Some bad stuff can happen to you even not working on these trucks....I was watching the Phoenix Open several weeks back..
Reminded me of this guy who went in looking for his ball..
Seems they have something called "Jumping Cholla Cactus" there...
Must be the one kind of cactus we don't have in Texas thank goodness.

Ben in Austin
1950 F1

 

Should we call you shorty?

 

No major mishaps or acts of stupidity (yet) for me while working on my trucks except whacking yourself on the head or nose with the ratchet handle when the socket slips off the nut or something like that....

But one incident I had involved a truck: As a Sr in high school and my first 2 years in college I worked for the local lumber yard. Among other things I delivered lumber and building supplies. Some of the trucks were Ford F600's or bigger, Internationals, some flatbeds, some flatbed dumps, all with 14 foot beds and one old REO with a 16 foot bed which was a bear to drive and we only used it when we had to. One Sat. Morning I had to take the REO out to a new house site loaded up above the headboard, front to back, side to side, with lumber (2x10's for floorjoists, 2x4 for framing), plywood, flakeboard, etc. all banded together with steel bands in one big load. We put long 2 x's on the bottom and the plywood and shorter 2 x's on top of them. We could put 2 skids of plywood side by side on the bed. The way we unloaded these loads was this: there is a roller at the end of the truck bed, and we put a pipe under the load halfway on the bed. When we got to the site we took the chain off, unlocked the roller at the end of the bed, backed up, hit the brakes and the load rolled off until the bottom 2 x's hit the ground and then we drove forward until load dropped off.

Well this Sat morning, I got to the site. It was a new site carved out of the woods up on a hill. There was not enough room on the flat area near the foundation to roll off the load and then be able to drive out because of the trees. There were no contractors there to help unload it by hand since it was a Sat. So I thought I can back up the drive (uphill) as fast as I can go and hit the brakes and roll it off. I flew up the hill backwards, and hit the brakes. I look out the back window and see the load rolling off and then it stops and starts rolling back towards me! The load hit the headboard and threw me into the huge steering wheel. The steel bands broke. Some of the flakeboard (4x8 sheets) flew off over the headboard sheering off the cab lights. The back of the cab was smashed in. I was not hurt, just shook up and mad, as I had to pick the load off (what was left of it) by hand.

It wasn't till years later that I realized I could have been crushed to death! And of course years later I figured out a way that I could have unloaded my load: wrap a chain around the load, tie it to a tree and drive out from under it.... Ahhh, youth!

 

glad to see I'm not the only one learning bye surprise ..power tools have collected a fair pile of skin and flesh over the years ..the worst for me ..was while learning the safety of a steel garbage can for rags and all the crap that accumulates while cleaning ,painting ..and rebuilding ..I made the mistake of throwing a container of fiberglass resin that was getting hot in my hand into the garbage can ..a little while later I got a raging headache...I turned on a ventilation fan and went to the house for a coffee ..a few minutes later someone came to the door to tell us we had a fire .....the fan had ignited the fumes that had given me the headache the garage and a Harley the MGBGT..tools camping gear ..fuel ..food .. disappeared in a ball of flames .3 hours and 26 firemen to save the house .and the neighbours home ..I learned garbage out side ... chemistry is more dangerous then a power tool..and no insurance will not cover all the stuff you collect ,,just look around at what you have stashed and what have you got receipts for ?? and yah ..lost a few fingernails..crushed fingers ,,split fingers ..toes ..gashed leg..anyone here heard of a gapper wound ??when the skin wont pull back to cover the wound ..punctures ..all a learning processes right ??

 

How about "LORENA BOBBY" (Bobbit)

 

You should try trimming back a cholla! Damn things grow like the weeds they are. I was sawing on a branch of one and a chunk fell off onto my forehead -- talk about pain! The needles are barbed!

 

I have been injured by all kinds of flying parts but the one that hurt the most was to the wallet when I was building T MATER the coe wrecker and had everything fitted and bolted in I found a little piece of metel rubbing on the inner fender so I was cutting it off with a cut off wheel when it caught and the wheel went into a bunch of pieces. Not to worry, everything was ok, no blood, 10 fingers, life is good till the next day when I was putting coolent in the new 285.00 radiator and there it was about 1/2 of the cutting wheel sticking out of the front of the radiator, almost went all of the way through. It's hard to explain stupid stuff to the radiator shop while they are laughing at you. YOU CAN'T FIX STUPID.

 

Proper PPE is a must. this photo is on my desk at work to remind me . lol I found out that a circular saw doesn't work very well in reverse, as in when your pulling it backwards rather then pushing it.... especially when hanging off a ladder, reaching out holding it with one hand. I have no idea how it didn't make it though my jacket and in to my arm.

 

I have bled on so many occasions that it's hard to pin down any single event but I still remember when I got treed by 14" hard dis grinder when I was about 16 or 17.

