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Use a respirator or dust mask as much as you can bear too. (Bob Maulucci)
Also vital is a pair of $6 rubber gloves specifically designed for handling sharp glass and metal and available at any OSH. These are the only gloves I've found that bamboo will not cut through and are worth their weight in gold. I also warn folks in my household when I'm about to use bevelers, table saws, lathes and other types of potentially dangerous power tools. I ask that they refrain from coming in the shop until I'm finished. This started when I was surprised a few times by someone standing behind me without me knowing it due to all the noise. This can very dangerous to yourself and them be surprised like that. I would add that they might consider checking on you if there is a long period of silence and I have a habit of emerging from the shop beaming proudly or cursing loudly about how the project went. This also lets them know the coast is clear. As that Sergeant on Hill Street Blues used to say..."Hey, Be Careful Out There." (Chris Wohlford the Ultimate Bamboo Fly Rod Library)
Many of the folks who are taking up rodmaking these days aren't tool users by trade and aren't as familiar with the damage these things can do as those of us who work with them every day and I don't want to see anyone get damaged by using a power tool in an inappropriate way. Sharp objects are inheritantly dangerous anyway, use them enough and you will get bit, it is not a matter of IF, it is a matter of WHEN and HOW BAD, that part is up to the user, I know because I have the scars and the hospital bills to prove it. Fortunately for me, I'm a 50 year old carpenter who still has all his fingers full length (although a couple won't stand up straight anymore). (John Channer)
A couple of absolute rules in my shop are:
I fully realize that I may be out of line saying the aforementioned (preaching to the choir?) but for my own peace of mind, I had to say it. Fortunately, most of the lathes being used are small ones and are not overly powerful, but you can still get hurt real bad, real quick !! So much for my 2 cents worth! (Mike Shaffer) Mike, thanks for saying that. It was a good reminder. Now, here is my question: many years ago in shop we learned that metal shavings should be kept separate from other trash because when soaked with oil they can combust. I remembered this right after I vacuumed a bunch of nickel silver shavings off the lathe and bench. Has anyone had any experience with this? Under what conditions can this occur? Do I need to worry about the shop vac bursting into flame? (Jeff Schaeffer) I don't think nickel silver will burn under any conditions, nor will brass. Steel, however, will burn rapidly when very finely divided, as in 0000 steel wool. Does not need to be oil soaked, either. Go outside with a fourth of a steel wool pad (no, not if you're in the drought and fire-stricken areas), tease it apart and light it. Be ready to drop it into a bucket or something. The finer, the more likely to burn. I'll never forget this, as my Army reserve unit was given a failing score on an annual inspection because of what one inspector believed was a very serious safety violation - personally, I could not get too excited about 2 steel wool pads, especially since they were 00. Protested the gig as unrealistic, given all the other really nasty stuff we had, and higher HQ agreed with me. Even so, my rear took months to recover after the ripping from the Col. Also aluminum shavings will burn when finely divided, and we all recall what magnesium can do. The critical issue in all 3 cases is not just that they will burn, but that the rate of heat release is very high; i.e., they go fast! This property is what makes Christmas trees so dangerous, they release a huge amount of heat very rapidly, much faster than most other materials can absorb and dissipate it, therefore other things ignite, too. (Carey Mitchell) I learned from my father (a millwright) to use electrical tape to tape the chuck key to the end of the power cord near where it plugs into the wall for anything that uses a chuck key. That way, you have to unplug the machine to use the chuck key, and you have to remove the chuck key to plug the machine back in. This has saved me several times when using my half-inch drill. (Claude Freaner) Great idea. I got a new (old) craftsman and I can't tell you how many times I've started it up and had the chuck key go whipping across the garage. I'm going out to tape it up now. (Mike Canazon)
I'm wondering if Todd would consent to add to his "Tip" section another section encapsulating some of the things that we have experienced. Maybe this will keep some of us from loosing body parts, poisoning ourselves or our families. (Don Anderson) Your mail and the one about the MEKO earlier prompts me to repost something I wrote a while back. I don't know how MEKO and MEK (methyl ethyl ketone) compare, but I recall reading that anyone with potential heart problems shouldn't go NEAR that stuff as it can cause spontaneous coronaries. I paid especial attention to that as my father-in-law is a do-it-yourselfer, he has a serious heart condition, and that's often used as a paint stripper. (Art Port)
