Building Injuries....

HORRIBLE INJURE!!!!!

....The worst I have personally experienced, and it can really change your life. Also it appears to be incurable and lasts your entire productive life. I developed a very nasty case of carpal tunnel syndrome in my arms from repeatedly reaching for my wallet.

Doing some TIG work and needed to quickly reposition the workpiece, so rather than lay the welding rod on the bench I stuck the end in my mouth...the hot end.

Holding a piece and hand drilling.

A #40 drill goes about 3/8" under the thumbnail before you react.

Strangely it didn't hurt until about 20 mins later.

Superglue sorted it out - a must for shop cuts and the like

3rd degree burn

I was wearing my wedding ring and tightening the positive terminal clamp on the battery with my left hand. My ring contacted the wrench and the wrench contacted the aluminum at the port aft corner of the plenum support near the oil cooler.

Instant burn and no way to quickly cool it down.

Take off rings before ....

Soldering Iron

While removing the blue plastic from a skin, I picked up the wrong end of the soldering iron...smelled and heard the sizzle before I felt anything..

I ran a center punch through the web between my thumb and index finger.

The sad thing was that right before I did it, I said to myself " Self - Don't let the punch slip while you're doing this, it might hit your hand.... OW!"

It hurt less and healed faster than you'd expect.

Drilled (#10!) hole in finger.

Multiple soldering iron and TIG burns over the years

Stinson flap hinges to the head.

Hit knee so hard on Stinson door frame I could barely get out of airplane

C-130 MLG inner door to the top of the skull...saw stars and layed on the ground under the airplane for a while...

Worst airplane related incident involved a big breakfast, too much iced coffee and sitting in a HOT hangar trying to figure out why I was so sick feeling. Made it halfway home...I can NEVER, EVER go to that gas station again... Broke a 12 year no-puke streak, too.

This is a really good thread & made my day reading them all.

I don't think you'll ever be considered a real builder if you haven't drilled into your finger.

I have so much DNA in my plane I could have told the FAA to do a DNA check to qualify for my repairman certifcate.

Ouch ...

The worst injury I suffered (outside drilling into my finger a few times) was when I 'rolled' the squeezer against my chest with one hand to reach for something and hit the trigger which promptly closed onto the meat of the 1st knuckle of my ring finger .. taking all the meat away with 3,000 lbs. of squeeze! Not much bleeding due to the pressure .. wrapped in shop rag and duct tape and continued. However, it took a while to heal!

Be careful out there!

DWS

Nearly off thread but related.

Many years ago, I flew skydivers and the guy I flew for was always in a hurry.

Anyhow, he got out of the 206 and shortly afterwards there was this - Thud !

He had walked into the back of the wing.

Much profanity, however, when he re-appeared, I had to bite my knuckle because there was a row of diamond shaped indents right across his forehead.

Oh my how we laughed.

And the other one was when I took my lad to work at the airport for a look around. All great - he was about 6.

Came back to the parking lot, I walked past the barrier....... again, there was a Thud.

He walked straight into the barrier and was now on the floor.

Well - what is a dad to do ........ ?

ROFL

Don't think he ever forgave me.

He's 27 now.

While Building the RV-10, after the tail was mounted, but before the wings were on, while working in a small T hanger with the tail about 3 feet from the back wall I would move sometimes move very fast around the back of the tail and duck my head while going under the elevators. One day I did not duck enough and the elevator trailing edge hit me in the top of the head causing a big gash. Needless to say there was lots of blood. After saying a few choice words and grabbing some paper shop towels to hold on the top of my head to stop the blood flow I drove myself to the ER but after waiting about 45 minutes, going into the ER bathroom and trying to wash off some of the blood and putting a stack of paper towels on the top of my head to continue to try and stop the blood flow I went back up to the counter and was told to have a seat it would be awhile before anyone could see me.

I promptly went home, got a plastic lawn chair on the back lawn and a water hose and started washing my head. My wife said it was an L shapped gash in the top of my head but I told her to put a guaze pad on it and secured it with a cloth strap running back under my chin until my wife confirmed the blood had stopped flowing out from under the gauze pad. After about 30 minutes of sitting outside in the lawn chair, and taking some motran, I decided to go back to the T hanger and get some more work done.

Needless to say from that point on I walked under the tail VERY CAREFULLY and much more slowly. Those RV-10 tails sit a long way off the ground.

I think that I am in trouble.

Since unpacking the wing kit for he -14, I have:

1. sliced my index finger on a sharp edge of some random piece of aluminum.
2. stab the pad of my thumb with the corner.
3. deburred the skin on the back of my thumb.
4. burnt my hand on a soldering iron. Was not looking and grabbed the hot part. Boy that is hot. And like glass, you can't tell when it is hot.

And I unpacked the kit less then a month ago. I think that I need to start wearing cut resistant gloves. Not sure when to expect something worse to happen.

Cheers
Ken

I bought some mechanic's gloves. I have cheap ones from Harbor Freight, and a nicer Mechanix brand pair that have a better "feel". I don't wear them all the time, but I'm learning to wear them (and shoes!) when deburring.

I match drilled my finger tip while drilling the fuselage longerons. Ended my weekend build session! Blood is still there. I see it during each annual when I remove the aft bulkhead.

You'll want to watch that (or clean it off) -- blood is quite corrosive, I'm told.

