Tractor/pto death

[b249]

Had a local farm hand get killed yesterday (27 years working on the same farm...not a rookie). He was wearing loose fitting sleaves with a pair of coveralls when he got his hand/arm too close to the pto shat that did not have the protective sleeve on it. Ripped his arm off & he is d.r.t.

I feel bad for his family and coworkers for this needless death.

 

[Youare]

A few years ago my brother-in-law was asked to check on a fellow who was using a PTO driven saw mill behind his house in the woods. It was past the time he was usually home so the wife of this guy was concerned and called my brother-in-law asking him to see if he was still there.

Well, when he got to the site he found the guy had gotten a piece af clothing caught in the PTO shaft, the details I will leave out, he was dead.

Even a compact tractor PTO has enough power to do a person in, maybe there should be a kill switch located in the 3PH area for those who don't think they need to turn off the PTO while doing something back there.

Randy

 

[b249]

Incidents like these happen too quick, there would not be time to flip a switch. 'Spose you could use a lanyard type kill switch like on boats, but by the time the lanyard tightens enough the damage has all ready been done and the pto shaft has been neatly (or not so neatly) wrapped with whatever the person was wearing.

I would imagine that by the time he realized he did something really, really wrong he only had the time to think "aw #$%^"

 

[reedfish1954]

A real tragedy. Moral of the story is "turn the tractor's PTO OFF when performing maintence.

 

[Soundguy]

I guess that is why we don't see belt/pulley attatchments much anymore... but there are still a few stationary attatchments like generators / pumps, etc that could give cause for alarm..

Soundguy

 

[Kiohio]

Just an aside, Are the stay chains on your PTOs intact? Or do you use them?
KO

 

[b249]

yes to both, although I have had to repair them a few times. The plastic hole on the pto does not seem to have a very long lifespan. Incidents like this push me away from taking the lazy way out.

Mark

 

[frank_f15]

i wonder if they could put a kill switch on the seat, if the pto is engaged and u get off the tractor the engine quits, this is the way my GT works, if attachment clutch is engaged , get off the tracto and it dies. not sure if this would be practicle for tractors tho.. am sure there must be some apps. where it is necessary to get off tractor, and still have equiptment running. i guess no matter how safe things are made thered is no replacement for common sense.

 

[gerard]

think you answered you own question - you could put a kill switch on and just about every farmer out there would disable it. Lot of times you need the pto running with tractor unattended ie no one in seat. Running generator, silage blower are tow applications that come to mind....... I'd rather not see more "safety" features built into equipment as they will NEVER replace common sense OR protect one from oneself. I prefer to see safety equipment which prevents accidents due to mechanical failure, not human error. I really don't need a guard on a snowblower chute because too many idiots don't shut the engine down while clearing a clog and chew up their hand.

 

[MJB]

My JD4300 has a safety switch like that. If the PTO is engaged and the operator gets out of the seat the tractor will shut down. There is also a procedure you can follow in order to operate the PTO without an operator in the seat, although I don't remember exactly what the steps are right now.

 

[sleepyhollow]

MJB,

I'm sure you will remember and have done it before, but for anyone else wondering the steps for activating the rear PTO (can't do this with mid PTO) when not in the seat are:

1. While in seat, assuming engine is off, put transmission in neutral
- Gear Models: Fully depress clutch pedal and move transmission gear and range shift levers to the neutral position.
- ePowrReverser: move the reverser lever to the neutral position.
- eHydro: move range shift lever to the "N" (neutral) position

2. Lock the park brake

3. Push the mid and rear PTO knobs to the off position

4. Start the engine and set RPM to 1500

5. Get out of the seat and pull the rear PTO knob to the on position.

Sleepyhollow

 

[Anonymous Poster]

To sleepyhollow's post I'll add:

6. Assume it's trying to kill you, and act accordingly.

I had a friend lose a finger once, and now realize just how lucky he was. Particularly with cold weather coming, loose clothing may be the biggest danger. I have had my shirt sleeve pulled into a bench grinder buffing wheel before, but fortunately I am much bigger than it is and it stalled the motor. My tractor wouldn't even slow down.

