Vehicle repair related injuries - pictures??

[Subzilla]

Was reading the post about dropping things on toes and thought we should have a thread with other vehicle repair related injuries - with graphic images.

So here's mine: Was replacing the rubber leaf spring bushings on my K5. Had the spring bolt out and had dropped the spring just enough to get at the bushing. I had the pliers with both hands in a death grip pulling on the bushing. Pliers slipped off, my whole body went backwards and my thumb nicely slid across the "metal" inner fender with a slice into the finger and nail (in 2 pieces). Wouldn't stop bleeding. 2 stitches in the skin and 3 in the nail. Didn't know they could do that. Didn't loose the nail. I was amazed the cut dissapeared as the nail grew out.

 

[Blaze]

Since my toe smash inspired this, I won't post up that one. I had one other one, I was taking off a fender using the cordless impact. I had my finger near the bolt and was turning it off when the speednut broke and spun with the impact. The flat edge hit my fingertip and sliced off almost the entire fingerprint pad off of my driver's side pointer finger. No pics, but that bitch HURT.

 

[Kamel]

This was many, many years ago, but; I had a jack fail, causing truck to fall, caught my pinky finger in a frame hole on the way down. When I snatched my hand back, I ripped my nail completely off. It was the middle of summer, and I was taking a class, trying to write with a massively bandaged pinky that throbbed if you looked at it. BTW, did you know the end of your finger nail is square?

 

[mommucked]

I don't have pics but a friend of mine was using needlenose pliers to install or take off the springs on some Truck drum brakes. He was seated, pulling up hard on the spring w both hands when the pliers slipped off and he stabbed himself in the forehead w the closed pliers and punctured his SKULL. He pulled out the pliers immediatly and his brother drove him to the ER, He was luckily somehow not seriously hurt, but we used to tease him saying he was dain bramaged!!

 

[barnee]

I don't have pics but when I was building an FJ60 on 35s a couple years ago it come off the jackstand on the corner I was under. My right foot was crushed & pinned under the rear diff. They had to dial 911, fire & rescue got me out then they rushed me to Mission. The first 24hrs they debated on going ahead with an amputation. Luckily the blood flow started returning & swelling went down. I was on a walking cane for almost a year. Its been 2 years now & 2/3 of my foot is still numb & the other 1/3 still hurts everyday. It's okay to deal with except for rainy or cold days.

 

[Hurdt299]

This is the first incident that comes to mind. Several years ago I was putting a dual disc south bend in a Cummins truck. This was before I bought a Cummins barring tool to keep the engine from turning over. I had a square pry bar laid in the intermediate disc slots with the tip of the bar on top of the frame to keep it from turning. Right before the torque wrench clicked, the pry bar shot out. The butt of the handle hit me in the eye socket in the corner. It didnt knock me out cold but when things started getting dark I went ahead and laid down on my creeper so I wouldn't hit my head when I passed out. The next day I got a barring tool.

Sent from my SCH-R950 using Tapatalk 2

 

[BUCKEYE PERFORMANCE INC.]

Thought of just posting a pic of myself that should show the last 18 years of turning wrenches!

Buckeye Performance Inc.
828-779-2242

 

[Croatan_Kid]

I've got some pics and this shit hurt! I was wrapping up my evening of work on the Cummins swap in my K30, it was a little after midnight. Last thing to do was let it run while I filled the cooling system. At this particular time, I didn't have a ran shroud and my fingers met the fan in a blur of noise and pain. After it happened, I cut the truck off, picked up my tools, and closed up the shop...one handed...and I still hadn't looked at my hand yet. It was searing with pain and blood was running down my elbow. Luckily, all I got was some tendon damage and some really sore fingers, but at least I had FIVE sore fingers! The fan was badly bent and eventually it knicked a hole in the radiator.

Everything I own, except my S10, has electric fans now...mostly to save me from myself. I've also cut myself, burned myself, popped myself in the head/face with a hammer, smashed knuckles with a ball peen, etc....but this was probably the worst one.

