Watching accident videos

[Agent_zed]

@Agent_zed

It's OK, I don't mind. Here are my thoughts.

It's entirely up to you or the purchaser of a woodworking machine to achieve the necessary level of competence required to operate the machine to an acceptable safe working standard.

Unfortunately, in order to save a bit of cash and to make life easier, people turn to videos like this one for their information. Then, in many cases, after doing a bit of shed work, youtubing and blagging their way through an NVQ2 in wood occupations, these people turn up on a construction site thinking that they are somehow qualified and know how to do it all.

If you work in a construction site environment, which I do, you find yourself surrounded by such people and its immediately obvious that;

• They don't know what they are doing.
• They have received no proper training.
• They are dangerous to be around.
• And crucially, they shouldn't be standing on a construction site.

Unfortunately youtube is also full of such people providing "training" to the unwary. That's why I don't watch these videos and my personal choice is to obtain formal training from a suitably qualified instructor if I want to purchase or use any woodworking machine or safety equipment.

I'm not going to be arrogant and list my qualifications, experience and training, but they are many, and despite this training, I still don't consider myself to be qualified enough to provide safety instruction on the use of woodworking machinery.

That is why I don't watch these people messing about in their sheds.

Thanks for your reply. I understand your position a lot more now. I think we are looking at this from 2 different angles. I am looking at this more from the hobbiest worker rather than someone intending on working on a site or industry. That's not to say safety should be any greater for one than the other but there will be differences in the types/power of machines used and other peoples safety on site.

Training is likely to be paid for by a company employing a worker which is going to be different to a hobby worker.

I would guess that (or at least hope) in industry there will be someone who will correct dangerous behaviour (if it is seen). Whereas there is no one in my garage saying when you cut that make sure you do X or Y.

I can see how learning things from videos could be dangerous if the person teaching is showing you wrong things which is why I tend to watch a few different people with good reps and try and understand why they are teaching the things they are teaching. Watching videos such as the one I posted for me at least puts another potential danger into my head and gets me thinking a bit more about safety the next time I come to use my tools. The more ways I can see something going wrong the higher the change I'll spot the potential in my own work.

I think my bandsaw and router are potentially the most dangerous tools in my garage, not because of their maximum damage potential (as they won't do as much damage as a table saw or chainsaw for example) but because they appear less dangerous and I'm potentially more casual with it. My bandsaw quietly hums away but will easily bite me given a chance.

 

[Ttrees]

Bandsaws are a lot safer if they've got a large table IMO
as they lend themselves to longer pushsticks @ 450mm minimum per HSE.
Briefly had a 20" far eastern one before, with plenty of capacity,
and standing in front of it one is very close to the blade compared to some.

Suppose I can rig up some spring mounted pressure featherboard sometime,
Steven Woodward's recent video is certainly worth a look.

 

[Agent_zed]

What I always do is drop the top blade guide down pretty close to the top of the wood, with a gap that is smaller than my finger so if so some reason I slipped or moved my hand there is little to no chance I'd get my fingers to hit the blade.

The top picture in the above post for example looks to have a big gap above the wood exposing a lot of blade, which I would prefer wasn't showing if I was using the machine. Obviously push sticks are going to take most of the risk away but I'm thinking if I am pushing by hand up until a point and then reaching for a pushstick etc and misjudge or something.

Am I doing the right thing having the top guide low near the wood?

 

[Ttrees]

All of the newer guards have wheels, so therefore need to be larger to accommodate.
Seems a safety feature, given the reason Agent_Zed above mentioned, for one..
Might a set distance be required, i.e minimum distance from the front of the blade?

Here's another guard, somewhat demonstrating how it's adjusted.
Shows off the wheels for clarity.

 

[Ed Weber]

A little late to this but it was discussed at length on another forum I'm a member of.

Personally, I usually don't watch these videos, if you need photos or images of accidents and gore to remind you of the potential dangers, you shouldn't be using power tools.
The only thing dangerous in this video is the operator.
There are many, better, safer ways to teach bandsaw safety, than posting a video of your own bad judgement.
Many seem to want to pat him on the back for showing his mistakes, I disagree. You don't get extra points for being stupid.
(for the newcomers) I would much rather see someone explain how to make the cut safely. A little knowledge goes a long way towards safety in the shop.
He also openly says, that this isn't the first time this has happened to him, clearly he did not learn from the first time.

Think about this:
If he did not get a catch, he would have most likely gone about his normal method of work and no one (the newcomers) would be aware that this is not the safest way to go about this.
The accident is the only thing that made him stop and think about it, at least for a moment.

Too many of the YT folks (and others) just don't know enough or have experience enough to understand what could happen. If you don't know, well that's fine but then you have no business showing others how to perform the same task.
Safety briefing? Understanding the capabilities and limitations of your tools? Basic understanding of physics? These are foreign concepts to some and the not knowing, can be quite dangerous, as we just saw.

