injuries during wrenching

yoder519

Well-Known Member
Joined
Feb 1, 2010
Location
Abingdon, VA
not sure if this has been before, if it has i apologize.

Lets hear those stories of injury while working on your rig


i was putting the driveshaft back on my DD yota after i replaced the rear end, i was tightening up a bolt on the driveshaft, when the 1/4" drive ratchet slipped off and busted me above the eye, while my fist hit my nose. stunned me a minute, kept wrenching and saw blood. looked in the mirror and my eyebrow was layed open a little over a half inch. turned out i cut it a half inch deep. 3 stitches, a sore nose, and swelled eye from a friggin 1/4' drive.



lets hear yours!
 
One of my buddies was a hammerin' on a cherokee antenna to make a reach-tool from it, when his 1.75" Tube-tek tube bender die fell off of the table he was hammering on (~42" height), bounced off the concrete floor and landed on the side of his foot.


I'll let Spence tell you how that went:lol:
 
No. It was a direct hit on my left pinky toe.... hit the concrete after. that thing weights what? 30-35 lb? lots of limping and some cool xrays of the broken toe followed.
 
Mounting a 10 ply truck tire with a machine and caught my pinky between the bead and the rim and I was putting the tire on the rim . I twisted my pinky 900 degrees and put it over the top of my ring finger .

6 months out of work and 2 pins later I have partial use of that finger .
 
Wwildman said:
Mounting a 10 ply truck tire with a machine and caught my pinky between the bead and the rim and I was putting the tire on the rim . I twisted my pinky 900 degrees and put it over the top of my ring finger .
6 months out of work and 2 pins later I have partial use of that finger .
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I think I'd just amputate!
 
most recent:

doing u-joints on my truck, i can slide under the frame with about 3" to spare.... wife comes out and asks me a question.... i go to look up, head is right under the frame. nail forehead on the end of a bolt and out of reaction jerk back and SLAM the back of my head on the ground.....

worst:
let a wire wheel on a grinder get a hold of my arm.....
 
The worst i think i have had i dropped a 700r4 out of a truck and somehow didnt get my hand out of the way and it got caught in between the tranny and a cinderblock...2am trip to the er....it layed my left thumb open around the curve of the muscle down to the bone....emergency surgery, they had to call in a specialized surgen from his house, 6 months worth of rehab( finally just stopped goin) and a 18,000 dollar bill...i have the majority of my use in it back. I think theres some pics of it floatin around here somewhere on the forum
 
I had to take slravene to the ER one night. He was making a bed mount for his truck and the grinder wheel bound up and blew apart. Long story short, it took a good chunk out of his stomach.
 
I was grinding with a flap disk in an area of the truck I couldn't see. just had to stick it in there and woller it around. anyway, something happened and it caught my index finger and melted/ground a line in the top of it. Was so hot it cauterized it instantly. It looked like someone did a burn out on my finger. It finally grew back together but I now have a permanent black line in the top of my finger to remind me.
 
Worst I've had was when rotating tires on the dually, I unbolted the wheel, stuck my hand through the spoke hole of the wheel to pull it off, pulled it about 6" out and let it down, forgetting the hub stuck out probably 7"...70lbs of steel and rubber and the 1/4" thick steel wheel acted as a guillotine between my ring finger and the hub. Had a glove on, knew I smashed it pretty bad, but kept going for about 1 minute before noticing blood dripping out of the glove. Pulled it off, I had broken the finger, lost my fingernail and nearly sliced off the end of my finger.

Still can't bend that one quite right and there is an obvious chunk of bone floating around under the skin. This was one month before my wedding, wifey jammed the ring on anyway.
 
the absolute worst pain I have felt while wrenching was when I was changing the fuel pump in my neighbors F150. Dropped the tank onto my creeper and slid it out from under the truck. As I was following it, my shoulder bumped the fuel lines. I got about 5-8 drops of gas in my ear. I swear it burned all the way into my brain. My whole head hurt so friggin bad all the way down to my shoulders. Luckily my neighbor is a paramedic. He ran and got the hose and flushed my ear for 20 minutes. I couldnt do anything but stumble around whining for the next hour. I have had gas in about every place on my body. I will make sure to never get it in my ear hole again!
 
Young, dumb and easily injured.

I was cutting a hole in the floor of a old school bus with a cut off wheel. The disc came apart and went flying. I looked over and half of it was stuck into the rubber floor mat. The other half was burried about an inch and a half into my thigh. That will make you feel a little shockey. Being young, dumb and stupid with tools will either teach you or kill you.:lol:
 
Was attempting to put the rear 3rd in my buggy after installing the ARB, I was laying on a creeper-big mistake... The creeper rolled away from the axle after I got the 3rd lifted up, I wasn't able to get it started on the studs, dropped it but tried to let it land softly, which it did-on my middle finger... About 80lbs of steel from 15", I got out from under the buggy and shook my hand some, then got back under without a creeper and put the 3rd in, had RTV on it so I didn't want to deal with cleaning it off.

Still have a lump (not visible) on my middle finger, I am thinking I may have fractured it, but never went to the doctor.
 
Had a cheap cigar in my mouth, under the Jeep pulling out some kind of heavy part. About the time that I was getting the weight of it in my arms, my armpit grabbed the lit end of the cigar and I was stuck like that for several seconds until I could slide out and put down the part and get the cigar out of my armpit!
Have also had steel fragment in the eye, (had to have it scraped out), and extreme sunburn from welding in shorts and no shirt...
 
Man...I have some reeeeeeeeeeeal stupid moments.

