Safety Police

[GCMSNoob]

Any tips on writing a hazard assessment so I don't have to wear safety glasses while at my damned desk, away from all hazards?

[Consumer Products Guy]

Any tips on writing a hazard assessment so I don't have to wear safety glasses while at my damned desk, away from all hazards?

Sadly, I know that you are not joking. But we don't need to wear safety glasses at the desks. However, we do need to wear goggles when using "chemicals", stemming from a past incident when a Micro employee got some body wash product in her eye (like that never happens in a shower). Of course, other divisions' labs don't have to wear goggles, we're "special". Myself, I'm nearsighted, in the lab I wear non-prescription padded goggles to be "safe" from chemicals, but I can't see that well and I've knocked more stuff over since we went that direction.

Our safety police are very strict, worry about the number of aerosol cans in the department, squeeze bottles left out, stuff "too close" to the edge of the bench, want safety diamonds on everything (whether accurate or not), say fire department would need those and MSDS in case of fire; I say they worry about flames, if our sprinkler system didn't work, and aren't going to be fussing around looking up MSDS.

[Peter Apps]

Any tips on writing a hazard assessment so I don't have to wear safety glasses while at my damned desk, away from all hazards?

Surely that last bit gives you a clue - point out that secretaries, managers, QC and HSE don't wear safety specs at their desks.

Peter

[Peter Apps]

Hi CPG,

I'm pretty certain that if you need spectacles your employer has to provide safety specs or goggles that match the prescription.

Peter

[tom jupille]

On the other hand, if your desk is actually *in* the lab, then there is a reasonable chance you could forget to put the glasses back on. I it's in a different room then I would agree it's unreasonable.

[Peter Apps]

On the other hand, if your desk is actually *in* the lab, then there is a reasonable chance you could forget to put the glasses back on. I it's in a different room then I would agree it's unreasonable.

Good point. In a previous life I moved all the desks out of the labs for that exact reason.

Peter

[bunnahabhain]

On the other hand, if your desk is actually *in* the lab, then there is a reasonable chance you could forget to put the glasses back on. I it's in a different room then I would agree it's unreasonable.

Good point. In a previous life I moved all the desks out of the labs for that exact reason.

Peter

In a previous life I worked in a radioactivity control area. The desks had to be in the lab, and there was no chance to put down the goggles for desk work. This was really annoying.

Jörg

[Consumer Products Guy]

Hi CPG, I'm pretty certain that if you need spectacles your employer has to provide safety specs or goggles that match the prescription.

Employer would provide OSHA impact-resistant glasses of "my prescription", but those are not goggles or designed for chemical protection. So I'd need to wear goggles over those.

Since I have a complex Rx including astigmatism, strabismus, base curve sensitivity, need exact pupil-to-pupil distances, plus "older age" close vision, no two pairs of glasses work the same for me, cannot simply switch. The OSHA safety glasses are thicker lenses, so that throws things off for me even when technically "the same". My regular glasses are still glass lenses, I would tend to scratch plastic lenses way too much. Plus plastic lenses have a different refractive coefficient, that would put me back at square one.

I know there's at least one company that makes Rx inserts for goggles, but for simple prescriptions only.

So I go without Rx glasses and just wear comfortable padded non-Rx goggles in the lab. They work fine. Except I can only see close. Apparently, when I view close, the strabismus is not a factor.

[DR]

Get scratch resistant polycarbonate lenses. They're lighter, thinner and tougher than plastic. There may even be a slightly thicker OSHA compliant version available (at extra cost) that you could just put blank goggles over.

[Peter Apps]

Hi CPG, I'm pretty certain that if you need spectacles your employer has to provide safety specs or goggles that match the prescription.

Employer would provide OSHA impact-resistant glasses of "my prescription", but those are not goggles or designed for chemical protection. So I'd need to wear goggles over those.

Since I have a complex Rx including astigmatism, strabismus, base curve sensitivity, need exact pupil-to-pupil distances, plus "older age" close vision, no two pairs of glasses work the same for me, cannot simply switch. The OSHA safety glasses are thicker lenses, so that throws things off for me even when technically "the same". My regular glasses are still glass lenses, I would tend to scratch plastic lenses way too much. Plus plastic lenses have a different refractive coefficient, that would put me back at square one.

I know there's at least one company that makes Rx inserts for goggles, but for simple prescriptions only.

So I go without Rx glasses and just wear comfortable padded non-Rx goggles in the lab. They work fine. Except I can only see close. Apparently, when I view close, the strabismus is not a factor.

Think yourself lucky that you can see close up ! Without my specs everything is a blur from zero to infinity. If I need goggles I put them on over my prescription specs.

Peter

[Consumer Products Guy]

Think yourself lucky that you can see close up ! Without my specs everything is a blur from zero to infinity. If I need goggles I put them on over my prescription specs.

Yep, the "luck" of being nearsighted combined with getting older. So I can take off my glasses to see close, while others who never had to have glasses when younger are now carrying and losing their glasses to see close !

Even for most involved reading, and when using the computer (have monitor closer) I don't use any glasses.

[Peter Apps]

How about threading 100 um i.d. silica through a vespel graphite ferrule . I have to use a magnifier.

[MSCHemist]

I just wear visorgogs over my glasses. I find they aren't to uncomfortable nor fog up.

[lmh]

oh yes, PeterApps, vespel graphite ferules. There is nothing like trying to thread a bit of black-coloured column through a small black hole in the middle of a small black ferule, when you've only got a foot of column to manipulate and it's fixed in a dark GC oven with no lighting available beyond a gloomy ceiling light that points in the wrong direction. And of course wearing gloves while you're at it. All we really need to make it completely impossible is black gloves to match.

My other favourite job used to be setting up the electrospray needle on the old DecaXP Thermo ion-trap. It was originally a piece of silica capillary threaded down a stainless steel tube. The coating on the capillary would tend to creep and become longer than the silica itself when running acetonitrile, so the engineers' advice was to burn off a few mm of the coating. This then means that you have an almost invisible capillary in an unlit, gloomy spray-chamber, and then you have to set it about 1mm inside the stainless steel - so you have to position something you can't see somewhere where it isn't visible anyway, and then guess how far it moves when you do up the fitting.

[Peter Apps]

There was thread not so long ago on what manufacturers don't make, but they should. Every oven and microwave in every kitchen in the world has alight in it - GC ovens never.

Peter