This post is long but it contains some things that I feel need to be said. I have seen posts recently, both here and on some other forums I visit, that indicate to me that people aren't really being as careful as they should be. Things like "Is this glue really not toxic" or "Should I use a respirator / spray booth" or "How do I adjust my compressor". These are things that you should be aware of BEFORE you start using them, and it bothers me that people are taking unnecessary chances.
This is one of those hobbies that can be as safe or dangerous as you allow it to be. In my 40-odd years of building models, it can safely be said that I have done every stupid thing you can imagine. I have cut myself with razor knives and saws, I have ground myself with Dremel tools, I've painted most of my body at one time or another, I've breathed enough paint and glue to choke a mule, I've glued fingers together, parts to fingers, fingers to benches and tools, you name it. I was in the emergency room once as a kid to have a piece of styrene removed from my right eye that came blasting off the sprue when I clipped it. The sad thing is that every single one of these could have been avoided if I had been just a little bit more careful.
I'm sure there are dozens of safety-related stories that can be added, and I encourage everyone to do so. If we keep one person from getting hurt it makes it worthwhile.
CHEMICALS ...
We use a lot of different chemicals when building models; paint, glue, accelerators, soap, decal solutions, Future, etc, etc, etc. Some of these chemicals are labeled as being "Non-Toxic" but are they? Manufacturers are in business to sell their products. They would not sell many if they had labels like "This stuff will kill you dead!" so they sugar-coat it with ambiguous terms like "Safe when used as directed" or "Use adequate ventilation" or "Avoid prolonged exposure". Well, what is "Adequate" ventilation? A 10,000 cfm vacuum fan directly over your head with particulate and organic vapor separation? Or is it just simply opening a window? "Adequate Ventilation" is an ambiguous term and simply protects the manufacturer from liability. I can hear it in the courtroom now, "Well, apparently he didn’t use 'Adequate' ventilation." Same for "Avoid Prolonged Exposure". How long is "Prolonged"? A day? An hour? A Minute? Again, this protects the manufacturer without coming right out and stating that their chemical may be harmful. How about "Used As Directed"? Every sprayed Future on a model? That isn't "Used As Directed" for a floor product that was meant to be poured on a floor and then spread out with a mop.
Another thing to keep in mind is that in many cases the manufacturers have no idea what the long-term consequences of using their product are going to be. After WWII there were several deaths among women across the country. People across the country die every day so nobody thought much about it, but the cause of death of these women was unusual. It wasn't until several years later that someone managed to put the pieces together. All of these women had worked for the same division of the same plant during the war. When the war was over, the plant closed, and the women scattered across the country. The plant made watches, and the job these women had was to paint the numerals on the watch faces with paint that glowed in the dark. The numerals were small, so to paint them accurately the women normally licked the tips of their paint brushes to keep the bristles tight. The chemical that caused the paint to glow was radium and these women all died from radium poisoning.
The bottom line is this: If it's not pure water it is probably dangerous in some way. It probably should not be put in your mouth or breathed or spilled on your skin. Are glue fumes toxic if you sit there and breathe them all day long? Probably! Is acrylic paint non-toxic? It probably won't hurt to swallow a little bit, but acrylic is a form of plastic and coating the inside of your lungs with a coat of plastic is not a good idea! Should I be using a respirator or spray booth or fan? Yes, you certainly should be!
I'm as guilty as anyone else about not using my respirator all the time, but we should. The chemicals we use are not completely safe and we should all exercise caution when using them. Use your head. Keep a fan blowing to keep fumes away from your face. If you are spraying paint, do it outside or use a respirator or spray booth. If you use a respirator, check your mask and cartridges! They do no good if they aren't working.
SANDING AND GRINDING ...
Some people stop and think about this, most don't. Ever noticed that when you sand a bunch of plastic off a piece that there is a bunch of dust on your hands and the model? Of course you have. That dust HAS to be removed before you can paint the piece! Ever wondered how much of it went in your lungs? If it's in the air you are breathing it so part of it went in your lungs. How about your eyes? Your eyes are moist and snag dust out of the air all the time, so part of that plastic dust is getting in your eyes.
I've seen a lot of cautions here about sanding resin kits. People are good about cautioning people that the dust from resin parts is harmful and to use a particle mask while sanding it. That is very commendable, but I have yet to see a post that reminds people to clean up their workspace after sanding. You sit there happily sanding away on your resin parts for a couple of hours wearing your mask the whole time. You get done, take the mask off, dust yourself off, and go upstairs (or downstairs or whatever). When you started moving around you stirred up the dust that was on the floor and bench and your clothes, but you had already taken your mask off to. So why did you bother to wear it while sanding?
