Log splitter injury (no pics)

[ruffdog]

Did it look like this ring finger?

 

[s219]

Hard to say. I had a 4cm laceration from the tip around to the side, open to the bone, then a smaller laceration on the pad. Nail stayed attached to bed. Be interesting to hear what the surgeon thinks tomorrow. I don't even want to look at it -- had enough the other night.

 

[ruffdog]

With mine the bone in the tip was crushed, the nail was mostly off, and tissue blew out the side. The hand surgeon removed the nail, sewed up the open nail bed with dissolving sutures, sewed up the blown out side, trimmed the nail and used 4 stitches to temporally hold it on for protection.

PS...good luck!

 

[gwstang]

Yeow! Glad it wasn't much worse. I am very careful with my fingers/hands as I like to play guitar/piano a lot. I try to remind myself as I start working with my tractor/wood splitter/PHD/bush hog that this can kill me or make me wish I was dead. Been doing that for years. As you said, it is hard to be more careful when teetering on exhaustion (which I usually am when doing those last minute chores). My splitter has pinched me a couple of times and kicked the split pieces out hard enough to leave a mark or two, but nothing serious. I have wondered if anyone has ever been killed when splitting a large hard piece with knots? Those take so much more power and I can hear it grinding in and the force build up and up and...blam! It rips it. Those are usually where a limb was at or grown off. Scares me a little for sure. That pow noise after the build up is sort of a tense moment...almost compared to going in to see the proctologist and he pops that latex glove on and says, "bend over". He has that popping on of the gloves down to an art of presenting the biggest of anticipation....almost like an opera build up to the finale...lol. ......And-Then-The-Fat-Lady-Sings and it's all over. My neighbor across the road was splitting and smushed his hand up getting in a hurry one evening. Said it hurt like a mother ****er.
I've learned that a smart man learns from his makes....but a wise man learns from others mistake. I'm still working on the last one, the older I get. I look at an unsafe situation that someone else has attempted and immediately said that was gonna leave a big mark (scars). :duh:

 

[troutsqueezer]

After thirty years of splitting wood, I split my last piece this last summer. When I shut the splitter down it was not lost on me how lucky I was never to have had any kind of accident over all that time. I'm glad it's over.

 

[ultrarunner]

I won't let people use my splitter... if they are a friend... I do it.

Splitter travels with me... last thing I want to hear is the kids wanted to help and had an accident.

I do encourage them to do a lot of things... age appropriate.

All I need to do is tell them about the accident their great grandfather had and that's enough to dissuade them.

 

[PhysAssist]

I won't let people use my splitter... if they are a friend... I do it.

Splitter travels with me... last thing I want to hear is the kids wanted to help and had an accident.

I do encourage them to do a lot of things... age appropriate.

All I need to do is tell them about the accident their great grandfather had and that's enough to dissuade them.

We have been heating with woodsince we bought our house in 8/1994, and used a combo platter of rented, borrowed, and finally our own splitter, as well as a whole bunch of hand splitting [which I have been doing off and on since my teens], and aside from minor dings and scratches, neither ofcus got hurt except once I got my left ring finger caught between a twisted piece of wood and the splitter table, causing a tiny, but stable crush fracture of my bone, the only effect of which was that I could no longer wear my wedding ring.

So I got one tattooed on instead.

The last October, I dropped an 16" diameter x 18" long ash log on my left big toe.

Now it's well healed, but 8 weeks limping around in a cast shoe put my back out, and I have been going to the chiropractor once a week since then trying to get it back to rights.



All it takes is a moment of inattention or relaxation of the safety rules, and potentially a lifetime of regrets can follow.

God bless and watch over us all, and the OP will be in our prayers for a complete recovery.

Thokas

 

[LD1]

I could no longer wear my wedding ring.

So I got one tattooed on instead.

Got one of those as well. Only mine was not due to injury, rather to prevent injury. The work that I do, and places that I work, do not allow rings. Either getting caught in moving machinery or working in electrical panels are good reasons not to wear one. So the wife and I got them tattooed. Seems to be a popular thing now a days

 

[PhysAssist]

Got one of those as well. Only mine was not due to injury, rather to prevent injury. The work that I do, and places that I work, do not allow rings. Either getting caught in moving machinery or working in electrical panels are good reasons not to wear one. So the wife and I got them tattooed. Seems to be a popular thing now a days

I also considered my work in getting mine, but mine was because of scrubbing for surgeries- I had to take it off a lot and frequently forgot to grab it off of or out of my surgical scrubs until hours later, leading to having to sort/search through a hamper filled with others' sweaty used scrubs- that alone would have been enough, but the finger fracture was the last straw.

Does your SWMBO have tattoo too?

Mine got hers with me [10 years into our currently 24 yr marriage] because she has a medical issue that made her have to take hers off too.

Back to thread for this:
Having had the toe injury, and spending way too much time explaining dings and divots out of my hands and arms from log handling, I have finally committed to wearing my steel-toed shoes and bought some kevlar gloves and arm sleeves, and they have done a lot toward reducing the incidental/collateral damage to the skin of my arms and hands.

 

[jerrybob]

Interesting log splitter here........looks a little dangerous.....


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3TnPAGyx12Y