At night, do not use the extreme left hand lane (fast lane) because MOST drunk drivers who end up driving the wrong way on a divided highway end up in the fast lane going in the wrong direction and 50 % of the time they don't have their lights on!! Secondly, do not use your cruise control when the roads are slick (ie...rain, snow, etc.).) because if you hit a slick spot the loss of traction will cause the computer to think it needs to speed up the car. Once you get traction again, the wheels are turning so fast you can easily lose control (spin out). Both of these suggestions came to me from a highway patrol officer. (Mike Shaffer) Great suggestions, another to add to the list is do not use locked 4 wheel drive when on icy roads. The locked drive can cause loss of steering. I heard this on Click and Clack, their response to a guy in Colorado who kept sliding off the interstate when all the 2 wheelers were passing him. (Bob McElvain)
Wow. I hope you will be all right. I have seen a reaction similar to that when I use super glue to seal the deer hair heads of some of my flies (bullet head flies and trimmed deer hair patterns). It only seems to happen with certain colors of dyed hair. Very weird, and a little spooky. I've never kept it close enough to get it in my eyes, fortunately. But a single drop does create a pretty significant puff of smoke. I hope your eyes recover without permanent damage. (Jason Swan) Be careful of dyes. Some of these are hugely reactive. I could be wrong but I think I recall reading Alfred Nobel was a dyes chemist before he got into gunpowder? Dyes also affect the strength of materials. I know the mantle of a red climbing rope is not quite as strong as a blue one for e.g. Sobering thought if you like to color coordinate your crag side apparel. (Tony Young) Thanks for the heads up and I hope this doesn't cause any permanent damage to your vision. As a photographer I value what vision I have left more than I ever used to. For years I kept an old pair of glasses as a reminder of when I was a teenager while working on a heavy motocross bike I became pinned under the bike, hot exhaust across my chest and gas dripping down the side of my head. When I finally got out from under the bike my first reaction was to throw the large 14" screwdriver in my hand at the cement floor, the equal and opposite effect being that the pointy end of the driver embedded itself into the left lens of my glasses. To this day I thank God I had glasses on. Needless to say, I've never thrown a tool again since, although the temptation was there more times than I can count. (Shawn Pineo) I'm sorry that you had to experience that, and I hope your eyes are OK. This made me wonder what else in the cane shop is hazardous. I used to worry about acetone, but I was informed that you can take a few shots of that without ill other than getting get snockered. The other obvious is rotating machinery, but what else is out there in the shop, as far as chemicals are concerned, that is hazardous? I use brass black, PU glue, flame with MAPP gas..... makes me wonder? (Kyle Druey) Heavy doses of sawdust. Especially if you are working with any spalted or exotic wood. Wear a good filtered mask. (Steve Trauthwein) Absolutely, unless one desires to find themselves experiencing flu-like symptoms. The commonly available "dust" masks are not. They are "comfort" masks, designed for allergy sufferers. Use either a good respirator, or buy masks that are rated to be dust masks for wood particulate, etc. Most of what we do occurs in such small exposures as to be of no effect. Don’t eat it, don’t wear it, don’t bathe in it, don't breathe it covers all potential hazards. (Martin-Darrell) Yes, this is true. I have seen some pretty dramatic photographs illustrating this point. A golf course employee was asked to mix "pesticide" in his usual manner. This particular individual decided that a dust mask was acceptable. Turns out the "pesticide" was not a pesticide at all, but rather some type of nontoxic dye that, when viewed under a black light (I believe), showed up quite vividly. As I said, it was very dramatic. His dust mask actually worked against him, as it did not conform properly to his face. The air he breathed in followed the path of least resistance... through the sides above his cheek bones and straight to his nose. In other words, the mask served to "straight pipe" the air amongst which were airborne dye particles (read "chemical") to his respiratory tract. Even when they do seem to fit well they are little more than what M-D points out. (Carl DiNardo)
The Knife-in-the-vice method is usually used with a deliberately DULL knife. You don't want a sharp edge on this, as it's more of a prying/wedging tool than a cutting tool. (Rick Funcik) Generally speaking, every time I manage to cut myself it is with a dull knife. The only way I would even consider this would be to turn the froe backwards. All of the other methods work so well, though, that I just don't see the need to do it at all. (Larry Blan) Instead of a knife blade just stick a thin shafted screwdriver in something secure and push your bamboo onto that. Works great, just ask anyone who has seen me do it or has taken up this splitting method when I showed them. (Bret Reiter)