This is the problem with YT and woodworking, not enough basic knowledge too much confidence.
(the illusion of explanatory depth) look it up, it's a problem.

 

[TRITON]

I'd never set one that high. Not entirely a waste of space but I'd be setting the blade to come about 1cm out of the top surface of the wood and I want less than 1cm between the bottom of the guard and the top of the wood to keep fingers out from under. Also, the less momentum you let the timber build up in the wrong direction, the easier it is to stop.

All the guard in the video is going to do is slow the timber down if it pinches on the back of the blade and swings up and over into the operators face. It'll do nothing to stop the wood being lifted off the table and then fired back into the operators gut.

Why is it set like that ?
Most of those style guards are slow and awkward to adjust so users don't bother repositioning them as they should.

Might be set high for the vid. And as above. Fully down,covering the top of the blade and the nose bit lowered to just clear the top of the timber.

 

[Against_The_Grain]

But is/can it still be legit, if set correctly?
as most machines with such overhead guards are generally quite a bit longer,
(note the blades hung up on the wall)

Discounting an argument whether it counts as safe or not, when the blade is tilted,
should that not count as enclosed, (guessing there's some gray area there)
but I'll happily read it.

The guard is sufficient for the machine's purpose, if you need more covering of the front of the blade there is an adjustable nose portion at the front of the guard for that, the side of the saw plate is harmless and you should be nowhere near the rear of the saw blade and there would typically be a riving knife installed. What you need to remember is that you're not ripping one foot long lengths of timber through one of these, you're cutting timbers well over 1m long at a minimum so there's no need to be that close to the blade to be picking up smaller pieces.

The blade doesn't tilt on a Wadkin BSW, or many larger diameter saws, typically the fence as with the BSW or the whole table tilts.

 

[Doug71]

I used to have a Wadkin BSW, it was just used for ripping. It always had the biggest blade in it could take and the blade was always left set at full height. The guard was normally left about 6 1/2" high as the deepest timber we generally ripped down was 6", the adjustable nose piece was then dropped down to about 1/2" above the timber you were cutting. Never used push sticks because as said above you were generally putting long lengths through so never needed to go anywhere near the blade.

Despite the Wadkin looking big and scary there is more chance of Diy Dave cutting his fingers off in his garage workshop on his little DeWalt or Lidl special as he's taken the guard and riving knife off and is fiddling round with his fingers next to the blade trying to make box joints on his little homemade jig........

 

[MikeJhn]

I made this for my table saw, seemed the best of all worlds;

 

[Bingy man]

The internet / utube / google etc all give information on how to do , use , install or remove just about everything you can think of from woodworking to central heating to car mechanics to electrical installations and so on . None of this means that you should just jump in and ignore the fact that most of these trades takes several years of training and many more years of experience to become proficient in any given trade - no argument there . But there are hundreds of posts on this forum by members asking for advice on a whole host of different topics . Yet we offer advice based on our own knowledge or experience of a given field . We often don’t know the skill levels of the member ( especially new or novice members ) I imagine we offer this advised based on the member requesting the advice that he or she will use common sense to decide if the particular repair / install or project is beyond their comfort zone . Electrical issues and gas appliances fir eg - I’ll advise generally but my ultimate advice will be to contact a relevant qualified person as the fact someone is asking for said advice generally means they don’t know what they are doing or they aren’t sure . But that’s my point if I’m feeling or thinking that something is outside of my skill set or comfort zone then I don’t touch it . It could be a machine or or an installation or or some mechanical repair . Hired this recently to remove several tree stumps . No safety advice offered ,, no questions of competency in using this equipment , no safety equipment offered but had my own., common sense told me to keep away from the huge spinning blade and keep said blade away from anything other than the tree stumps . Now imagine the outcome of a lesser minded person …

 

[RogerS]

Every now and then I'll see an accident video on youtube. I never watch them out of morbid curiosity or desire to see someone injured, but I often find they have a valuable lesson in them.

This one popped up today and was a good reminder, whilst thankfully not resulting in much more than some bruises.



Out of interest does anyone else choose to watch this type of video or do you actively avoid things like this?

Question...why do most US woodworking videos take 10,000 words when a British one will get the same message across in 100 ?

 

[Bingy man]

Question...why do most US woodworking videos take 10,000 words when a British one will get the same message across in 100 ?

Imo it’s just to get more subscribers /
Likes and possibly ( go viral ) as posted previously he would have been better off saying don’t make this mistake that I did - show Video at full speed as the slow motion is not reqd . And then immediately go on to show a proven safer method - if there is one .

 

[Agent_zed]

Question...why do most US woodworking videos take 10,000 words when a British one will get the same message across in 100 ?

If the video is longer than 10mins on youtube you can add more than 1 advert, if it is less than 10 mins you can only have one advert. So most likely they try and make it long enough to break the 10min mark.