 

[mommucked]

^^^^OW,OW, OW,OW, OW.......that's alot of OWS

 

[GCncsuHD]

1. Was under wife's car changing out the bushings in the rear suspension, the link bolts were crazy tight, my impact wouldn't touch them, so I was under there with a 24" 1/2" SK breaker bar (not some cheapy harbor freight unit mind you), had both feet pushing on the axle while I was pulling on the breaker bar so I was using everything I had-arms, legs, core to turn that bolt. The breaker bar snapped at the joint sending it hurling into my gut, I rolled over, proceeded to projectile vomit all over the shop floor, thought I was going to die, and developed a hematoma about 6" in diameter that was all sorts of fun colors. In hind sight I probably should have gone to the hospital for internal bleeding but I didn't. Didn't even tell/show the wife until a few days later (was before we were married). If that breaker bar had been a couple inches longer I might not have a kid now

2. I was working on my dually, unbolted the front wheel, grabbed it through the hand hole on the wheel, and pulled it off...forgetting that a dually hub sticks about 6-7" out, I simply let the weight fall (guessing 80ish lbs wheel/tire), crushing my finger between the ~5/16" thickness of the steel wheel and 3/8" or so hub flange creating a nice guillotine effect that broke my ring finger into two halves, luckily it didn't shear the finger off though, just crushing the bone into a million little pieces (have several chunks I can feel floating around in there now). This was about 1 month before my wedding, so in my shock and pain I was more afraid of my wife's reaction if my ring wouldn't fit over the swelling...to which she laughed at me during my pain because it was my right not my left...oops. No pictures, though the swelling is obvious in several of our wedding photos.

 

[Blaze]

I forgot about a funny one that really only hurt my pride. I used to strip old Trans Ams for parts when I was in college to make side money, and did it a little after my wife and I were married. I was too cheap to buy a snap ring tool, so in order to remove automatic shift knobs I would just position myself over them and yank really hard. Worked every time.

Well, the first time my wife was helping me strip a car I had a 78 TA for parts. I got in and bent over the console and yanked really hard. Didn't check to see if the snapring was on it first. Yep, came off easily all right, right into my forehead and knocked me out of the car on my back.

 

[BRUISER]

I was going to get a new project and smashed my pinky finger between 2 - 6x6 boards at full speed ( like if we're throwing one between your legs )

My pinky exploded

After it exploded we wrapped it up and kept loading the new project the. Drive 1 hr to hospital to get it stitched up

 

[RenegadeT]

no pics, and it wasnt that major, but it makes me laugh thinking about it...
I was laying under the front end of an XJ finishing some simple tierod/draglink BS. I carefully tried to slowly sit up so my head would clear the pitman arm...too slow, stomach muscles quit. Laid back down, tried again a little quicker, crunched my stomach muscles, still no go. I guess I forgot why I was being so cautious, third time I just whipped myself with every ounce of energy I had, essentially doing a situp headbutt combo right into the end of the pitman arm. BOOM, it knocked my right back down and I was dazed. I think I rolled out from under after that. Left a decent mark and bump dead center of my forehead, but photos wouldnt have done justice to the level of stupidity. Might've made a hilarious youtube video though.

 

[mbalbritton]

Not Mine, But My favorite story was A Buddys Wife came home to find a trail of blood, like in a movie, from the garage to the kitchen. Ends up he was using an angle grinder and it got away from him. It hit the floor and chased him down and found the bone in his ankle. He had some pictures and it was flat out nasty. Since then I've called them Ankle Grinders.

 

[toyota1]

Dont have a pic but a 14" chop saw blade came apart while cutting, thought i was fine no major pain till i noticed blood everywhere. A chunk of blade chopped my thumb off except a tiny piece of skin through a mechanics glove didnt even hurt till the next day. Missed 3 days of work

 

[transman731]

i have hundreds.