Hand + Dremel + cutting wheel + a jillion RPM

This is a painful thread. I thought I had forgotten about this, but reading these post has brought this painful memory back.

I was holding a Dremel tool with fiber cutting disk turning about a jillion rpm in my right hand. I was holding one of the HS fiberglass tips in my left hand. I was trimming off some excessive material when I turned to get better light on the subject. The cord of the Dremel reached its limit and pulled the tool down into my closed fist so that the spinning cutting disk was encircled by my thumb and fore-finger. I opened my hand and dropped the Devil Dremel to the ground, but not before it did its thing to right hand, cutting a rather nasty, shredded gash from thumb to fore-finger.

This put my right hand out of business for a week or two, and added to the total build time.

You guys need to work on more airplanes...you're but rank amateurs at self inflicted pain (unless you too have permanently removed a body part)!

With that out of the way, I do know a few of y'all that have some humdingers!

For example, friend 1 was fishing a coax cable out of a small hole under his RV10 fuselage to hook up a Comm antenna. The cable slipped back into the fuselage throught the small hole so the friend stuck his finger into the hole to try and wiggle the cable through. Whilst his finger was in the hole it swelled up slightly and became quite stuck..and could not be withdrawn, so there he sat for a good long while unable to reach anything (including a cell phone). After some time he finally just yanked the finger out, leaving much skin behind.

Friend 2 who is rather portly was trying to work under his newly completed RV-10 panel. After a bit of wiggling around between the seat, the stick, center tunnel and side of the plane, the friend sort of "fell" into that cavity and completed his work....only to find out he was entirely and completely stuck. Luckily he had his cell phone handy and called some friends over to butter him up and winch him out. He was stuck there almost an hour!

Friend 3 was working on his velocity injection servo plumbing while mounting the engine. As he stood up really fast while backing away from the plane his head smacked one blade of his brand newhis MT prop (not running).....so hard it knocked him unconscious for some time....and cracked the prop blade which required an overhaul before it'd ever been run! A visit to the hospital, stiches to his scalp and he was all cleaned up....except for the blood stains on the hangar floor.

Friend 4 was painting his fuselage and had stood up on one of those little 3 step ladders. He forgot he was up 2 steps and when he went to step down he miscalculated....wiped out (broke his ankle) and ended up with paint everwhere t shouldn't have been!

Friend 5 was tig welding on a fuselage and din't notice the slag in his shoe until it was sompletely on fire and caused 3rd degree burns on his foot.

Friend 6 was messing with an old BRS chute in the back of his pickup truck when it fired off. Didn't really cause bodily harm, but beat up the truck pretty good, and...as the chute flew in the air it caught on fire and burned up as it settled back down to the ground.

Friend 7 broke his nose during a compression check when the prop got loose and smacked him good.

Friend 8 is the anonymous idiot that got his hand caught in a running prop while messing with a carb...and the rest as they say "is history"!

I have many more of these, but those will have to do for now!

Cheers,
Stein

Hey Stein,
You got any friends left
With out injuries

All I can say is OUCH for the last friend... You listed.
Jack

When I was working on the interior of the Rocket, I had a step ladder next to the fuselage to use to climb in and out. The wings were not attached. One day I exited the airplane backwards onto the ladder and missed the step. I fell about four feet to the concrete floor backwards. End result was a fractured skull, two broken ribs (the most painful), and torn ligaments in my right knee which eventually led to a total knee replacement a year later.

I do not like ladders one bit!

Unfortunately as I read the other stories here, I saw myself several times. I mean, who DOESN'T drill a #40 hole into the palm of your hand at least once? That's a right of passage. I also think it's on the FAA form for getting your pink slip.

f1rocket said:

Unfortunately as I read the other stories here, I saw myself several times. I mean, who DOESN'T drill a #40 hole into the palm of your hand at least once? That's a right of passage. I also think it's on the FAA form for getting your pink slip.

Click to expand...

Everyone should just get it out of the way as soon as you order your kit.

Take drill, drive into your hand, be done with it.

"Check box if you understand terms and conditions of sale."
"Check box if you have already run a #40 bit into hand."

f1rocket said:

When I was working on the interior of the Rocket, I had a step ladder next to the fuselage to use to climb in and out. The wings were not attached. One day I exited the airplane backwards onto the ladder and missed the step. I fell about four feet to the concrete floor backwards. End result was a fractured skull, two broken ribs (the most painful), and torn ligaments in my right knee which eventually led to a total knee replacement a year later.

Click to expand...

Ouch! I had a similar incident while working on the wiring in a friend's RV-10. The engine was mounted and the fuselage was on the landing gear, but wings still off and the top fiberglass portion of the cabin was installed but the doors were not yet installed. I'd been using the right main gear tire as a step to get in and out of the co-pilot side while running wires thru a firewall pass-thru eyeball on that side. One time exiting the plane, I missed the step onto the tire and fell backwards all the way to the floor, hitting my back and ribcage onto the main gear tire and wheelpant mounting bracket on the way down. Cracked a rib too, and yes that was very painful and took weeks to heal up. Not much you can do about a cracked rib either, except wait patiently for it to heal. I'm lucky I didn't impale myself on the wheelpant bracket either, but the way I hit it caused it to bend over and not slice into me. Falling out of a plane that's under construction is a very serious danger.