Eyes and Ears...

I went to the ER just two days ago to have a fleck of rust removed from the edge of my cornea. I always wear safety glasses, especially when using power tools. On this day the suspect fleck came in from the eyebrow hours after the grinding was complete and the glasses were removed. I waited to see if the fleck would come out on its own and besides the military clinic was closed for Chrsitmas. So, after 3-4 days and still no progress, I went to the ER downtown. The doctor used a beveled needle to remove the speck like you would use a sewing needle to remove a splinter. You know the tension you have in your skin when you really gotta dig deep to get that pesky sliver...your skin has sort of a snap to it??? That is what my eye felt like when the doc plucked the rust out. Fortunately the eye was numbed with drops, I lost no vision, and it wasn't even painful..just a wierd sensation. So the lesson here is twofold...first dust yourself off before removing safety glasses...and second don't wait to go to ER. Your eye does NOT sluff cells like your skin does. The dirt/rust/etc will simply be covered by more and more mucous until you get a tumor, or go blind!? Yuck, better to have safety glasses then a needle in the eye. Now I wear them just to turn on the heater.

Lesson two:
Imagine if you will, lying on your left side with your back against the wall, safety glasses, long sleeves, hat on backwards holding hair in, proper lighting, while using a pnuematic cutting wheel to open the panel holding the tacked-in nut which secures the trailing edge of the front fender to the rocker panel because the bolt broke off from the previous owner (you gotta hate those previous owners huh..no care at all?!) Anyway, the shower of sparks is arcing beautifully over your right shoulder against the wall when ONE just ONE of those little red hot sparks decides to cool itself at the base of your now vertical ear canal...on your ear drum! For you science gals and guys...you know there is not much mass to a fleck of red hot cowling material so the ear drum at its modest 98.6 does a fair job of instantaneously cooling it (just after the pain receptor sent an urgent message to the mother ship) OUCH! Lesson learned: Hearing protection is not just for loud noises...those ear plugs keep the GuNk out too! I have no hearing loss, but there was about an hour of good pain and now a dull throb?!

I think I need a space helmet just to go into the garage, so if anyone needs me, I will be on Ebay in the NASA section.

Happy motoring

cosmic

I feel your pain. When I was working at custom truck in Las Vegas I had a similar problem. Unfourtanly I had to have Eye surgery and now have to were glass because of damage to my left eye. If I would have went in right away the doc's said that it wouldn't have been a problem. Consider yourself VERY lucky

I have also been to ER and had the needle pluck a piece of grinding junk out of my eye -- I now wear safety glasses while grinding!

Worst part was attempting to drive my 68 rs/ss home with a patch over one eye - NOT http://www.camaros.net/forum/redface.gif . I quickly called my parents to come drive "us" home (this was about 20 years ago).



[This message has been edited by Turbo_Jet (edited 12-30-2001).]

My doctor said I would not get a volume discount for my being an idiot when I went in for a similar incident. In my case " I just wanted to duck under the car and get a bolt that dropped onto the frame rail". So, with my safety glasses 10' away, I slid under the car and reached for the bolt with my eyes closed. Not feeling it immediately, I opened my eyes to locate it, allowing a rust fleck to leap into my eye. You all know the ending.

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Rick Dorion
69 RS Conv,355,M20,4.10's and I don't worry about stone chips.

I too had a piece of rust in my eye once. I fished it out with a Q-tip though. That wasn't pleasant.

thanks for sharing,

it is important for all of us to take heed,

many times I know myself and many others think "well i'm only going to quickly do this one thing" so glasses would be more of a hinderence than good, my sight is not as clear, whatever... I to find myself sometimes lacking saftey glasses. I do try to always use them whenever on the wire wheel on the grinder, or on the dremel or Angle grinder.

