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[lake_wrangler]

I put my fingers down, and it came out.

Kinda like diarrhea of the keyboard, then...

Meanwhile, I'll leave the cat psychology to you...

his nephew came to "clean up" the place, including the workshop... he ended up taking all the tools, but leaving all the mess behind, including close to ¼" of sawdust everywhere back there...

Open the workshop door, and use a leaf blower. Wear a face mask.

While I would definitely need a shower after that, I would be afraid of clogging up the shower drain... And I'd still need to sweep the sawdust that would have blown all over the place... (Including on all the plants in the backyard...)


Actually, there are a few shop vacs in the workshop, but I have yet to see if they work...

[Dave]

Actually, there are a few shop vacs in the workshop, but I have yet to see if they work...

A shop vac, with an outboard cyclone separator, would be a good approach (the separator will dump most of the sawdust into a separate container, keeping it from reaching and clogging the shop-vac filter).

I don't recommend the blower approach for dealing with sawdust. If the cloud of dust happens to reach an ignition source (say, a pilot light on a water heater), you could have a very nasty fuel/air explosion on your hands. Earth-shattering kabooms are better observed at a distance.

Meanwhile, I'll leave the cat psychology to you...

I knew that many cats are quite picky about their food, sensitive to changes in food supply, and prone to complain about it, but I hadn't heard of any which were depressed by loss-of-gooshyfood to the point of attempted suicide.

[GlytchMeister]

Cats are assholes.

This one is just a dumb asshole.

He went through all of that effort out of pure spite. Simple as that.

No telling what it was that pissed him off. Coulda been any little thing. The most insignificant slight can prompt a cat to poop on your bed three weeks later.

Cats are assholes.

[Bookworm]

Actually, there are a few shop vacs in the workshop, but I have yet to see if they work...

A shop vac, with an outboard cyclone separator, would be a good approach (the separator will dump most of the sawdust into a separate container, keeping it from reaching and clogging the shop-vac filter).

I don't recommend the blower approach for dealing with sawdust. If the cloud of dust happens to reach an ignition source (say, a pilot light on a water heater), you could have a very nasty fuel/air explosion on your hands. Earth-shattering kabooms are better observed at a distance.

FAD (fuel air detonations) take very finely powdered material that's dried. Caked sawdust doesn't quite fit - although if you have a fire, it does sparkle. (generally not dry enough)

If there's a pilot light in the workshop, then definitely shut it off first. Open a window as well. If there's a window opposite the door, you can start _outside_ the building.

You don't need to do anything with the sawdust outside other than blow obvious pockets on the plants apart. After the next rain/watering, or even after a week or two of wind, it'll settle to the soil level. Once the majority of it is outside, then you can clean the rest normally.

[Dave]

FAD (fuel air detonations) take very finely powdered material that's dried. Caked sawdust doesn't quite fit - although if you have a fire, it does sparkle. (generally not dry enough)

It can happen, though. If you've got fine particles in the sawdust mix, and if you're dispersing it manually (as an air blower would do), you can get enough fines into the air to make a combustible mixture.

Here's one example: a fire started in a sawdust hopper at a furniture factory, firefighters were working to extinguish it, and their water jets (!) threw enough sawdust around to make a cloud that then ignited and made a rather impressive fireball.

https://www.core77.com/posts/56583/Why- ... re-Factory

And, an artificial but very real example:



In place, the old caked sawdust isn't all that much of a hazard... but blowing it around could create a fire hazard. And, of course, it's an inhalation hazard... a lot of woods are toxic if inhaled, and at this point there's no way to know just what sort of woods went into the mess that now needs to be cleaned up.

With all the focus on dust collection in the modern woodshop, blowing a years-long dust residue around just sense like a bad idea to me. Vacuum it up (with a proper filter, while wearing a good made it respirator), then dump it... maybe miss it with some green waste and compost it properly. (Although if there's any chance that it contains chemically-treated wood, disposing of it might be safer.)

[lake_wrangler]

https://www.core77.com/posts/56583/Why- ... re-Factory

And, an artificial but very real example:

HOLY SMOKES!
(No pun intended. I think.)

In place, the old caked sawdust isn't all that much of a hazard... but blowing it around could create a fire hazard. And, of course, it's an inhalation hazard... a lot of woods are toxic if inhaled, and at this point there's no way to know just what sort of woods went into the mess that now needs to be cleaned up.

With all the focus on dust collection in the modern woodshop, blowing a years-long dust residue around just sense like a bad idea to me. Vacuum it up (with a proper filter, while wearing a good made it respirator), then dump it... maybe miss it with some green waste and compost it properly. (Although if there's any chance that it contains chemically-treated wood, disposing of it might be safer.)

That does sound like the most reasonable thing to do... While I do have an electric leaf blower, and the workshop has multiple exits, so that I could, potentially, start at one end and work my way across, I think vacuuming it up is just going to be less messy...