I was working for this construction outfit and they had brought in this dozer blade for a bunch of welding. The shop was barely big enough for me, the dozer blade from this D9, the welder, and a few tools.
I finished V grinding a broken weld on the lateral arm and laid this big ol' gear drive grinder down on the floor, cranked up the welder, plopped my helmet on and began laying beads. The grinder was in my way so I took my foot and shoved it away from me (or so I thought). Some how, some way when I kicked it away from me I had to hit the trigger and the damm lock button with my foot because all of a sudden this thing shot right between my legs (leaving a nice curf in the inside of my white work boots) bounced off the lateral arm ( missing me by inches) and began screaming around the walls of this 10 by 10 shop at mach speed. I jumped up on the dozer blade and could only watch as this flippin grinder (which was plugged into a 100 foot cord) raced around me, bouncing and knawing on everything it came into contact with. It devoured both of the welding leads, took cunks out of the Lincoln welder frame and almost climbed up the face of the blade a couple of times in an attempt to get at me. This went on for minutes and minutes until another mechanic opened the door, saw what was going on and yanked the plug from the wall thus ending the grinders reign of terror. I still have some of those wrenches in my tool box with big knaw marks on them where that hard disk had caught them and slung them across the shop over and over.

I can laugh about it now but at the time I was scared silly and almost wet myself as I perched on the prow of that dozer blade ducking tools and welding rods that that thing was slinging everywhere.

 

This is a terrible story....

A couple of years ago, a buddy of mine needed help getting a large, nice gun safe moved into his basement from the back of his truck. It was Dec. 23rd. We are both big guys and did not think much about it. We managed to get it into his house with some serious work. I was at the top of the stairs and my buddy was going the down the stairs (his back to it). The safe was between us, strapped to a hand truck. We got about two stairs down when the safe broke away. My buddy basically rode it down the steps and into a wall. The safe crushed him into the wall, luckily, in between two studs. He broke his pelvis. The Fire Department had to come to move the safe and he was taken by ambulance. He spent Christmas in the hospital and basically laid on a hospital bed in his living room for a couple of months.

This is an incident I think of often when I am about to do something that could actually kill someone.

Anyone want help moving a gun safe, call me.

 

I guess the good news is that the safe is in the basement now, and wall mounted too.

 

WOW! Here I thought Phoenix would be a NICE place to live! First I find out they have rattlesnakes, scorpions, and tarantulas, now attack cactus! I think I'll stay here...
When I first looked at the picture I wondered why the guy was decorated with bottle brushes???

 

 

Well, Had my moment today.
Got home a little early today about 5:10 and had some light left in the day so I decided to lower this heavy duty frame and I beam hoist down so I could fit it through the 8' tall garage door.

I used the highlift jack with a long 4x4 post to raise it up one notch at at a time alternating from one side to the next. was slow and tedious but seemed to work ok.

going down was not so well, Jacked it up enough to pull the pin and got it down maybe 2 clicks on the jack when the entire thing came out from under it and the top portion slammed down tot he bottom of the bottom tube. the trollies and the hoist where at the other end with the chain wrapped around the column and when the end I was lowering slammed down the trollies and hoist came sliding right towards me ( I didn't even see it coming) luckily the chain wrapped around the column stoped it just before hitting me in the back of the head.

so now the setup is tilted and without the pin to keep the end from rolling the base with wheels was trying to turn (pivot) which made the entire thing start to tip, I somehow stopped it from tipping over but took quite some doing to get the other side down. was quite scary.


here is a picture of the setup in the full upright position.



I need to figure a easy (safe) way to be able to raise and lower it, maybe something like this set up? or any other suggestions?

 

Dad had a machine shop when I was growing up. I never paid as much attention as I should have, but he made it a point to teach me safety, with very graphic examples.

Don't wear gloves when you are working on the Bridgeport.
He put a work glove on the end of a broom stick and brushed it against the 3/4" spinning endmill...It grabbed that glove and wrapped it in the endmill so fast...snapped off the end of the broomstick as it yanked it out of his hand. Scared me half to death. "Better it take a chunk from your finger, than your whole arm."

Always keep the lathe chuck key in your hand.
One of his machinist buddies that would come around was the example for this. He left the key in the chuck once and hit the start button on a 8ft south bend...He described it as a "sledgehammer hitting him in the face"...he has a 5" scar in his forehead and a big dent in his forehead in the middle of that scar.

Aside from the normal grinder-sparks-through-the-hole-in-my-pants trick, I managed to stab myself in the face with the wire from the mig welder. Welding away, I stopped, clipped the ball off the end of the wire, and went to wipe the sweat from my face. And did it while holding the gun in my hand. I had about 1/2" of wire sticking out of the tip...went right through the side my nose. I bled for about 30 minutes...