I to seam to recall that Cocobolo has a certain amount of "Toxicity" in the dust. It along with most woods from Africa and south America can cause problems with some people, ( basically I believe all wood dust can, but some are actually poisonous). I have always held the safety rule of wearing a good dust mask when sanding, turning or cutting any "Exotic" wood. It may be over kill but better safe than sorry. Know it wasn't much of an answer but hope it helps. (Jimi Genzling) Here is one list of toxic woods. I can second iroko, it really caught me badly one time. (Reed Curry) The most common toxic (causing allergic reactions) woods are exotic hardwoods that are dense and oily. Cocobolo, rosewood, bubinga, etc. are common examples. These can cause breathing problems in sensitive people if the sawdust is inhaled and skin rashes in some cases of contact with the wood oils. Then you have your "narcotic" hardwoods like satinwood, it's smoke is a sedative and will put you to sleep, you don't want to burn that in your fireplace. Finally, you have your "just plain hazardous to your health for assorted reasons" hardwoods like pink ivory. If caught with it in your possession in some tribal areas you could be put to death because it is reserved for tribal chiefs only. Amazingly, someone thinks it is worth the risk because it can be purchased in small quantities in the US. (George Bourke) The toxicity is there for a reason of course... If it wasn't toxic, it would be worm casts on the floor of the forest, and it wouldn't be so damned attractive to furniture makers, boat builders and rodmakers. I had a bad experience with a native wood here in New Zealand - Kowhai. My advice is if you get a metallic or bitter taste in your mouth or throat when exposed to sawdust, play safe, stop and do something to stop the dust. In my case it took four hours or so for the full effects to develop, and about 36 hours before I had come right. I think I took most of the toxin through the skin, as I don't believe I could have breathed or swallowed any significant amount of dust. (Dave Kennedy)
Well, one of my wraps had a pretty large bubble next to the guide foot. Even though I do have some small bubbles here and there, that wrap really bugged me. Tuesday night I cut the wrap off and rewrapped that guide (I am so fast at wrapping now that I can wrap an entire guide in one night). Last night after getting home from work, I sat down at the kitchen table (where I wrap) to get things ready to apply varnish to the new wrap (my wife and children were out). Got my sable brush out, bottle of thinner and unscrewed the cap on my bottle of varnish, but left it sitting on top of the bottle to reduce evaporation. Got my bowl of water and stuck it in the microwave for about 90 seconds. This usually gets the water very boiling hot. I placed the bowl of boiling water next to my wrapping rack and started to put the bottle of varnish into the boiling hot water. Well, I guess I filled the bowl a little more than I should have and the hot water was burning the hell out of my finger tips and this resulted in me accidentally knocking the metal cap off into the hot water. The water was so hot. I decided to leave the cap in until it cooled off. I varnished the wrap and it looks much better now, no big bubble next to the guide foot. About 30-40 minutes later I was going to apply another coat of varnish to the wrap. I took the bottle of varnish and the cap out of the bowl of water. I did notice a slight oily film on top of the water, but did not really think much more about it. I placed the bowl back into the microwave for 90 seconds and hit the start button. While the water was getting hot, I decided to refill my coffee cup. As I was pouring my coffee, I heard a muffled boom (IE: light explosion). It was loud enough to scare me and I turned around to the microwave and the glass window was saturated with water vapor. I opened the door and after all the steam cleared, there sat my bowl completely empty of any water. The smell of varnish/thinner filled the kitchen. The water had been blown out all inside the oven. What a mess. My first thought was "my wife is going to kill me". Several years ago I was dying some quail feathers with golden yellow dye and spilled the mixture all over our kitchen counter tops (which were white, now a light golden yellow). I was almost exiled from the kitchen area after that. I would guess that if someone was using a toothpick, for example, to apply varnish and a single drop fell into the water, it would be at least twice than what I had mix into the water. Too much of this stuff in your water bowl will blow the whole door off of a microwave. (Dave Alexander)