[lake_wrangler]

After reading the article about the hopper fire and the ensuing fireball caused by the sawdust, I ended up in the section of suggested (unrelated) reading, and found this:

Accessories for the paranoid


Which itself, referenced the original video describing the objects:

[Bookworm]

The key is dispersion, ignition point, and dryness. If it's moist, it won't tend to ignite like that. If it's too dispersed, it won't detonate. If there's no flame around, it won't ignite.

As for the toxicity of the wood? Please, don't panic like that. I do woodwork as a hobby, when I can, and I've worked with some toxic stuff. The key is that most of them are skin irritants more than really toxic, and those that are toxic are so in extended amounts.

Yes, if you worked with bocote or other exotic hardwoods for hours a day, day in, and day out, you can definitely get enough in your lungs to cause problems. If you're a casual user? Not so much. The sawdust itself is more of a hazard, and that's because of clogging up the lungs, not because of toxicity (physical, not chemical). The shops I've worked in used dust extraction systems not for the toxicity, but just because even _with_ those systems, you could cover the floor, walls, and all the equipment with layers of wood dust. Sweeping was fun when you had to sweep the walls, under the table saw table, etc.

I still stand by my suggestion. Blow it out to get the bulk of it out of the way, then clean normally. Wear a face mask to keep from inhaling the dust - not a paper one, wear a good one. The only things likely to be in the dust to cause a problem is if they spread insect poison around, and that's why the dust mask.

[Catawampus]

Actually, there are a few shop vacs in the workshop, but I have yet to see if they work...

A shop vac, with an outboard cyclone separator, would be a good approach (the separator will dump most of the sawdust into a separate container, keeping it from reaching and clogging the shop-vac filter).

And then you could process the sawdust into biofuel, and save on petrol costs!

Cat knows it's not supposed to be up there. It put THAT MUCH EFFORT into getting, opening, and eating something it knew wasn't for it.

Perhaps it wasn't trying to kill itself, but rather was trying to gradually kill you off due to stress? It might even have hidden the scale beforehand, so that you couldn't find it readily.

Either that, or kitty's stashed the poison away somewhere for future assassination plots.

If it's moist, it won't tend to ignite like that.

Instead, it might ferment and self-ignite. Try not to keep it too close to your collection of vintage oil-soaked rags.

As for the toxicity of the wood? Please, don't panic like that. I do woodwork as a hobby, when I can, and I've worked with some toxic stuff. The key is that most of them are skin irritants more than really toxic, and those that are toxic are so in extended amounts.

Yes, if you worked with bocote or other exotic hardwoods for hours a day, day in, and day out, you can definitely get enough in your lungs to cause problems. If you're a casual user? Not so much.

Unadulterated sawdust isn't much of a toxicity hazard, unless you get into some really weird or stupid types ("Hey, let's build something out of oleander branches and poison ivy strands!"). But sawdust that's sitting around an old workshop from who-knows-what is a different matter, especially if the previous owner was re-working old pieces of wood. Treated wood could have fun things such as arsenic in it, or various paints on the wood could be full of heavy metals or other exciting additives. Plus, who knows what else might be spilled into and mixed up with the sawdust? Rat poison? Asbestos? Cleaning chemicals? Weird spores? LSD?

So while the chances of inhalation or contact toxicity isn't great, it also isn't unlikely enough to be worth the risk. Wear something to keep from inhaling it, and don't hang around in the cloud of fine particles when you manage to get rid of it. Clean up yourself and your clothes well afterward, too.

Using a leaf-blower should be safe enough then, if you keep things well ventilated and don't let it catch on fire. Personally, I'd probably sweep/shovel up what I could first, then try to vacuum the remainder. That way you wouldn't have the dust going everywhere and have to potentially clean up even more.

[lake_wrangler]

Using a leaf-blower should be safe enough then, if you keep things well ventilated and don't let it catch on fire. Personally, I'd probably sweep/shovel up what I could first, then try to vacuum the remainder. That way you wouldn't have the dust going everywhere and have to potentially clean up even more.

With the amount of clutter in there, I'd be worried about blowing sawdust into even more hard-to-reach/unreachable areas...

So yeah, most likely will go the vacuum way...

We'll see. I don't have time this week anyway, as I am busy recording an accompaniment track during my spare time (saxophone, clarinet, bass clarinet, alto recorder), for a song that I will sing at my dad's 80th birthday, on Sunday...

And I still have to write a letter to him (an homage, you know... telling how nice a guy he is, and how much I've learned from him... that kind of stuff), as well as shop for better fitting/nicer clothes, as I haven't shopped for clothes in a while, so mine are rather ... unkempt... so to speak... That's what happens, when your work provides you with a uniform, and you don't go out much, so that you only wear your other clothes around the house... After a while, even what you used to wear at church (I don't wear suit and tie at church) needs to be refreshed, and I haven't taken the time to shop for clothes in quite a while...

It doesn't help that I don't like shopping for my size... I want to lose weight, and would rather be able to wait until I lost some, rather than buy clothes at my current size, and have them not fit, later on, because of any weight that I would have lost... Of course, I've been saying I want to lose weight for some time (ever since I gained back almost all the weight I had lost from 2010 to 2012), but I haven't really, actively, purposely worked on doing so...

