Buying Hand Tools. Part 4 - Hand Tools are Safe, Right?
Hands behind the cutting edge. Every. Single. Time.
Power tools and machines have earned a reputation for danger and missing digits. Hand tools are portrayed as a safe and romantic way to work. Is that right, or even fair? Here’s some things you’ll need to consider to stay safe in home workshop and I have an interesting story for you at the end.
You don’t need machines yet. Period. This is great news! Machines are excellent and might become the backbone of your home workshop. But when starting out they bring noise, dust and increased risk.
Power tools aren’t needed either, apart from perhaps one. You might even have this one already. A cordless drill driver is all you’ll need. You won’t need noisy impact drivers, just a plane Jane drill driver is fine. My drill driver was picked up from my local supermarket and does a great job.
They are relatively safe, but please, read your instruction manual and follow all the safety guidance. Here’s the basic safety message with a drill driver. Don’t have your hand(s) in line with where a drill bit or screw will project. People have, a will continue to drill into their hands because they don’t clamp things properly. Appropriate safety glasses are essential too, especially when drilling.
So then we’re onto our hand tools. They’re safe, right? Wrong! Hand tools have the potential to hurt you very badly. A classic is injuries resulting from poor use of the chisel. I’ll cover plenty of good practices I adopt in future posts, but here’s 5 Safety Tips For Hand Tools.
Treat edge tools (chisels, plane irons, gouges) like loaded guns without a safety catch and a dicky trigger. ALWAYS keep you hands behind the cutting edge.
Keep hand tools secure. Review your situation. For instance, if young children can access your workspace having your hand tools locked and secured is a good idea.
Keep sharp. Dull edge tools take much more effort to use and therefore, loosing control and badly hurting yourself becomes much more likely.
Use both hands. Spoke shaves and drawknives are designed to be used with both hands on the tool. Avoid waving your hands about. The long exposed cutting edges present real danger.
Stout shoes and no shorts. I always wear jeans and boots in the shop. An edge tool falling from the bench or something heavy dropping on your foot, It only needs to happen once and you can end up with broken toes or a nasty gash taken out of your leg.
That list isn’t exclusive and please feel free to add your own tips in the comments. I feel we can be ignorant of good safety practice with hand tools because they seem romantic, but ignorance is rarely bliss.
Make sure your shots are up to date, tetanus etc. At some point the skin will get broken and it’s good to know you’re protected. Which leads us neatly to the next thing, a properly stocked first aid kit and some knowledge of first aid. Sounds boring, right? Not to me. Excited to spend £300 pounds on a smoothing plane but not willing to learn to keep yourself safe? Sounds idiotic to me. These resources can be found for free too, see below.
And that story I mentioned. Well, during my time at work I’ve seen people get hurt with hand tools but thankfully very rarely have I seen issues with power tools or machines. The worst injury I can recall was suffered by the most talented person I’ve worked with. The injury follows a certain template, over confidence leading to complacency. While using a wide and sharp chisel the craftsman slipped and the long 50mm cutting edge slid into their thumb creating a nasty and deep cut that required stiches. It could have been even worse, a tendon cut, a cut across the wrists, it doesn’t bear thinking about. Thankfully there was a full recovery. If it can happen to one of the most skilled people I’ve ever worked with, it can happen to anyone.
Woodworking is inherently dangerous and hand tools can lull us into a false sense of security due to their often quiet and relaxing way to work. But regardless of your tools being plugged or unplugged, you have to be responsible for your own safety and the safety of those around you.