I guess the one thing that I would add is that bamboo is dang sharp once you start planing it. On my first couple of rods, I ended up planing until I'd slash a finger while trying to hold a strip in the groove of a nonadjustable form. Well, if blood makes a rod cast better, that first rod oughta cast like a dream! (Todd Talsma) Obviously the first safety priority is to avoid accidents and injuries. A friend's shop accident story is about what happens AFTER an accident occurs. My friend accidentally cut a finger off with his table saw. He was home alone at the time, and rather than calling for help, he picked up the severed finger, wrapped everything with a towel, and decided to drive himself to the hospital - about 10 miles from his home. Everything went well for the first few miles, but he eventually succumbed to the pain & blood loss and passed out at the wheel. Fortunately he didn't hit anybody else. Unfortunately, he hit a tree so hard that he broke his neck and the car caught fire. The fire department rescued him and took him to the hospital, where he spent the next 6 months recovering and having several operations, including skin grafts and plastic surgery. He never looked the same, and 10 years later he still limps. The scary part for me is that I'm the kind of guy who would have done the same thing! So if you do get hurt, swallow your pride, stay calm, and CALL FOR HELP. (Tom Bowden) I have a friend who's wife made a plaque for the wall of his shop. It reads: "Do not use remaining fingers for push sticks!" (Robert Kope) I find as I get older, Help is taking a more prominent part of my 4 letter word vocabulary. It is there right behind ouch and food. <g> (Rich Jezioro) Sometimes I think that there may be more hazards in a typical rodmaker's shop then the typical woodworker's. Consider that many of our tools are homemade. I'm no electrician, but my oven was homemade using Wayne's instructions. One thing I noticed when building it is that where you attach the wires to the mica strip is exposed and uninsulated. Want to make sure I keep my fingers off of those two terminals, don't I? And what about my rough beveller and sharpening wheel? I wired them up, too. The power tools you would buy for woodworking have all sorts of shields and guards to help keep one's fingers out of harms way. We try to address safety too when we make our own contraptions and machines, but as hobbyists, most of us don't have as large of a product liability department as Delta, Jet or Craftsman. Additionally, most of our work pieces are pretty small. A wood insert is 3 1/2" long by 5/8" and that thumbnail bit is spinning how fast? And the end cap for a wood tube is 3/4" thick and roughly 2" in diameter. How much of a shoulder do I need to cut on that? Most of us have built jigs of one sort or another to help solve the problem, but it is still a case of small work pieces, big hands, and sharp objects spinning at high speeds. Clutter in the shop is another problem. I tend to clean up after a project rather than as I go, so there is something always in the way. Since my shop is in the garage I also have to allow for storage space for "stuff". My wife is always bringing something else out for storage. Sometimes it's so bad that I think my wife has dreams of world conquest. Once she has fully occupied my shop, she'll turn her eye towards Canada. (I'm not so worried about Canada as I am about having to build all those shelves.) But a cluttered workspace is full of hazards and traps. This is one that I really have to work on. And, lastly, we use a lot of flames and a lot of inflammable liquids. Acetone, alcohol, and mineral spirits are all found in my shop along with propane torches and alcohol lamps. Those are just a couple of thoughts on a subject that has always been a concern. (Tim Wilhelm) I just wired up an oven. My strip heaters were from a surplus store and didn't have standard terminals. Instead they had wires coming out from the end of the strips. The clerk at a local HVAC supply house suggested "ceramic wire nuts" to splice them to high temp wire. It works fine and they are only a couple of bucks for a bag of ten. (Joe Handwerker) Ceramic terminal blocks are also available if you find yourself in the position of having to make electrical connections in the hot section of the oven. They are just a couple of dollars apiece, and, just like the ceramic terminal nuts, they are made for the task. (Larry Blan) While Bob Nunley could tell safety stories all night long, even the most careful of us have had our mishaps. If you remember last year's SRG, I cut the heck outta three fingers while rough planing. I'd remind folks that while there are lots of ways to cut and burn yourself while making rods, failing to pay attention while using a lathe will get you dead. Luckily, my only mishap only cost me four stitches. (Harry Boyd) I have learned the hard way to always use gloves when I am planing. I am in the process of making my first rod. I have started practice on some bamboo and found out why the Vietcong use them for pongee sticks!!! My hands have razor cuts all over.... I guess its the fun of making rods!!!! (Bill Tagye) One of the hazards of larger lathes (3 hp or so, like you might find on a common and popular 13 x 40 or 14 x 40 lathe) that I often found reference to was "ripping off an arm". Of course, even with a small lathe one has to be careful of fingers, hands, and projectiles from the lathe. (George Bourke) All to true, George. To make matters worse, I suspect that I am not the only person who has acquired poor safety habits on the small