i had back surgery,12 or so years ago, recovery was going great and went to the doctor on a thursday and the doctor released me to go back to work on monday. i called a friend in va and asked if he wanted to go fishing over the weekend, he said come on up and lets go. the wife,daughter and i jumped in the car and headed up friday night. saturday morning comes and we getting everything ready when a tractor trailer pulls up to deliver his new lift (car lift not suspension). obviously the fishing is canceled for saturday and we were moving on to installing his lift. i informed him that i had waited 8 weeks to go back to work so i wouldn't be doing anything physical, he could consider me the instruction reader.
the lift install was going great and they were getting ready to install the crossbar (the steel piece across the top) they climbed the ladders and got ready to install it when one of them dropped the bolt they needed. i leaned over to pick the bolt up when one of the ladders slid a little, when the ladder slid the guy let go of the crossbar, SMASH, the crossbar comes down and hits me in the top of the head. i stagger around for a minute and walk out of the back of the shop holding a rag on my head. when i looked down, i saw the blood running down my leg and new this wasn't looking good.
i walked through the shop and towards the house, about halfway to the house i realized i couldn't go into the house and get blood everywhere. the girls had seen what had happened from inside the house and were on their way out to see what happened. when i moved my hand, my daughter freaked out and thought i was going to die. there was fat and blood everywhere, and you could see all the way to the skull. the wife said we had to go to the hospital, so i said give me the keys, i'm driving. within 10 to 15 seconds later i passed out and awoke to the ambulance. they said i passed out from blood loss. after fighting with the emt's for 10 minutes about trying to put me in the ambulance backwards(wasn't going to happen), i finally get to the hospital and they have to start cutting the fat away with scissors. i ended up with 27 stitches on the outside and 15 or something on the inside.
the doctor said he couldn't believe there was no skull damage and that i was lucky it didn't kill me. he said 100lbs or so from 12ft should have killed me.

 

[BRUISER]

i have hundreds.

i had back surgery,12 or so years ago, recovery was going great and went to the doctor on a thursday and the doctor released me to go back to work on monday. i called a friend in va and asked if he wanted to go fishing over the weekend, he said come on up and lets go. the wife,daughter and i jumped in the car and headed up friday night. saturday morning comes and we getting everything ready when a tractor trailer pulls up to deliver his new lift (car lift not suspension). obviously the fishing is canceled for saturday and we were moving on to installing his lift. i informed him that i had waited 8 weeks to go back to work so i wouldn't be doing anything physical, he could consider me the instruction reader.
the lift install was going great and they were getting ready to install the crossbar (the steel piece across the top) they climbed the ladders and got ready to install it when one of them dropped the bolt they needed. i leaned over to pick the bolt up when one of the ladders slid a little, when the ladder slid the guy let go of the crossbar, SMASH, the crossbar comes down and hits me in the top of the head. i stagger around for a minute and walk out of the back of the shop holding a rag on my head. when i looked down, i saw the blood running down my leg and new this wasn't looking good.
i walked through the shop and towards the house, about halfway to the house i realized i couldn't go into the house and get blood everywhere. the girls had seen what had happened from inside the house and were on their way out to see what happened. when i moved my hand, my daughter freaked out and thought i was going to die. there was fat and blood everywhere, and you could see all the way to the skull. the wife said we had to go to the hospital, so i said give me the keys, i'm driving. within 10 to 15 seconds later i passed out and awoke to the ambulance. they said i passed out from blood loss. after fighting with the emt's for 10 minutes about trying to put me in the ambulance backwards(wasn't going to happen), i finally get to the hospital and they have to start cutting the fat away with scissors. i ended up with 27 stitches on the outside and 15 or something on the inside.
the doctor said he couldn't believe there was no skull damage and that i was lucky it didn't kill me. he said 100lbs or so from 12ft should have killed me.

when I was installing my lift I kept thinking about this story

 

[Croatan_Kid]

Mother effin owwwwww!!! That pinky is nasty lookin! I bet your noggin was too!


Forgot to mention I had the x-ray tech girls come try to take pictures of my hand about 4 different times and I'd let them come get me and walk all the way down the hall (ahead of me, of course ) before I would tell them I already had x-rays taken.

My hand is usually drawn up in a fist when I wake up, takes a few minutes to get it working right. Hopefully it won't get much worse...I don't want it to affect my banjo playing skills!

Also, in the end, the ER nurse gave me a pan of warm and soapy water to wash my hand myself and I think they gave me Tylenol 3. I don't think they knew quite how bad my right arm and shoulder hurt!