladyspiller
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03/30/2011 12:51PM  
Man, I am sorry to hear about your injury. This is woodcanoe but I have to use an alias because Adam is mad at me and likes to censor me. No worries. I'll play his game as long as he wants me too.

I did a number on my finger once while cleaning up a thwart on a router. 3 hrs in the emergency room for me too.

Your canoe is absolutely stunning. You are making a fine heirloom.

Best of luck as you finish the canoe.

Tom
 
HighPlainsDrifter
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03/30/2011 02:59PM  

Mr incognito
I had been wondering about you. Long time no hear.

Thanks for the thumbs up on my canoe. In many respects my encounter with you got me off the fence and into a strip project. Thank you.

I am very gratified with this project even though my pride was hurt along with my hand. My hand is healing very nicely. Doc thinks that he can pull the drain on Friday. My pride in being a good and safe woodworker will take longer to heal :)

Routers are a dangerous tool. After the fact, I am discovering how dangerous they can be. My router is set speed (25,000 rpm), and this speed is not safe for large diameter bits (like a bead and cove tool and others that I have used)

I will be buying a new router with variable speed. Have my eye on a Bosch (2.25 HP, 12 Amps, 8,000-25,000 RPM).

 
03/31/2011 07:39AM  
HPD, have you glued in the decks yet? If you haven't you should experiment with gluing a 1/4" piece of bent ash to the curved end. I think it would look really cool and it would cover up (and protect) the end grain.

Either way, it looks great.
 
HighPlainsDrifter
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03/31/2011 02:46PM  

Not glued up. Not doing much with that hand right now....... but, I think I get what you say. But that would mean white (deck face) would hit white (inwale)

I am thinking that your suggestion means to cover the face of the black walnut radius (that I traced using a coffee can) that faces the interior ????
 
04/01/2011 07:45AM  
Yes, I have an unnatural aversion to exposed endgrain. It just doesn't look as nice and the white curved edge will outline the deck nicely. You don't even have to commit. As a test, take a small strip of leftover cedar and wedge it in there with a curve to see how it would look.
 
HighPlainsDrifter
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04/01/2011 09:14PM  

Drew
I studied the photos of your Bob's special when you posted them in the wood canoe thread. You did some nice work on the decks. The joints were tight and look good.

Off hand, I think it would take some work to get a tight fit of the walnut and ash on that curve. It would have to be a tight fit to look good (and keep me happy)........ right now I am leaning toward the exposed endgrain
 
04/02/2011 07:46AM  
HPD thanks for the kind words regarding my deck design. I had a lot of fun doing the decks. It was a lot of extra work but I feel it was worth it.

I certainly do appreciate your desire for perfection. The decks are critical for the overall aesthetics of the canoe and your decks, as they currently are made, are very nice.

The ash trim idea would just be an interesting way of completely outlining the deck and visually setting off the carry handle. As long as the curve is fair, you should easily be able to steam bend a piece of ash to fit. And if you built a simple clamping jig, you should be able to get tight fit.

Either way, you are building a spectacular canoe, so heal that hand and get back to work. I want to see pix of it on the water
 
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