lathes. There is no doubt in my mind that these same habits, transferred to a "real" (read that as having a powerful motor) lathe, would lead to an ugly situation. (Larry Blan) If you run across a sure fire cure for leaving the chuck key in the chuck when you turn on the lathe. Think of me and let me know. (Ralph Moon) The one my father taught me, and I use today on my portable 1/2 inch drill, is to use electrical tape to tape the chuck to the power cord about 6 inches from the plug. In order to change bits, you have to unplug the drill... Probably takes an extra 5 seconds, but there's no way the drill will accidentally start when I'm changing bits. (Claude Freaner) Like mine, smart dad. I remember, every time I violate the rule what mine told me when he gave me my first pocket knife, "Never, never cut toward yourself." Doh! Did it again!. (Darrol Groth) I just ran downstairs and tried an idea that I've had, but never tried. I have a small bungee cord that came in an assortment pack. It's about 10" long and has enough strength to pull the chuck key out of the chuck and allows it to hang high enough from the lathe to be out of the way. I have a 7x12 mini lathe that sets under the basement stairs. I hooked one end on a nail in one of the stair runners, the other on the key. The bungee cord pulls the key up and to the left out of the way. I know my toes will like this!! Too bad all lathes don't have electronic speed controllers! It's nice to be able to start out slow! (David Dziadosz) Keep the chuck key on a short piece of bungee cord on your wrist so you can't leave it in the chuck. Then take it off before you turn the lathe on. Not perfect, obviously . . . . (Brian Creek) Rig a "Safety Switch" where you have to insert the chuck key into the "Safety Switch" to be able to turn the lathe on. A Micro switch attached to a block of wood with a hole in it for the key works for me. The key has to be inserted far enough to activate the switch or else the lathe won't come on. Same for Drill Press. (Dick Fuhrman) There was a fella on the 7x10 mini lathe list that came up with a solution for that. He drilled a small pilot hole on the end of the chuck key, then fitted a spring and a pin into it. Kinda like the chuck keys for drill presses and such. Once you take the hand pressure off the chuck key, the spring loaded pin pushes the chuck key up out of the chuck. (Mark Wendt) Just use a spring loaded chuck key. The aligning stud is spring loaded ...If you don't apply pressure it cannot be left in the chuck, it just falls out! (Bill Tagye) The problem of the chuck key left in the lathe when turned on is one of the easy easy problems to solve: You can either buy or make a safety chuck key. This type of key has a spring loaded plunger in the tip that goes into the chuck. To insert the key you have to put some light pressure on chuck key to depress the plunger so that the chuck key will 'go home' - the nifty part is that without the pressure, the plunger will kick the chuck key out of the chuck all by itself!! (Mike Shaffer)
Unless you're single, or SWMBO is out of town for a couple of weeks, I don't think the odor of cooking bamboo in the house would go over too well! I HAVE used a torch inside, but for soldering, not flaming. Do you have a garage you could do it in? The first rodbuilding class I took, we had snow on the ground, and it was pretty cold, but with coats and gloves we flamed everyone's culms outdoors. (Neil Savage) I would consider this to be an extreme fire hazard. Yes, and I find the fumes pretty caustic. Why not look for a friend’s garage, out of the wind, or go by a local warehouse or machine shop and ask a favor. I did this one year and even drew an audience and sold a rod as result. (Timothy Troester) I have done about 50 culms in the garage in my time, just never tried it in the basement before. Guess the consensus is go out there! (Bob Maulucci) Correct me if I'm wrong, but I would have thought that burning propane produced carbon DIOXIDE and water, like most open burned hydrocarbons, and that that was extremely unlikely to do you any harm. (Peter McKean) You are correct. It is only incomplete combustion that causes carbon MONOXIDE. That is why it is necessary to keep all heaters, vented and unvented, clean and adjusted properly. Cars and other equipment with internal combustion engines have incomplete combustion in the combustion chamber, that is why they produce carbon monoxide. I worked for over thirty years in the R&D department of a major heat & air manufacturer and tested designs for many type of heating equipment. To this day I can walk into a building and sense if a piece of heating equipment in burning correctly or not. I have cleaned many unvented heaters for people that I was just visiting. Their senses were dulled by having been exposed to the fumes for so long. I guess that I am sensitized to carbon monoxide as I can feel it. (Dick Fuhrman) Rob Hoffhines flamed a rod in a snow storm and got an absolutely fantastic pattern on it. Who knows what you'll get if you don't try? (Brian Creek) I've flamed cane in the shop several times. Not because of cold, but because of windy conditions. I don't like trying to keep the flaming