It's similar to recipes on blogs. There is 3 miles of why they are making whatever recipe it is and their lifestory and after 2 hours of scrolling you get to the actual recipe. On the way though you get loads of adverts.

 

[Ed Weber]

The internet / utube / google etc all give information on how to do , use , install or remove just about everything you can think of from woodworking to central heating to car mechanics to electrical installations and so on . None of this means that you should just jump in and ignore the fact that most of these trades takes several years of training and many more years of experience to become proficient in any given trade - no argument there . But there are hundreds of posts on this forum by members asking for advice on a whole host of different topics . Yet we offer advice based on our own knowledge or experience of a given field . We often don’t know the skill levels of the member ( especially new or novice members ) I imagine we offer this advised based on the member requesting the advice that he or she will use common sense to decide if the particular repair / install or project is beyond their comfort zone . Electrical issues and gas appliances fir eg - I’ll advise generally but my ultimate advice will be to contact a relevant qualified person as the fact someone is asking for said advice generally means they don’t know what they are doing or they aren’t sure . But that’s my point if I’m feeling or thinking that something is outside of my skill set or comfort zone then I don’t touch it . It could be a machine or or an installation or or some mechanical repair . Hired this recently to remove several tree stumps . No safety advice offered ,, no questions of competency in using this equipment , no safety equipment offered but had my own., common sense told me to keep away from the huge spinning blade and keep said blade away from anything other than the tree stumps . Now imagine the outcome of a lesser minded person …

I'd be willing to bet you could find several videos on YT about "when stump grinders go wrong" or something similar.
There is no vetting on YT about what one can present and that's fine but this puts the onus on the viewer to have a half a brain minimum. Unfortunately this can't be policed and judging by the comments under many videos, this minimum is rarely met.
What you end up with is potentially dangerous videos viewed by those who don't know any better.
What could possibly go wrong?

 

[Bingy man]

I'd be willing to bet you could find several videos on YT about "when stump grinders go wrong" or something similar.
There is no vetting on YT about what one can present and that's fine but this puts the onus on the viewer to have a half a brain minimum. Unfortunately this can't be policed and judging by the comments under many videos, this minimum is rarely met.
What you end up with is potentially dangerous videos viewed by those who don't know any better.
What could possibly go wrong?

Yes I agree , chainsaws , rotavators and lawnmowers and probably just about every tool available . A lot of these accidents are likely to be users of these types of machines and equipment by by those who have no idea on its safe use or simply don’t care or those that are just not fit to use such equipment due to alcohol drugs or both . A percentage of these accidents will be proffesional/amatures who got complacent or distracted etc in many cases ( imo) u tube etc is a short cut to save money by any means rather than pay a qualified tradesperson to do do the job safely . We all have our own limits and comfort zones and skill sets so by that we know when to say no or that I’m not doing that and of course this requires a modicum of intelligence and dynamic risk assessment . My own accident with a mains powered 9” angle grinder was because I was in a rush , didn’t fit the side handle , had removed the guard to repair the bracket , and I had put the grinder in a bag that had previously contained gypsum plaster and finally had plugged it into the mains with the trigger locked on . My own fault , luckily no limbs lost but several hours wasted at a/ e but a very valuable lesson that will never be repeated as looking back it was inevitable that it would end badly ..

 

[TheTiddles]

I doubt any pupil would be allowed to use a bandsaw at school now. I was allowed to use it and the lathes unsupervised in the fifth form but I was the only one at the time and that was 50+ years ago.
A friend of mine got a job for a major construction firm as a H&S inspector. In the pub everyone extracted the urine mercilessly but he came in one day with a large folder full of A4 pictures of horrific accidents and injuries and after everyone had seen them he made the point - every single one of them was easily preventable.

Yeah, they are.

 

[paulrbarnard]

Question...why do most US woodworking videos take 10,000 words when a British one will get the same message across in 100 ?

I immediately hit “don’t recommend” if the intro talking goes over 30 seconds.

 

[Stigmorgan]

I like to watch as many videos as I can when I get a new tool, for instance when I got my bandsaw a few weeks ago I hit YouTube for all the videos I could find, mainly for instructions on use, maintenence and setting up but it does no harm to watch the accidents vids too, knowing what could happen through common sense is all well and good but seeing it happen and seeing the potential harm that results really concretes into the mind the reasons safety measures are there.

 

[Ed Weber]

I like to watch as many videos as I can when I get a new tool, for instance when I got my bandsaw a few weeks ago I hit YouTube for all the videos I could find, mainly for instructions on use, maintenence and setting up but it does no harm to watch the accidents vids too, knowing what could happen through common sense is all well and good but seeing it happen and seeing the potential harm that results really concretes into the mind the reasons safety measures are there.

Yes but the accident in the OP video was 100% avoidable, strictly operator error. To me, these are not helpful at all. Especially with no good explanation of how to perform the task safely.

Whatever you do, please be safe

 

[Ttrees]

The things people do, bye bye clampie!