Safety Police

john in la · Dec 3, 2014

No offence to any farmers here as this is a general observation and not directed at any one person.
I am also very sadden for the families involved in the 2 related stories.

BUT............

After reading
"I saw the ambulance and fire truck"
and
"Another farmer in a hurry is dead"
that are only 3 post apart and seeing many such stories on this forum often; I got to thinking.

1) 90% of the general public are idiots when it comes to safety around machinery; Farmers are made up of the general public; So a high percentage of farmers are most likely idiots also.

2) We see safety guards on all kinds of machinery; ie; belt guards.
We even see safety devices on every riding lawnmower to where if you get out of the seat without turning off the pto/blades; and set the brakes; the mower kills.

So why are we not seeing safety devices to where if you get out of the seat of a tractor or combine without locking it down it kills the engine?

These are really tragic events; but really; my 3 year old grandson knows better that to stick his hand in a fire; you would think grown men would know better than to stick their hands into or work in close proximity to moving machinery.

IaGary · Dec 3, 2014

It is coming John.

My 2002 combine shuts down the grain head when you get out of the seat for more than 5 seconds.

Now I have to set a cinder block on the seat to oil the gathering chains on the corn head. JUST KIDDING!

Gary

David G · Dec 3, 2014

We in industry are drilled and trained on safety so it hopefully becomes a habit. You will get fired for violating the rules. There are still accidents but fewer. I do not know of training for farmers to build these habits.

rrlund · Dec 3, 2014

We'd find a way to bypass them. I can't make excuses,but I remember when Floyd lost 4 fingers,him saying that it was almost supper time and he was in a hurry,just trying to get across the field for the last time.
Myself,Monday,I was getting frustrated picking corn. The stalks were brittle and I took a few too many chances. It was only 3 o'clock,but it was time to quit for the day when that happened. I was getting too pizzed. I wasn't near the husking bed,but I started the PTO from the ground while I was standing in front of the snapping rolls.

jlewis457 · Dec 3, 2014

I rember not long ago the topic was OSHA coming to the family farm with stories like these popping up you can bet as the saying goes they will be coming to a farm near you soon.
John

Pair-a-dice farm · Dec 3, 2014

90% might be an understatement. At some point nearly all of us do stupid stuff. However there is no way to make anything 100% safe besides, there are some people that you can wrap in bubble wrap and they would still get hurt. I've had my share of minor injuries but nothing serious. How do you put a guard on a cow? The best safety feature is between our ears. At some point we become counter productive in safety and as harsh as it sounds, we no longer clean up the gene pool

Bob Bancroft · Dec 3, 2014

As IaGary says, it's here, and more is on its way.

I don't know the absolute answer to your question, but have a few ideas. I am one of the few lucky idiots to have tangled with a corn picker and not lost anything, but the use of one hand for a while. Something I never thought I would do.

I think it's the stress, anxiety, tiredness, passion of the moment type of thing. I have long confounded people with my looking at my cash cropping like warfare. I prepare for months, in all ways, then hit the field with a vengeance in the all too short window we get anymore. When your ONLY source of income is out there, that's how it is. Perhaps if I could work 18 hour days, and longer, like some of my neighbors can, I wouldn't be so driven. But my limit has always been about 12 hours. Any more than that and I lose the gain the next day.

BANDITFARMER · Dec 3, 2014

I watched our safety director (at work) grab hot wire (850*) coming out of a press to check the temp to see if the operator was running by procedure. He only did it once. 3 months later I watched him sit a cup of coffee on a drum of 50/50 mix of aluminum and magnesium powder, I ran! He came and found me and asked why I ran! I said "Water and magnesium" go BOOM! YOUR an IDIOT! Coffee is not WATER! He said. WOW! And he was in charge of plant safety. I am glad I don't work there anymore. Bandit

mtny · Dec 3, 2014

Was gonna post on the ambulance one but thought I would here. About a year ago lost a good friend and coworker to a pto accident . Slipped on ice grinding feed. Not an idiot but a young man farming and working full time . I grew up milking cows and watching my parents work to pay off a farm they bought . The grace of God has kept me safe using old equipment.

Brendon-KS · Dec 3, 2014

What you describe has been in place for many years on some types of equipment. Typically they utilize a combination of seat and door switches where at least one has to be "made" or just a seat switch with a timer that shuts things down if the seat is unoccupied for a certain length of time (usually around 3 to 5 seconds).

There are industry standards put out by the American Society of Agricultural and Biological Engineers (ASABE, formally called ASAE) that dictate how things like this function. It is not the law that a manufacturer meet these standards but if they don't and someone gets hurt, well, let's just say the plaintiff's lawyers will have a field day. Like has been indicated, these safety switches are very easy to bypass but in that event the manufacturer's lawyers will have a viable defense.