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Chris's 67 RS 327,can be seen at http://www.67rs.com
check out another site once in a while! http://www.fbodyconnection.com

Safety glasses don't seem to help much, they will keep a direct hit out when grinding, but usually you still get the rust in your eyes when you take them off. I finally purchased a full face shield and that seems to have solved all the problems associated with grinding and safety glasses. Everyone do yourself a favor and pick on of these up, they only cost about $8-10 dollars.

Gambitt

I worked in a pipe and pressure vessel fab shop for over 20years. You need a face shield plus your saftey glasses. I can't remember how many pieces of steel and other assorted things that were dug out of my eyes. If you want a real thrill have a piece of hot welding slag get in you ear and roll all the way to the ear drum. Where it sits and sizles, it will actually bring tears to your eyes it hurts so bad.



[This message has been edited by oger (edited 12-30-2001).]

The potentially worse (and definately most frightening) "eye experience" for me happened a few years back when I was working for a large company as the maintenance tool crib manager. They needed a new florescent bulb to replace a burned out one, so I went to the upstairs level of the crib to get one. Someone had put the last box of florescent bulbs on the top of the storage shelving that was a little over 7 feet tall. I grabbed the box, couldn't quite get my hand in the opened end to grab a new tube, so I pulled the box down towards me, tipping it near verticle so one would slide out in my hand. It was directly over my head, I was looking up into it, when I heard a slight "tinkling" sound coming toward me. I didn't get my eyes closed fast enough, and sure enough, someone had broken one of the glass florescent bulbs and not cleaned the box out. I got a face full of tiny glass slivers, including some in my eyes. The pain was intense, to say the least. My eyes clamped shut involuntarily, and hurt to keep them closed, but I couldn't open them because any movement caused severe pain. I frantically stumbled down the stairs, and made my way across the plant towards the nurses office. This was second shift, and the nurse wasn't there except full time on days, and on-call at night, but there was an eyewash station in the office. I felt my way to it and rinsed and rinsed my eyes out. I was in a near panic, worried that I would be blind, cause it felt that my eyes were cut to pieces. I washed alot of glass out of my eye, and a supervisor that was walking by took me to the hospital, turned out I had rinsed it all out. Talk about being VERY lucky!

I've had 2 bad things in my eyes, one was the usual metal bit that the eye doctor had to remove, the other was wierd. I was just driving along with the windows down, and something just blew into my eye. Almost crashed, I couldn't keep EITHER eye open! I could see it in the mirror, but could not get it out. After a few painful days I went to the eye doc, and had it removed--It was half of a seed pod/shell that had suction-cupped itself to my eye!!!

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76 Camaro/mild 350 .030/M21/Z28 body parts/lotsa other goodies

I always wear saftey glasses too.I spent one Easter in the ER getting a hunk removed from my eye from the day before.The bill was $250!I can't beleive some of the guys i have worked with(mostly older too)who will grind or have the full spark spray of a cut-off wheel going with NO eye protection.The other day i caught my sleave on fire while welding,i smelled it before i felt it. http://www.camaros.net/forum/eek.gif I think the worst one though happened while using aircraft stripper.Lets just say i ALWAYS wash my hands before going to take a leak when using stripper now! http://www.camaros.net/forum/redface.gif

[This message has been edited by ochrisl (edited 12-31-2001).]

[This message has been edited by ochrisl (edited 12-31-2001).]

OK fellas, hate to do the "my dad can whup your dad" thang but I was using my grinder with the brass wheel on it cleaning a part (bolt) lifted my goggles 'cause they were foggin up (due to the Georgia humidity) and a piece of the brass wheel came off and STUCK INTO MY EYE. I had to get a pair of needle nosed plyers and pull the dang thing out. and it took me three trys as the brass was stuck and my eye was not lettin' go! THERE! I finally have it off my chest, and it's been told on the internet. By the way my contacts do not fit comfortably in my left eye any longer. (it was in the white of my eye) WEAR EYE PROTECTION!!!!

By the way, didya notice the one eyed smiley?

Oh and Happy New Year!!