Most recent was probably changing out the timing set on the Bronco from underneath...had two crow bars on the sides of the cam gear...cam gear popped off...lost grip on both crow bars...smacked in the face by the cam gear, then 2 crow bars.

Again, working on the Bronco...was doing some carb work...I needed to get a little closer, so I stepped up from my stool to the front bumper, slipped and caught the inside portion of my upper arm on the fan.

I was pulling the 205 out from under the Bronco...lost my grip on it and luckily landed on my gut instead of my chest.

And probably the dumbest one was when I was scraping some vc gaskets got preoccupied talking with my dad, got a little overzealous scraping...hit a rough patch of gasket...then went through it, right in to my armand still have a really nice 3" scar on my left wrist.


So most of my accidents should have been prevented, but I wasn't as safety conscious as I am now.
 
had a electric fan on my buggy...a oem style w no guards... when i moved radiator to back i had air bubble/ overheating probs..my father in law reached around rad to feel if air was hot cominng off rad, not thinking about a fan, and heres the result after they put it back on..that was a ruff nite
atapatalk.com_mu_6b301086_8d4a_1fd9.jpg


Sent from my LS670 using Tapatalk
 
Built up a 318 Dodge V8 longer ago than I am willing to admit. Screwed up the carburation and was leaking fuel into the oil pan. When it finally fired up a random spark through the block ignited the layer of gas that was now floating on top of the oil in the pan. Explosion blew up through the cylinders, past the valve guides and blew off the oil breather on the top of the valve cover. Unfortunately my head was between the engine and where the cap wanted to go. Woke up a few minutes later layed out on the floor. Engine was idling, light coating of burn oil on most everything in the shop. Turned off the engine and stumbled into the duplex. (was single, living alone). Next day I did my best impersonation of Frankenstein with a swollen head, extended eye brows, etc. . Had a head ache for a couple of days, concussion, and blurry vision. But that stupid motor ran for about 75k before I finally sold the truck.
 
Motorman said:
Built up a 318 Dodge V8 longer ago than I am willing to admit. Screwed up the carburation and was leaking fuel into the oil pan. When it finally fired up a random spark through the block ignited the layer of gas that was now floating on top of the oil in the pan. Explosion blew up through the cylinders, past the valve guides and blew off the oil breather on the top of the valve cover. Unfortunately my head was between the engine and where the cap wanted to go. Woke up a few minutes later layed out on the floor. Engine was idling, light coating of burn oil on most everything in the shop. Turned off the engine and stumbled into the duplex. (was single, living alone). Next day I did my best impersonation of Frankenstein with a swollen head, extended eye brows, etc. . Had a head ache for a couple of days, concussion, and blurry vision. But that stupid motor ran for about 75k before I finally sold the truck.
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Sorry but this is hysterical, I can't help but lol. The worst thing I have done was got my hand caught between a front strut and the body of the car. Nothing horrible just some bruising.
 
Being a mechanic, I have had hundreds. The worst was a simple one, leaned under the hood (like I do all day) while smoking a cigarette, and BOOM, the battery exploded. Was taken to the hospital after a few minutes rinsing my face, with no vision. They patched my eyes and told me when the patches were removed in 2 weeks, I may or may not have vision.
For those of you who know me, I will go ahead and answer your question,no that is not why I'm so ugly.
 
man, seems like grinders are eventually gonna kill us all.

same day i busted my eye, my buddy was cuttin his door hinges on his yota with a grinder and cuttin wheel. he had the gringer locked in run, the grinder bucked back at him, broke his nose, then while falling to the ground, cut him from knee to ankle. he said " Tyler, think we need to lay off them toyotas for awhile." hahaha
 
If its a story of working on a 4x4, then it has to be the one when I was in college 6 years ago for auto mechanics. We were rebuilding the carb off a CJ 7 that belongs to some friends of mine. We had the thing in a metal pan, and the teacher decided we needed to check the solenoid on it with a jump box, anyways, the jump box sparked real bad on the pan in a pool of gasoline and a couple of us lost our eybrows.

But in general wrenching, theres that time I SIZZLED my forehead on a cat converter, or what I did today, getting my finger caught in a 5 spoke wheel between the wheel and the caliper as I was spinning the wheel to check the tire for out of round. My fingernail hasnt fallen off yet, but Im sure it will. The manager sent me to Urgent care to get it checket out. They x rayed it, said its ok, and sent me back to work with a band aid on it!
 
All I have to say is " Forklifts Bite !! "

YES it hurt and I did feel it, no I did not pass out
1006080927a.jpg

according to some I'm a dumb ass for having this happen, only to find they did similar not long after, finding out how quickly and innocently something like this can happen.

funny how that happens
 
Nothing as bad as some of these, Broke my wrist pulling a transmission.
Most recent and funny NOW, I was replacing a leaf on my trailer, when the jack slipped and I thought I would be ok because I had a jack stand under it. Jack and jack stand both fell my hand got stuck between the axle and the wood , Broke my hand in 5 places but Funny part NOW is I was there 45 min because I didn’t want to yell for help. I finally reach the jack after kicking off my shoe and using my toes to grab the jack handle I got my self loose
 
Ive got a handfull myself. Once putting transmission in one of my novas and was using a trans jack without a strap had it fall of hit me in the head , fractured my knoggin then pinned my arm luckily had my brother and a buddy there to help get it off. I had just started working on stuff since learned better.

Another time at work, I was repairing a rear roll up door had to be inside with it closed and i had to use the interior emergency handle to pull it open. The handle is resessed and the door opened faster than I could get my hand out. It ended up pulling me up into the door operator hanging me a few inches off ground. It was very funny I will admit except for some torn ligiments or somethin another in my hand.

Got more and thankfully none are as bad as some of your guys
 
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