From a practical standpoint tractors must provide a means to legitimately bypass the safety switch for doing stationary PTO work. However, activating this mode takes a deliberate action by the operator each time it is used.

rusty6 · Dec 3, 2014

I could not put up with a combine that shut off the engine every time I had to get out of the seat. I've never had to deal with it but would soon figure out how to disconnect that feature. Take it slow and careful, never forgetting the stories of all the other guys that were not so lucky. That has worked for me so far.

Dick L · Dec 3, 2014

Apparently you have never had to spend time inside or under a piece of machinery when the engine stopped before the fodder or straw had cleared when it was real cold or 90 in the shade. A devise that killed the engine on a tractor would be disabled after the first time it caused a plugged machine. My dad was a strict safety trainer. I am 76 and he has been gone for 20 years and when I am out in the field I still hear his voice in my head when safety thing come up. Saying all of that about 15 years ago I got my hand about half cut off in a combine. It all comes from shortcuts to try to save time when behind. I'd rather die on a tractor than in a bed with tubes stuck in me.

notjustair · Dec 3, 2014

The JD7800 has an alarm and light that goes off when you get up with the pto engaged. The seat sensor has gone out so it chimes and flashes every time I turn on the pto. The tractor is almost 20 years old.

Farmers can find a way to injure themselves no matter the machine. I can't recall the last time I made it a day without adding a scab somewhere. Did I mention we don't stop and dress the wound? No time for that.

I remember my grandfather prying on something once with a screwdriver. He slipped and jammed the screwdriver all of the way through the palm of his hand and out the back side. He stopped, walked over to the barrel and poured gas through it, and went back to work. My hind-end puckers just at the memory.

JMS/.MN · Dec 3, 2014

Still his mistake- the correct pto guard would have protected him from entanglement.

oldtanker · Dec 3, 2014

(quoted from post at 18:53:58 12/03/14) I could not put up with a combine that shut off the engine every time I had to get out of the seat. I've never had to deal with it but would soon figure out how to disconnect that feature. Take it slow and careful, never forgetting the stories of all the other guys that were not so lucky. That has worked for me so far.

But all it takes is stumbling or being tired or careless or a combination and you become a statistic. I don't know how many guys who I've heard say, after they were injured, "I've always done it that way". How many of you naysayers have been out, tired, storm moving in, trying to get finished or another round or 2 in before it does? If you are farming all of us! And that's when you are most likely to make a mistake. And these are not minor mistakes. When you wind up missing body parts it's pretty serious. I'm not sure we need switches in seats to turn stuff off. But we need to be aware of what we are doing and just how dangerous it really is.

Rick

Royse · Dec 3, 2014

Four generations of the family around the corner from me are
missing parts of their hands from trying to unplug a corn picker
without turning the PTO off.
Most, if not all, were lost in the same picker.

old · Dec 3, 2014

Sorry I am old school as in to run something you need a brain. Safety devices are for the stupid and if you have to have them you should not be on the machine in the first place. I still have all my fingers and toes and I use my brain when I do things and most machines I start stand beside them. Brains are the one and only safety device that works if one has one but many do not use there brains

Pair-a-dice farm · Dec 4, 2014

(quoted from post at 23:47:41 12/03/14) Sorry I am old school as in to run something you need a brain. Safety devices are for the stupid and if you have to have them you should not be on the machine in the first place. I still have all my fingers and toes and I use my brain when I do things and most machines I start stand beside them. Brains are the one and only safety device that works if one has one but many do not use there brains

I agree. One of the problems with safety devises is that they are prone to fail too, just look at the airbags problem in cars. People get dependent on them and don't use their heads because the safety switch is supposed to save them.

buickanddeere · Dec 4, 2014

(quoted from post at 23:08:24 12/03/14) Four generations of the family around the corner from me are
missing parts of their hands from trying to unplug a corn picker
without turning the PTO off.
Most, if not all, were lost in the same picker.

That is the kind of people we are talking about. Talk to any of them this day and they will probably want to make a contest out of the matter. To the effect that they can do what ever they d*m well please as it's a God given right as an "Umerucun" Maybe up to the point where my tax money is spent supporting their errors.

caterpillar guy · Dec 4, 2014

So you want to pay somebody to set in a seat while the auger is running grain up to the bin, or while the elevator takes bales to the mow. I see the block being set in the seat so it will keep running to fill the bin. I recently was hauling corn to a local dairy for feed. We ran the roller mill to unload. Nobody in the seat while it ran. What about the guys with aerators for their fish farms. To many places things have to run while nobody is in the seat in a stationary position.

Bret4207 · Dec 4, 2014

Some safety features work well, others are no more than wishful thinking. The #1 safety feature is right between your ears.

