How they add up

[billp]

Some time ago I post a topic about recieving my first burn while working as a blacksmith. Will a few weeks ago at my doctors for an exam I was questioned about a new burn on my arm when a piece slipped an flew back and slapped my arm. As I was explaining how it got there in my mind I started adding up just how many I have gotten and forgot about. Kind of like badges that show who we are, Man I love being a blacksmith.
Bill P

[hildenmw]

my hands are so mangled, I might just heat up my fingers in my forge and hammer them into normal looking fingers

while admiring a poker I had just hammered out. held it up to the light and ran my ungloved hand along the taper. saw the smoke. Thank goodness for callus

[Bentiron1946]

Many years ago I was at the doc's for something or another and he noticed a little burn on my arm, he said does that hurt, I said yes and he said he envied me. I asked him why and he said he wished he could afford to get burned, bruised and cut up a little but that his hands were worth to much. The last time I went to see him before he retired he said he was signing up for woodworking classes, his hands weren't going to be worth so much after he retired. Isn't it great to be able to work with your hands at something you really love to do. :P

[Frosty]

After a lifetime of welding, torching, smithing and just playing with fire I have absolutely NO idea how many times I've been burned. My two worst I remember though, A kitchen scald of my own dumb making and I slipped on the cab of a drill rig and prevented a fall by grabbing the exhaust stack. THAT automatic reaction sure saved me a terrible fall onto a pile of leaves, grass and twigs a couple feet deep! Well, not really, I let go of the exhaust pipe right quick and fell anyway I just didn't land on my head.

Frosty the Lucky.

[Marksnagel]

I tend to treat hot things like "wet paint" signs. Some day I will learn. :blink:

[Dodge]

Imagine if you will, hands that began handling tools at an early age as they handed them to a dad's seasoned hands reaching out from under a car. Later those hands worked in the auto repair field and eventually, for over 25 years worked in welding and other related avenues of metal fabrication. Then, imagine again, those same hands learning to work the tools of the new age of hi tech. These old digits must have looked strange on the keyboard to all the much younger fellow students and even professors at times; their un-burned, un-scarred, un-calloused, and un-wrinkled hands looking almost alien to these eyes. :lol:

[Mainely,Bob]

You can always tell a metalworker,he`s the one with the scars on the inside of his elbows from catching all the hot stuff there too.
Freaked some of the new hires out to watch us flip a glove or a sleeve off and then calmly pull out a knife,open it and flick a still smoking ball of slag out of our skin then put the blade away,pick up the sleeve/glove and go back to work still smoking.

[Glenn]

Or knowing your clothes are on fire, but your concentrating on finishing hammering while the metal is still hot.

Much like the neighbor who would chase the spark plug wires bare handed looking for a leak or short. His arm would flinch a bit when he found one. He would say put your hand here and you can feel it. Yea - right - did that once, and only once LOL

[edge9001]

I got you one. I had to cut some old iron water pipes out of the way to replace with pvc. the only tool i had onsite was my angle grinder in the truck with a cut off wheel on it. While cutting the pipe, I noticed i caught the wall on fire, or so i thought. turns out someone had stuffed a whole full of loose steel wool. the sparks gat caught it on fire. luckily the wall insulation was was not anywhere close so all i had to do was pull out the steelwool. i let it do what it wanted to until i got the pipe cut.

[Dragons lair]

It's when ya got burns on top of burns that were on top of other burns. Try sitting at a steel table tigging turbine blades. OOps that ball just rolled off the table. Time to go to the water cooler AGAIN. Been burned places ya don't wanna know about. Worst thing is cooling it off then light the fire again feels just like the first time. A blob of aluminum will go in your shirt at collar bone height and end up in your boot still hotter than XXXX. 7 holes inna shirt and 5 inna jeans 2 inna socks. I must like it. I did it for 20+yrs now I get burned for me not the Co.
Ken.

[billp]

One slight advantage I have had is for many years I wroked as an EMT on an ambulance in my home county. This gave me access to wed sights of medical suppliers in which I found a really great gel for burns called Water Gel. At first it only came as an additive to special burn sheets. But now it is sold in a squeeze bottle and is really great on burns. Now when I get burned I give it a little while to see if it's going to keep getting worse or die down if worse I just dab on a few drops and pain is gone and back to work. But to tell the truth the more times I get burned the more I'm getting use to it so this bottle may last a while.
BillP

[edge9001]

if your talking about what i think you are that stuff is awsome.

what i know as water gel can be used to treat burns as well as to heat proof things. a gel that is about as thermally conductive as a vaccume(ie a void, not the machine). I've seen that stuff coated onto tinfoil then hit with a oxy/acet torch and still the tinfoil underneath was ok.

[Pat Roy]

After a lifetime of welding, torching, smithing and just playing with fire I have absolutely NO idea how many times I've been burned. My two worst I remember though, A kitchen scald of my own dumb making and I slipped on the cab of a drill rig and prevented a fall by grabbing the exhaust stack. THAT automatic reaction sure saved me a terrible fall onto a pile of leaves, grass and twigs a couple feet deep! Well, not really, I let go of the exhaust pipe right quick and fell anyway I just didn't land on my head.

Frosty the Lucky.

You did fall on your head at some point in time, didn't you?

[shortdog]

My favorite was burning my face while putting a loop on the end of a fork. I was working it around a drift stuck in the hardy hole of my anvil and was a little too close to the work. When I went to pull it off, there was a burr at the end of the drift. The loop hung on it just enough for me to get enough force behind it that I slapped it right to my cheek and right nostril. Nothing like the smell of your own mustache and nose hair burning! That rusty water in the slack tub was some kind of inviting!

I felt so stupid. The ten percent rule definately came into question wuth that one.

[Frosty]

You did fall on your head at some point in time, didn't you?

Frosty the Lucky.