Oops (Warning: contains a bit of blood, but mostly iodine).

Emp_Fab

3 stitches needed.  The anaesthetic didn't take very well so I could only take the pain of two.  However, the injections into the finger hurt more.

I very narrowly escaped slicing through a tendon by all accounts.

The result of a stupid mistake drilling through sheet metal which bit into the drill bit and turned into a rapidly spinning blade.

Strat_a_tat_tat

Ouch.
Hope you're OK.

boogieman

Which is why you should always clamp light stuff down before you drill it. Glad you’re ok, that could’ve been so much worse. 

chillidoggy

Oh, dear! On first glance I thought you were about to pick up a discarded cheese and tomato pizza.

Instead of which I note you’re intent on disproving my long-held view that the older you get, the more aware of your own mortality you become. Get a grip, man. Literally!

Emp_Fab

When he did the stitches, it stung when the needle went in, but puncturing the skin coming up from the inside on the other side of the gap..... holy fucking shitballs.  It was a 'biting my lip, kicking the bed, shouting "JEEEEEESUSmuthafuckingbastardyeeeaaaaaaarrrrrgggggggggghhhhhhhhh - SHIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIITTTT !!!!" moment that brought a nurse running to the room to see what was going on!  

I'm pretty sure the anaesthetic didn't work very well as it hurt just as much as you would expect.

Kilgore

Just out of curiosity. What were you making and are you going to finish it? 

Kittyfrisk

I initially thought you'd just been getting carried away biting your fingernails. Bad habit, stop it immediately.
Hope you make a rapid recovery.

Danny1969

I did that once, didn't come off so badly for me but it did teach me to stand of a piece and drill it of no clamps or vice was handy. 
I strangled my fingers once, I was removing some screws from some reclaimed timber and a thread on my glove got caught in the 18V Hitachi driver and garrotted 2 of my fingers on my left hand, Thankfully the glove material snapped before my fingers were completely fucked. Ones never been the same since though. 

Emp_Fab

Kilgore said:

Just out of curiosity. What were you making and are you going to finish it? 

I was drilling a hole in a round piece of 0.5mm sheet to take a light fitting to mount in a large metal can being used as a lightshade.  I was initially going to rivet the sheet into the can then drill the hole for the fitting but because I'm a messy, disorganised twat, and found the rivet gun but couldn't find the rivets, I decided to glue the adapter plate I was making into the can instead.  Being impatient and also unsure if the glue would hold while drilling the hole, I opted to drill the ~30mm hole first.  So, I'm trying to drill a ~30mm hole in a ~90mm Ø piece of 0.5mm sheet steel, using a step-drill bit in a pillar drill.

That alone should have rang alarm bells.  Moreso when I tried holding the 90mm disc onto a block of wood as a drilling base and it spun shortly afterwards, cutting my left thumb.  After I patched that up, I thought it would be safer to hold the disc with two pairs of pliers and push it upwards into the bit (as I now have no free hand to operate the drill-press lever).  This worked for about ten seconds until the drill bit dug into the piece and it started spinning.  The jolt of the bit digging in knocked the pliers out of my right hand which then made contact with the very sharp edges of the now rapidly spinning disc of agony.

I'm detailing the accident here as self-punishment for my sheer idiocy.  I am normally Mr Safety....  I get the right kit, the right safety gear and do things properly.  This time I was lazy and impatient, so took a chance - and it bit me.  Indeed, it could have been significantly worse and I'm very lucky to have escaped with just a deep cut on one finger.

guitars4you

urrrrrgh - Stomach turning time - Hope recovery is all good

Kilgore

Ouch!! 

It does sound like it could have been a lot worse. Glad you're OK. 

Emp_Fab

Thank you for all the good wishes.  I am getting a little concerned now as the tip of my finger is pretty numb.  I loosened the dressing in case it was just a bloodflow thing but it made no difference.  I hope I haven't got nerve damage.  That's my right-hand index fingertip - it gets used for most things! 

Budgie

Ack! That looks pretty nasty. I hope it heals well.

Isn’t it always the case, that the one time you just ‘risk it’, it ends with regret! When I ran a landscaping business, I used to berate anyone I saw not lifting safely. Then one day, I was laying some paving in an awkward spot and had to lift one of the slabs to reposition it. Rather than standing up and doing it correctly, I risked moving it while kneeling down and had to twist to move it. Bang! My back is still fooked to this day... that must have been over ten years ago.

LastMantra

Hope you're OK and there's no permanent damage!
I had an accident involving a petrol hedge cutter and my finger tips. The nerves never fully recovered. 
Just try and let it heal as cleanly as possible, my fingers aren't bad but a little deformed now too. Makes it hard to play guitar cleanly. Near impossible actually for open "cowboy chords".

This thread should be stickied. Someone posted a vid of a popular pedal builder doing the same thing not long ago didn't they? ALWAYS CLAMP!!! This isn't a freak incident, it WILL snag.

dano

Is that your wanking hand ? If so use the left and it'll feel like a different woman.

WiresDreamDisasters

dano said:

Is that your wanking hand ? If so use the left and it'll feel like a different woman.

As a lefty, I can say... this is absolutely true.

Philly_Q

I hope you make a swift recovery Emp, but I think there should be a warning in the thread title, I almost threw up when I saw the picture and gave in to the temptation to read what had happened.

WiresDreamDisasters

Philly_Q said:

I hope you make a swift recovery Emp, but I think there should be a warning in the thread title, I almost threw up when I saw the picture and gave in to the temptation to read what had happened.

I would guess that most of what you're seeing is just iodine.

Emp_Fab

Indeed most of it is iodine.  The clinician covered up the blood pool with the dressings as I found out after taking the pic.  There's not much blood there really.

Stratavarious

Ouch.. 

duotone

Ouch.
Good luck with your recovery.