The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area General Truck Talk Safety Alert

I purchased on of these tail gate top edge protectors. They sell them at most of the part sites so I won't name which one. I installed it on my 59 stepside.

Friday after work I took it down to the local show. I noticed a little dirt in the bed of the truck so crawled up in and wiped it down. backing out of the bed my leg/shin brushed against the protective cover.

An ambulance ride, 4 hours in the ER and 17 stiches later I'm warning anyone with one of these they are extremely sharp. ER doctor says it looked like I was cut with a scalpel. Spent the whole weekend with my foot elevated and the wife waiting on me (okay so maybe it wasn't so bad)

Right John, not so bad after all, but that's one ell of a way
to get attention.

People underestimate just how sharp the edges of a sheared
metal part can be. Having served a sheet metal apprenticeship
when younger and worked in metal fabrication a good portion of
my life I can attest to the hazards involving unfinished edges.
Power saws leave nasty burrs that can be just as sharp as a
sheared edge.
The first day on the job, the owner of the sheet metal shop
gave me a lecture about handling sheared sheet metal. That
very afternoon the journeyman I was working with had me up
on a shingle roof installing a chimney flashing. Reaching for
a tool I happened to drag my right hand along the edge of the
flashing and it just felt like I'd nicked it. When the blood
came pouring out of my little finger I realized I had cut it
pretty bad. We wrapped it quick and headed for the emergency
room where they sewed what was almost the entire tip of my
little finger back in place. It nearly severed it completely
off had it not been for the bone.
That's probably why I can't hammer-on with that there little
finger. Guess that's a good enough excuse for my lack of
talent on the guitar.
Might seem like time wasted to a lot of people but I always
de-burr after shearing, saw cutting or doing machine work
on a parts.
About a decade of my productive life at the Fermi National
Laboratory was spent as an inspector. All of our drawings
for all of the incoming parts to build an accelerator
specified that all sharp edges were to be broken. Probably
another of the contributing factors why I've formed that
habit to this day.

Hope your leg heals well John, don't blame the part, just
the guy that made it.
dg

Geez, glad you are ok somewhat. I had one once, but don't remember how sharp the edge was. Thanks for the alert and advice from Denny. Rest well.