consistent when there's a stiff breeze blowing. As long as you have an exhaust fan of some sort running, you'll be fine. You will wind up smelling like smoke, but hey, that's the price we pay. (Harry Boyd) I do it in the basement all the time. My wife and kids say the cane makes the house smell good. (Jeff Schaeffer) I always work in the basement and even if I don't flame my cane, I still use the propane torch to heat my high tech heat treating oven. It will be burning for over 1/2 hour. And besides what is wrong with the smell of cooking cane. I love it and I too think it perfumes the house with a delightful smell. (Ralph Moon) My shed is 20'x20' and is heated by an unvented propane heater and I've had no problems as yet. I don't think a propane torch would asphyxiate you no longer than it would take to flame a culm. Might 'smoke you out though'. (Don Greife) I've flamed somewhere in the neighborhood of fifty rods worth of bamboo (call it forty culms) with a propane torch inside my 12'x16' shop, winter and summer. Most of them have been turned in my lathe while flaming them, no fires and no health problems that I know of, your mileage may vary, proceed at your own risk. (John Channer) To each his own but I have no open flames in my shop. Maybe I am subject to more lapses and spasms than most but I have been on fire before when I sit on a candle. Oops! I never realized before how often I sit down without looking first. (Timothy Troester) In a pinch I have flamed in my basement shop. Took a lot of grief from those smelling it upstairs but did not set off the smoke alarms (maybe I had better check those). I do have a small exhaust fan running in the basement shop so I could still breath. (Gordon Koppin) When propane is burned, carbon monoxide is not one of the byproducts. I can't say the same for MAPP gas, since I don't know what other fuel is included in it. The biggest worry you have with a propane flame is it's consuming of oxygen. That's why the area you use propane heaters in should always have adequate ventilation. Propane is not a noxious gas like natural gas, and it burns very clean. Crack a window or shop door a little bit, and you should be all right. (Mark Wendt) The primary concern that I would have about flaming cane indoors is the safety of having the propane tank indoors. When I lived in Alaska I knew a guy who was severely burned because he brought his propane take inside to keep it from freezing (propane freezes at around -40F). During the night the regulator let loose some propane, it ignited and his whole cabin went up in flames. I've been told since that regulators are made to be used outdoors and it isn't unusual for them to release propane. (Mark Lenarz) I don't think a hand held torch is such a problem, just unscrew the torch from the tank (the 16 oz. or so size you get in the hardware) and listen/sniff after a minute. I wouldn't try it with a 20# tank and hose setup. The little cylinders let off a bit of gas when you unscrew the torch, but it should seal almost instantly. You could also dip the end in water and look for bubbles if you've got a stuffy nose. (Neil Savage) On portable tanks, like the ones you use for a grill or a torch, the easiest way to avoid this, not that I'm sure it happens, is to close the valve on the tank, which should be done anyway when the tank is not in use. (Mark Wendt) What in the heck are you guys doing that generates so much smoke, vapor, or noxious emissions? I now am convinced that I am not heating my cane enough... Alternatively, I have the largest workshop on the list (doubtful) or the draftiest basement (distinct possibility). (Jeff Schaeffer) I do it all the time, but I do it in my bathroom as there is an exhaust fan and no burnable surfaces. Not a problem in the least and the smell of burning cane is, to my nose, a pleasant one. (Joe West) Well, being in the mechanical contracting business I can tell you that flaming cane with MAPP gas, propane, or acetylene in a semi closed environment is probably no worse than soldering copper pipe, especially since solder flux gives off nasty zinc chloride fumes. After 27 years of soldering pipe I can still breathe a little! The gas itself burns pretty clean, and as yet OSHA has not required us to wear respirators even in close quarters. The smell/toxicity of the burning cane though, that's another story. Cough, cough... (Tom Vagell)
The newer tanks cannot be vented as I did above as there is now a secondary valve located in the shutoff valve that requires the hose assembly to be connected for the propane to flow. In this case, you must get the tank to a propane filing station where the host assembly is constructed to vent the tank. Further, I had a similar failure with the small propane bottles. In this case, the valve wouldn't reseat after the torch was removed. I got it outside, turned it upside down and blew off the propane to a safe location. Failures similar to the above are rare but can happen. Heads up. (Don Anderson)
Don Schneider The following chart appeared in American Woodturner June 1990, Originally posted to rec.woodworking by Bruce Taylor taylor@tpwosf.tay1.dec.com
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