 

[NIXON]

It's always bad to hear of such things . While I have very little experience with farm equipment, I do have a lot (22 yrs.) of experience around aircraft . I learned right off the bat to keep my sleeves rolled up , if I had to weargloves ,they were tight fitting with no loose gauntlets ,I never wore a hood . This is even when the weather was COLD . As in Grand Forks N D ! manage to keep all my extremeties ! any piece of machinery ,while making work easier can,and will bite you if you get complacent
Having said that.... I did manage to break my left thumb twice while box blading with a ford 3000 . After that I learned to keep my thumbs away from the steering wheel spokes !

 

[MossRoad]

Speaking of aircraft... who designs those things???

Hmm, lets put the auxiliary power plug on the side of the engine compartment between the leading edge of the wing and the prop!

(7 Years at FBOs, several as line chief, saw lots of scary things, left with no permanent injuries)

 

[NIXON]

they're designed by folks that don't intend to work on them ... TOO Dangerous
My favorite bit of design was the jet fuel starter exhaust on the A-7 . It pointed directly to the ground... the same place the starter dumped it's fuel ,if ground crew forgot to empty the holding tank .... . Got real good real fast with a fire extinguisher ! Happy Thanksgiving to all , John

 

[Soundguy]

<font color=blue>Speaking of aircraft... who designs those things???
Hmm, lets put the auxiliary power plug on the side of the engine compartment between the leading edge of the wing and the prop!

<font color=black>Being an engineer myself, I always get bent out of shape when I see something like you are talking about.. something designed to be a problem.

For instance... I just had to remove/re-install the starter on my 1952 ford 8N tractor. This is one of those tasks that there are legends and myths about. ( about how much a pain it is! )
For instance, right behind the starter is a brass petcock installed in the block to drain coolant. It is so close to bloomin starter that you can barely get a wrench on it.. and then you get about 1/8th inch of travel... but it must come out, or the starter aint. ( the irony is that there is an area about 8" x 4" behind this petcock where it could have been put, and be out of the way....
The starter itself is some sort of evil mechanics rube goldberg device. The 'bendix' does not have a shroud, instead, the shroud is part of the engine casting around the ring gear... and generally, at some time in the tractors life, someone has had to grind part of that casting off to remove/replace the starter, as you have no room to work.. as the steering drag link passes parallel to the starter, and just below and parallel to the starter is the steering radious rod...
Incedentally.. I just had to r/r mine this morning..... If I could have had 5 minutes in a locked room with the eng'r that came up with that configuration....well.. it wouldn't have been pretty...
In my opinion.. bad design is lazyness, or ineptness.... I still can't decide if the ford eng'r was lazy or inept.. ( or both! )

Soundguy

 

[Egon]

Soundguy:

I firmly beleive that all design engineers should be mandated to assemble and disassemble their product with an ordinary tool box in minus 20 F weather with a 20 mph wind blowing.

Egon

 

[wroughtn_harv]

Soundguy I've decided we're caught twixt and tween.

For many many years now I've accepted the fact that design engineers all married girls whose mothers were mechanics. We pay the price.

 

[GlennT]

Decades ago when threshing machines were used for harvesting grain there were some really horror stories about farmers getting caught in belts--especially that big drive belt. That monster could literally cut you in half. Also, the machines would plug up and then it was necessary to open them up and pull out wads of straw. If someone was careless and started up the machine, it got to be a real mess. No survivor benefits for the widows and children, either.

 

[jhburke]

THat is like what I use to hear about airplane mechanics. I was told years ago that after a mechanic worked on a plane. On the test flight of the plane the mechanic had to go along as a passenger. I think that would make a person be very sure of what they did.