Clean up your work area when you are done. Vacuum it if possible, take some damp paper towels and pick up the dust. It doesn't take long and it makes wearing that dust mask worth the effort.
EYE PROTECTION ...
And of course there are the infamous Dremel tool stories. Everyone has one, everyone has seen their share of plastic shredded and cutoff wheels shattered. Everyone has also seen the labels that say "Use Eye Protection" but how many actually do?
Those of us who wear glasses feel that we already have adequate eye protection, but are your glasses impact and shatter resistant? Yes, you say? Notice I said "Resistant" and not impact and shatter "Proof". "Resistant" is yet another ambiguous phrase that manufacturers like to use. Define "Resistant". A plastic bag is "Resistant" to impact from a feather, but that's about all. By definition though, a manufacturer could claim their plastic bags to be "Impact Resistant" since they don't have to specify what impact is used. A cutoff wheel in a Dremel tool that shatters and slaps you in the face will most assuredly go right through an eyeball unless there is something there to stop it.
I shoot pistol competitions, so the reality of "Impact Resistant" has been shown to me. There is no telling how many times I've had shards of gilding metal bounce off my glasses when people are shooting steel, or chips of rock kicked up. I will ONLY use glasses made of polycarbonate because I know for a fact that it can withstand some pretty good impact. I have also used Lexan (polycarbonate) body shells on R/C cars that I used to race, so I have seen what this stuff can hold up to.
Get some safety glasses. Use them! The old adage that you only have one pair of eyes is just an adage until you lose one of them. Luckily I've managed to hold onto both of mine, but sometimes I wonder how. As I mentioned at the top of this post, I went to the emergency room once to have a piece of styrene removed from an eye. What really brought it home to me was an incident once. I was holding a small part with some tweezers and had just put a small drop of CA glue on it. It shot out of the tweezers, naturally. Luckily I found this piece. It wasn't hard. It was stuck to my glasses right in front of my eye. I have learned that wearing safety glasses is the best insurance I can possibly buy.
KNIVES AND SAWS ...
The only reason I include this section is because it is so obvious. I have been cut, gouged, sliced, sawed, hacked, and everything else. The sad thing is that every single incident could have been avoided if I had been paying attention to what I was doing. Do I even need to say that razor knives and saws are dangerous? Be careful with them, please.
COMPRESSED AIR ...
Those of us who airbrush are familiar with compressed air in one form of another, but we also tend to take it for granted.
I've mentioned this story a couple of times on this forum, but it bears repeating because it makes a point. My college machine shop had two patches in the concrete block wall. The first day of class the instructor made a point of telling everyone where those patches came from. The smaller of the two was from a horizontal milling machine that used a magnetic chuck to hold the material. Someone forgot to engage the magnetic chuck and the part he was milling was shot right through the wall. The larger of the two, about two feet square, was caused by an oxygen tank that someone carelessly knocked over. It hit a bench and broke the valve off. The pressure in the tank caused if to fly around the shop until it finally hit the wall and broke it.
Any gas under pressure is DANGEROUS when it is released. This includes compressors, hoses, fittings, CO2 tanks, propellant cans, even paint spray cans. Everything that contains any form of compressed gas has a maximum pressure rating, and that rating tends to get lower as time goes by. Hoses get old and brittle, tanks get rusty, and pressure limits go down. If you exceed the maximum pressure of a component you are probably not going to like the results of what happens.
Compressors normally come with an instruction booklet. This booklet has some important safety considerations included in it. Did you read yours? I didn't because I'm just like everyone else. Hoses and fittings have a pressure rating and if you exceed it they can rupture. Hobby-type compressors seldom produce enough pressure to cause problems, but general purpose compressors like many of us use are certainly capable of doing so. My compressor pressurizes the tank to 140 psi, but my hoses and fittings are rated at 90 psi. You need to check things like this because the only person who can insure that you are safe is you.
Rust is a common enemy of compressors and air tanks. Any time you compress air the moisture that is always present in air is squeezed out and condenses in the tank. If the water is left in the tank it will cause rust which will weaken the walls of the tank. Drain your compressor daily, or if you use an air tank, drain it each time you refill it. Check your hoses occasionally. Bend them into a tight loop and see if they look frayed or split. If they are, replace them. Compressor tanks have a safety valve on them. Check to insure that it is working properly on a regular basis.
AND FINALLY ...
Above all, use your head. Don't assume that everything is safe, insure that it is. Don't concentrate so hard on building your model that you forget to take care of yourself.
Everone feel free to expand on these topics and add your experiences. Knowledge is power!