[Bookworm]

Even if you use the vacuum, you'll probably end up using the leaf blower. There are too many tiny nooks and crannies that can hold bits and bobs of it that you can't get into with a vacuum or broom.

When I clean customers machines, I gave up on vacuums years ago. I take them outside and use a shop vac on 'blow' to knock out the old dust and dirt, and it's amazing how much crud comes out that would _never_ have come out with a brush and vacuum. Heck, even after I've blown it out, if I wait a minute, then go back over it again, even MORE comes out.

[AnotherFairportfan]

A friend of a friend - if you're active in SF fandom, you're no more than one or two handshakes away from all sorts of odd people {A Nobel winner's son?} - is a Federal inspector of grain elevators.

I( understand he has some pretty hairy tales to tell.

Another friend worked for an insurance company {before he went into business selling swords}. He was the guy who surveyed would-be commercial customers' sites before the policy was written, to make recommendations.

He liked to tell about the big industrial farm where he suggested that he and the manager adjourn to the office to discuss the fertiliser in paper sacks next to the diesel fuel rack for the tractors and other equipment.

You know = where the ground and at least one of the bags showed signs of being at least partly soaked with diesel.

[GlytchMeister]

Thaaaat’s a brown pants moment.

[AnotherFairportfan]

I forgot to mention that Hank said the office was about half a mile away...

[Dave]

He liked to tell about the big industrial farm where he suggested that he and the manager adjourn to the office to discuss the fertiliser in paper sacks next to the diesel fuel rack for the tractors and other equipment.

You know = where the ground and at least one of the bags showed signs of being at least partly soaked with diesel.

"Yes, sir, I believe that we can accommodate your company's need for insurance. Let me describe what we call our 'Texas City' policy.

"I must warn you, though, that you may find the cost to be higher than you had anticipated. This is due to the 'learning from history' clause in Section 8."

[Alkarii]

Being unfamiliar with diesel and fertilizers and their reactions to each other, do they have a tendency to explode?

[Dave]

Being unfamiliar with diesel and fertilizers and their reactions to each other, do they have a tendency to explode?

Yes.

A mixture of diesel fuel, and ammonium nitrate fertilizer is known as "Anfo". According to Wikipedia, it's the most commonly-used industrial explosive in the US (largely for mining of various sorts).

It's not terribly easy to detonate (as explosives go). It's considered a "tertiary" explosive - a blasting cap alone won't usually initiate it, and so it's usually triggered using a stick or two of dynamite.

It's cheap (compared to other high explosives) and the ingredients are easily come by, which accounts for its popularity in industrial applications...

... and for terrorist bombings, world-wide. The Oklahoma City bombing in 1995 used a modified version of anfo.

Just plain ammonium nitrate (without an added hydrocarbon fuel) can explode, if sufficiently mistreated. If it's heated enough, it can decompose explosively... that's what happened in the Texas City disaster I was alluding to (a ship loaded with AN caught fire, burned hot enough to boil the water around itself, and eventually exploded and set fire to a lot of the city).

The big risk in the situation AnotherFairport fan was referring to, would have been the possibility of a fire. Oil-soaked AN fertilizer which caught fire (for any reason) might well have burned hot enough to trigger that sort of explosive decomposition... it might not have been as potent an explosion as a triggered detonation but it could still have completely ruined the day (and all subsequent ones) for anyone nearby.

[GlytchMeister]

Ammonium
Nitrate
Fuel
Oil

I’ve got family in the mining industry. It’s about all they use in mines.

The fertilizer needs to be in a specific configuration (pellets with holes, I think) but that’s not too difficult to do. The difficulty is procuring that specific pellet shape. It’s watched rather closely.

It was also what the Mythbusters used to blow up the concrete truck, among other explosions.

It’s a slow-velocity explosive, relatively speaking, so it does more “lift and separate” than it does “disintegrate and aerosolize” like substances like C4 tend to do, which is part of why it’s so popular in mines (it’s easier to move chunky rocks with minimal loss than it is to move dust). That, and it’s damn near literally dirt cheap.

[Bookworm]

Look up "West, Texas" explosion. Which was finally determined to be arson, and if they catch the person that set it off, they're probably looking at one of the fastest tracked death sentences in recent Texas history.

[AnotherFairportfan]

Look up "West, Texas" explosion. Which was finally determined to be arson, and if they catch the person that set it off, they're probably looking at one of the fastest tracked death sentences in recent Texas history.

I don't know if i'd heard it was arson.

Yep. I'd advocate the same method of execution i did for the IRA guy who bombed the elem ntary school - gelignite suppository.

============

I was listening to The Pogues' song "Navigator" the other day.



{For those who don't know, the British term for heavy labourers, " navvy", is short for "Navigator", referring to the mostly Irish workers who built the canals and railroads over most of the British Isles}

And i listened to the chorus:

with your pick and your shovel and the bold dynamite,
for to shift a few tons of this earthly delight

And i wondered, as i often do when i listen to that, if the British ever regret teaching the Paddies how to use dynamite...