It's always sad when someone gets hurt or killed, but there are limits to practical methods of keeping the truly stupid and careless alive.

Meangreen · Dec 4, 2014

My dad's riding mower shuts off when you get out of the seat. Kind of annoying because I went to push snow and had to get out of the cab to close the garage door and the thing died on me.

My 11 y.o. nephew likes to drive my old A around the yard (in 1st gear) and every time he gets on it I point to the levers and pedals and make him tell me what they do. Finally one day he asked why do we have to do this every time? I replied this is a piece of farm equipment and not a toy.

mkirsch · Dec 4, 2014

Nearly all machinery with seat switches will stay running if the transmission is in neutral and the parking brake is set. Including lawnmowers.

If you don't put the machine in neutral and set the parking brake, how can you expect to perform any stationary work?

Really it's not so bad.

These devices are put in to protect stupid people from their own stupidity, with one of the side benefits being they don't become wards of the state and a burden on our tax dollars.

Of course the REAL solution is for people to stop being stupid, but that's not realistic.

keh · Dec 4, 2014

Which tractor was it a few years ago that the
pto clutch jumped in gear and started the pto
turning while some farmer was off the tractor
checking his pto powered implement? He was
injured or killed. Wife saw story and was
concerned about me. I told her that it must have
been a tractor with a hydraulically engaged
clutch, easily operated, and that my tractor had
a mechanical clutch mechanism and that I usually
cut the motor off if checking the hay baler,
unless it had to be running to check something
and then I stayed carefully away from it.

KEH

Pair-a-dice farm · Dec 4, 2014

Exactly and these kind of people will not be saved by a safety devise. You can't fix stupid with a guard or seat switch. I've lived a long time without them and the only injury was a dislocated shoulder from a cow. Not sure how a seat switch or belt guard would have prevented that.

old · Dec 4, 2014

Sad how many people have been dumbed down so they have to have a safety device for them to be safe and a lot of times that device is what gets them hurt or some one else hurt in the long run

pete 23 · Dec 4, 2014

I have seen two women driving lawn mowers with the safety switch under the seat. When they would go to turn the mower, they , due to their size , have to lift some of their weight off the seat and thus causing the engine to back fire or quit. They were both upset with the situation. One was a Cub Cadet, other John Deere. I would think the co. would make that switch a little more appropriate for the application. This is the reason safety switch's get by passed. Another one, my neighbor back up a lot when coming to the end of his lawn while mowing instead of just turning around. Apparently they do not have a reverse over ride switch or do no use it so every time they back up, mower stop and they restart mower when moving ahead again. That poor electric clutch takes a beating turning off and on a jillion times during a lawn mowing.

buickanddeere · Dec 4, 2014

Just received an update from two different sources with the same story so it's likely close to the facts.
Turns out it was anotherMcConnell family that lived on the same road as the McConnells we know.
Bryan called his Father from the field and asked him to come to the harvester right away because he had a situation. Brian then called 911. All this while he was jammed the header by one or both legs with the machine still running until he " stopped" being drawn in farther.
Bryan still lived at home with his parents. No spouse or children. Survived by one brother and pre-deceased by two sisters. Visitation and funeral Monday morning at the Ripley funeral home.

tractorguy2 · Dec 6, 2014

The most dangerous thing on the farm is the nervous farmer when he is broke down.he will not stop and think "what is going to happen when I do this"

I know one who tried to jump start his massey 850 combine at the starter. It was in gear and took off while he was standing on the little catwalk on the front of the engine.

The combine ran over his fuel barrels dumping several hundred gallons of diesel, then tore one door off the machine shed and tore several feet of tin off the side of the shed before killing the engine. This whole time he was hanging onto the front of the engine.
He had to change his pants when the ride was over!

The reason the combine wouldn't start? It was in gear.

buickanddeere · Dec 6, 2014

Size large or size small? Adjust the seat so they have their back on the seat's backrest and their feet reaching the pedals. End of most problems. Then tell them to sit on the seat and stay there. My youngest was beating the clutch out of the mower because he did not want to move the seat from the "tall" position.

GeneMO · Dec 6, 2014

(quoted from post at 04:52:54 12/04/14) So you want to pay somebody to set in a seat while the auger is running grain up to the bin, or while the elevator takes bales to the mow. I see the block being set in the seat so it will keep running to fill the bin. I recently was hauling corn to a local dairy for feed. We ran the roller mill to unload. Nobody in the seat while it ran. What about the guys with aerators for their fish farms. To many places things have to run while nobody is in the seat in a stationary position.

I was thinking of our feed grinder. It's purpose is to pull up to a bin or truck and grind feed. Then you use the unloading auger to unload. You cant do any of this from seat. Like you say, augers, uloaders for baled hay, etc.

Gene

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