In a recent blog post we featured four new woodworking safety products that we’ve recently added to our stock, each one suitable for slightly different applications.
But what are the health and safety best practices you should be considering when working in a carpentry environment? Here, we share some of the most important tips to be safe during woodworking.
How to be safe during woodworking
While there are an incredible number of things to consider in any environment where sawing and sanding are commonplace, our picks for the top woodworking safety tips are as follows:
1. Wear appropriate protective equipment and clothing
The first way to be safe during woodworking is to make sure you’re dressed appropriately for the job at hand. That means wearing:
- Clothing that’s not too loose fitting or baggy (so it won’t get snagged on a blade and pull you towards it)
- Safety glasses to protect your eyes from stray wood dust or chippings
- Gloves to protect your hands from splinters and sharp objects as well as chemicals like paints and glues
- Plus hearing and respiratory protection (more on that last point further down this post).
2. Be sober and lucid!
Whether it’s your profession or a casual hobby, it’s important to always recognise how dangerous woodworking can be – and never operate potentially dangerous machinery if you’ve taken something that could impair your judgement or reactions. That means staying away from alcohol, and even being mindful of the impact that prescription medication can have.
3. Check your blades and drill bits are as sharp as possible…
Our third woodworking safety tip is to make sure you’re working with the most efficient equipment possible. Of course, it might sound counter-intuitive – after all, sharper means more dangerous if you come into direct contact with it. However, sharper blades and drill bits give a cleaner cut with less debris being flung into the air, and generally less kick-back from the machinery. However, if you are going to check and switch them…
4. And disconnect the power before you change blades and drill heads
It’s easily done, but forgetting to turn the power off at the wall before you make the necessary changes to equipment can be incredibly dangerous. It only takes a slip or a mistake for the machine to get switched on at the worst possible time, resulting in a trip to the hospital. It’s an obvious one, then, but turning off the machine at the wall when you’re changing blade or drills is one woodworking safety rule that should always be observed.
5. Double-check for nails and other metalwork before beginning
Another tip to be safe during woodworking is to make sure it’s only wood you’re trying to cut. This can be deceptive, particularly when it comes to reshaping and refashioning reclaimed wood that may be lined with deeply-buried nails and other bits of shrapnel. Make sure to give it a good look over first so that your blade doesn’t cause stray sparks or get otherwise ruined, potentially also causing you a serious injury in the process.
6. Respect the blade!
No matter how experienced a woodworker you are, it’s crucial to respect how dangerous the machinery has the capability to be, and operate it in the right and proper way. That means always cutting square against the blade, rather than from behind or at an angle. It also means avoiding reaching over or around a running blade, and keeping your extremities away from the drop zone directly beneath a drill head. Additionally, another top woodworking safety tip is to keep blade guards handy and make sure they always go back on after use – ensuring you only apply them after turning off the machine at the wall first.
7. Do away with distractions
Our penultimate woodworking safety tip is to make sure you’re as calm and focused as possible – minus any possible distractions. Sometimes these are unavoidable, like another person unexpectedly entering your workshop on a day you’re open for business. However, some you do have more control over, like your mobile phone being switched to silent (with the vibrate option switched off altogether), or keeping music or the radio off so that your attention doesn’t get pulled into the beat, lyrics or discussion. Ultimately woodworking is a dangerous pursuit, so you want to be as concentrated as humanly possible until your work is done.
8. Keep your breathing zone safe with at-source extraction
Our final way to be safe during woodworking brings us back to the respiratory protection we mentioned at in point one – and, indeed, to the very remit of our health and safety-based business.
The Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations 2002 (popularly abbreviated to COSHH) suggests many measures you should take to keep yourself and your workers safe in a woodworking environment.
These include knowing the Workplace Exposure Limits (WEL) for both hardwood and softwood dusts, which can be found here.
Perhaps the best way to control dust levels and ensure your business complies with WEL guidelines involves the use of local exhaust ventilation – commonly known as LEV. This sees an extraction nozzle positioned at the very site where potentially hazardous dusts, fumes and other particulates can be thrown up into the air and enter a person’s breathing zone. By extracting these possibly harmful particulates, you can keep everyone in your woodworking space safer and lower their chances of conditions like COPD, asthma, and even occupational cancer.
Here at VODEX, we offer industry-leading LEV solutions of all kinds, including the woodworking industry, and are well placed to offer guidance and support on the right solutions for your workshop.
Making your workshop safer
Want more woodworking safety rules? Check out the Health and Safety Executive’s guidance on wood dust.
For more on our woodworking safety products, see the blog post on those very items or browse our range of solutions designed to help with safety during cutting, grinding and sanding applications.
Alternatively, check out the blog posts below, or get in touch to tell us about your specific woodworking safety needs.
