What's the craziest thing you've ever seen in a shop?

What’s the craziest thing you’ve ever seen in a shop? An insane number of wild stories from this post. We included a few of our favorites below, but it’s worth checking out the group thread in Facebook to read all of them if you have time. Naturally there are a lot of stories about accidents and injuries…

Top comments include:

• “I once seen a guy at a union shop not sitting down. Crazy stuff”

• “The craziest thing I ever saw in a machine shop was a drill operator that had long hair and the hair got her caught up in the drill and yanked a chunk of hair out of his head. That was one. Another thing I also witnessed was a horizontal mill operator slicing parts with a 10 gang saw arbor, as he is wiping the vice down as the saw blades are cutting, it sucks in the rag and pulls his hand along with it, with his fingers going through the saw blades. It was a bloody gruesome sight, but they were able to save his fingers. On another note the saw blades were spaced .425 wide.”

• “I once watched a 1”diameter, approx 3” tall piece of metal being used in a 75ton hydraulic press to press out something, i forget exactly what it was. it launched and hit the dude in the chest, and broke one of his ribs. now, to this day, i hold a sheet of 1/4” steel in front of the press when I’m using it.

• “A glove picked up out of the chip pan with three fingers in it and lots of tendons hanging out, two compound fractures in forearm to go with it. Also seen a person step on the wrong foot pedal and run a live center straight through her hand.”

• “I watched a secondary employee operating a chucker, he got his finger tip in the chuck... it turned on and snapped the finger at the second knuckle then slurped the entire 14+ inch long extender tendon out of his arm.

  This was about 20 feet from me.”

• “I saw an electrician pick up a broom and clean up after himself.”

  • “Pictures or it never happened”

  • “I call BS”

• “The aftermath of a fire by arson, at my shop is by far the craziest thing I’ve seen in a shop.”

• “I worked all day with a guy, maybe 10 hours, he didn’t complain once! It was nuts!”

• “Watched a gun drill used on an old vertical roughing mill with no enclosure Operator started the spindle without putting the drill into the pilot hole and launched a .437” dia gundrill fly about 75ft like a missile through an office window on our 2nd floor missing the sales guy’s chair about a foot”

• “Got you all beat.... this was early in my career when I had to save a guy from literally getting threaded to death. Supposedly, this guy had years of experience but decided to squeeze thru a couple of machines to get to an area. But in between was the threaded stop chuck rod sticking out that was turning at 2000rpms. It caught his shirt and pulled him in and started threading into his back. I didn't see what was happening at the time until I heard loud screams. Immediately ran over to hit the reset on the machine. I acted within seconds of hearing his screams. If not so, the guy would have probably died. There was blood everywhere and his body tissue all over the place. I'll never forget that day and im sure he won't either”

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What’s your take on music in a shop?

Top comments include:

• “Personally, I don't ever. I like being able to hear the machine.”

• “Time and place, if you are listening to music while grinding or deep hole drilling etc. you deserve to get fired”

• “We’ve got 2 old tower speakers wall hung in our shop with a couple centre speakers parked below them. Some days when the energy’s low we’ll turn em up and have it pretty loud but there’s a time and place for it. Lots of Creed of course”

• “I always ask the people around me if its okay and if it bothers them to let me know and I will turn it down. I have to have music, honestly it helps me focus and some of the shops I work in are pretty quiet unless a machine is running. Music helps me focus and bust out orders ahead of time with accuracy. As long as you aren’t bothering others, I don’t see an issue.”

• “I use one headphone pretty much constantly. Helps me focus a ton, doesn’t bother anyone else, and I keep it low enough that I can hear everything I need to hear.”

• “Get some beats fit pros, the passive audio makes it so nice for listening to your music as well as being able to hear what’s going on in your mill.”

• “RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE!”

• “get some good IEMs(NOT earbuds/earphones). you can get the best music quality without having to crank the volume too high, that way you can still hear people and your machines.”

• “To work on metal you have to listen to metal 🤘”

Question of the Day⁉️

Are you supposed to grease the gear set?

Top responses include:

• “Light grease on the pinions and rack. Dry on the scroll and jaw teeth. Oil would run out of the gear area, but otherwise it stays pretty clean. You should be cleaning it about once a year or so, more frequently if you run alot of cast iron.”

• “Tellus 46 or equivalent”

• “Been machining 15 years never taken apart or greased a chuck.”

• “Yes, just a little bit of oil on those round gears in that back section. You didn’t need to pull that back section off to clean the scroll. The scroll is the front part that the jaws slide in and out on you just take the jaws out and then you blow out the scrolls That should’ve been fine. Those chips should never been back where you were looking at.”

• “Been using these 50 years. Tear down maintenance is just a fact of machinist life. Light grease or heavy oil used sparingly in appropriate locations inside a must. Coolant and part materials big factor. If you load the chuck heavy or use cheat bars to tighten stock plan to replace chuck every 3 to 5 years. Once the jaw slots and scroll get worn you'll know it.”

• “I always put grease inside, graphite type not much spread it around a thin, oil is pointless it will spin out quickly. ANY new chuck if disassembled from the factory will have grease inside. Grease does make the chips stick, regular maintenance, (Cleaning and Light grease) will give you the best of both smooth and accurate operation.”

• “I don't know shit! But apparently the actual jaw pressure decreases when it's not greased. I've run them dry for years, I've run them greased. Never threw a part, so there you go”

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Funny Post of the Day 🤣🤣🤣

Machinists with questions or advice 🤔

⁉️ I’m new to setup. Other than don’t crash the machine, what advice can you give me?

⁉️What are the best ear protection headphones?

⁉️ How are your old CNC machines still competitive?