I Pulled A No Brainer

2 days ago I was working on a new project that involved
me grinding on some fiberglass. Well I had my glasses
on but had them pulled down some. I was using my
electric grinder with a alum bit and after about 10
minutes of gringing I noticed the whole shop was
filled with dust... I didnt think anything about it.
But yesterday I could barely see, my eyes were all itchy,
well I had to go to the emergency today. The doc
said there were a bunch of scratches on both eyes
and are all infected. Damn... they hurt more now
then yesterday. I rinsed them out a few times yesterday
but I guess that didnt do much........ DAMN I am so
stupid at times. I still dont know what I could have
done differently except maybe have my glasses up
full on my face.
DUMB... DUMB.... DUMB ... sorry... just venting
and I cant sleep due to the pain and itchiness

That sucks man! Guess you'll be grinding fiberglass outside next time. I know the eye thing a little, had a piece of 4x4 hub nut from an Explorer lodge itself into my eyeball and the Doc spent over an hour trying to get it out. Funny he was aking me how I was doing all the time he was scraping my eyball. Then he said he couldn't get it and was doing to much damage in the process, then I started feeling faint. I told him how I was feeling and he wanted me to move over to a bed and lay down. Well I didn't make it that far, My 6 foot tall 225 lb self decided to pass out. Poor [Edited by Moparts - Keep it clean] grabbed me so I didn't hit the floor. He was maybe 5'10" 150lb . I woke up in the arms of him and a 275ish lb Nurse a few seconds later.
I ended up having to go to a specialist first thing in the morning (18 hrs later) and even he had spent almost 2 hrs at it. Stupid chunk of metal wasn't the size of a grain of salt but it felt like a finishing nail to me. What a pussie eh??

Don.

I hear ya. Been to the eye doc twice in the last year. Both times was wearing safety glasses. I think the problem is that the fact that you're wearing them makes you more brave than you should be. Crap has a way of getting around 'em.

that sucks!i hope you get some meds to help you sleep and sooth your eyes more.i am glad it did not give you a lung infection from breathing it.

I always position the end of my shop-vac hose near the "work" when porting or grinding.Strapped on to the opposite end of the port,it's about 99% efficient.It ought to work on 'glass too.

When I was helping a buddy of mine at his shop I noticed he had some safety glasses that had foam around the lenses to keep ALL debre out of your eyes....might be something to look into. I hope your ok and you eyes clear up. My vision is jacked from s.w.a.t. and my eyes hurt daily from fractured orbitals......not fun and we only get one set.

I have used a set of chemical goggles for grinding. They work great, I highly recommend them. I wish I remembered the brand but they worked over my glasses and did not fog. My wife picked them up for me at the University bookstore of all places as the students in her labs are required to own a pair for when they are doing labwork. You might check for a pair at a nearby university.

Back when I was building custom composite boats we always worked really hard on dust control. You would have been drawn and quartered by your co-workers if you did that at the boat shop I worked in. Carbon dust is worse than glass and the America's Cup boats were all carbon. I agree on the use of a shop vac at close to the grinding site. Sometimes we would tape together a cardboard collector, just made it up on the spot. The other thing to do is to stop regularly and vacuum up what has fallen back onto the surface so you are not flinging that all over the place. I am sure you know all this.

I know what you mean about the injury to the eye. My wife once scratched (accidentally) my eye with her fingernail. Wow, did that hurt. Not much to do either other than drink lots of anesthetic (fortunately we distill large quantities of anesthetic here on St. Croix). At the clinic I went to to have it checked the doctor used a numbing agent for the examination but he said he could not prescribe it as if you used too much the cornea of my eye would slough off. That got my attention.

Hope you feel better soon and it does not progress to anything worse. The Exploder bit of hub in the eye story makes me feel faint just reading it.

Sorry to hear that Mike and hope your eyes recover fully Sometimes when we are working in the garage we tend to get involved so much in the project at hand that we forget about the safety factors in which we need to protect ourselves. Talk to you soon

hope you will recover fully from this soon!
sometimes we all do stupid stuff without thinking

Mike, get better soon. I hope you get 100% quickly !! . At least you got a great nurse to get you better

Thanks guys... yes the wife has been taking good
care of me

Don't feel bad about that...I had one of my employees shoot his nut-sack to a work bench one time with a framing air nailer..Paramedics got the nail pulled... The next day he did it again..Never saw him again after that..

..............

that sucks! hopefully it all works out for you. eye pain is just as bad as tooth pain. i have one eye with 20/15 vision and one with 20/200. i got a piece of metal in my eye and it was bothering me so i went to the emgernce room in the middle of the night. they ground out the metal but then the vision in my good eye was blury. i went to my optimoligest to get it check out. she told me to never let an emgerncy room doctor touch my eye. she said to call her after hours number. my vision finally returned to normal but it took awhile.

Hey Mr P. sorry to hear your hurting. You might try this, flush you eyes with milk, vitamin d if you got it. Ya I know, it sounds like BS. But it sure works for me with a flash burn to the eyes!

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I Pulled A No Brainer

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At least your qualified...J/K...Hope your feeling better, I've never had fiberglass debris in my eyes but I've had steel afew times..No fun...