A Cautionary Tale...

[Chamfer]

...or, Always Wear Protection!

Monday night I went to the garage to just poke at a fossil for a few minutes. I'd picked up a decent shell still mostly in matrix in the Selma Chalk of Alabama over the weekend. Though I only intended to take a few tentative swipes at it, I ended up spending over an hour on it, chipping away rock with my airscribe, then smoothing out the matrix with my Dremel.

Anyone who has ever worked on this kind of material will see where this is going.

The rock that comes from this deposit really is chalk. When dry, working on it with any tool, but especially a grinding tool, creates a lot of very fine dust. And since I hadn't really planned on working on it for more than a few minutes, like an idiot I didn't put on my dust mask.

Later that night I woke up from a sound sleep to discover that my sinuses were a disaster. Running, stuffed up, and a bad raw burning sensation all the way into my throat. Since then I've had a couple of nights where I didn't sleep for more than two hours at a time, I've become very well acquainted with my Neti Pot, suffered several nose bleeds, have taken enough Sudafed to run a respectably-sized meth lab, and burned through more than one box of tissues.

Finally, I think the worst is over. I'm down to merely frequent sneezing and nose blowing. Essentially, I believe I had the equivalent of bad road rash inside my sinuses, caused by the chalk dust irritant.

What did I learn from this? Well, probably nothing. I'm kind of dense, apparently.

But hopefully others will learn to wear a dust mask when working with this kind of material.

[fossilcrazy]

All I can add to this post is . . . I agree! Things that don't belong in your lungs should be prefiltered out to get breathable air.

There are worst outcome scenarios than what you have described. I'm glad you only suffered an irritation. COPD and permanent lung damage is real.

[Ptychodus04]

If one does that enough, sinus issues would seem like a walk in the park. I watched my father die of pulmonary fibrosis. It's not pretty. If I have my scribes out for anything other than a staged photo, the mask goes on.

Prepping without lung protection results in a slow, lingering death by suffocation as your lungs slowly harden. No thanks.

[JohnBrewer]

Thanks for the reminder. It's easy to lapse and think it won't do any harm for a few minutes. I hope everything's ok and no lasting health issues.

[Chamfer]

Thanks for the reminder. It's easy to lapse and think it won't do any harm for a few minutes. I hope everything's ok and no lasting health issues.

I'm on the mend. Feels like I'm down to a mere mild summer cold now, thanks.

[ynot]

Reminds Me of "black lung disease" and "silicosis" which were found in early miners of coal or quartz seams. (So it is not just chalk to be wary of.)

Nasty way to die.

Tony.

[Ptychodus04]

Reminds Me of "black lung disease" and "silicosis" which were found in early miners of coal or quartz seams. (So it is not just chalk to be wary of.)

Nasty way to die.

Tony.

All small particulates are bad news.

[Ptychodus04]

Let's not forget hearing and eye protection. The eye protection is pretty obvious as a flying chip impacting your cornea has an immediate effect. Dust is to lungs as noise is to ears. Hearing damage from compressors and scribes is a slow and irreversible process. I have significant hearing loss in one ear due to a hunting accident almost 15 years ago and do everything I can to keep what I have. As the Cinderella song says... "You don't know what you got 'till it's gone."

[Chamfer]

Let's not forget hearing and eye protection. The eye protection is pretty obvious as a flying chip impacting your cornea has an immediate effect. Dust is to lungs as noise is to ears. Hearing damage from compressors and scribes is a slow and irreversible process. I have significant hearing loss in one ear due to a hunting accident almost 15 years ago and do everything I can to keep what I have. As the Cinderella song says... "You don't know what you got 'till it's gone."

Quite true!

I wear glasses, and do all my work from behind a lighted magnifier, so I've got reasonably good eye protection. Not OSHA level, perhaps, but adequate.

Since one of my other hobbies is audio drama production, I'm pretty careful about ear protection any time I'm going to be using my compressors. I sit right next to it, and it echoes quite loudly in the garage.

So I'm extra foolish, in that I had actually put in my earplugs when I neglected wearing my dust mask.

Now, a week after my 'episode', I'm no longer having severe sinus pain or nosebleeds. However - not to be too graphic - my sinuses are still being extremely, um, productive.

Maybe I will learn the lesson after all.

[Ptychodus04]

Sounds like lesson learned! What a mess... literally.

[TimS]

I am really new to fossils but occasionally cut and polish agate etc, and in lapidary work i've learned to always work wet, whether cutting, shaping or polishing.

Is it normal practice to do fossil restoration work like grinding while the specimen is dry? If so, is just a standard dust mask usually sufficient or do you use special filters?

[Chamfer]

I am really new to fossils but occasionally cut and polish agate etc, and in lapidary work i've learned to always work wet, whether cutting, shaping or polishing.

Is it normal practice to do fossil restoration work like grinding while the specimen is dry? If so, is just a standard dust mask usually sufficient or do you use special filters?

I can't answer this with any authority, as I'm still a newbie. For me, I'm kind of constrained by the Dremel tool. I suspect it would not mix well with water.

I don't generally grind rock. The only times I do is when I'm trying to remove prep marks (like from my Airscribe) from the matrix around a fossil. For a lot of materials, working wet would probably be ideal. In this specific case I was working on a highly chalky matrix material that I'm trying to avoid getting wet, as I'm concerned it would crumble quickly. In fact, I'm not even sure this stuff would survive an acetone/butvar bath without dissolving. I'll probably end up stabilizing it with Paleobond PB002.

[Ptychodus04]

I am really new to fossils but occasionally cut and polish agate etc, and in lapidary work i've learned to always work wet, whether cutting, shaping or polishing.

Is it normal practice to do fossil restoration work like grinding while the specimen is dry? If so, is just a standard dust mask usually sufficient or do you use special filters?

I don't grind. For mechanical preparation, I use air scribes to chip away at the matrix. It is faster, cleaner, and safer for the fossil. Detail work is done with micro-abrasives but the lion's share is done with the scribes. A good dust mask is adequate.

My micro-abrasion is done in a cabinet for small stuff and outdoors for larger pieces. Trimming of slabs is done wet.

[siteseer]

Yeah, you should avoid scribe work indoors. If you have to work inside due to weather, you should buy/make a dust cabinet to work in or have a fan running so that the breeze runs past you and for some distance - not next to a wall.

...or, Always Wear Protection!

Monday night I went to the garage to just poke at a fossil for a few minutes. I'd picked up a decent shell still mostly in matrix in the Selma Chalk of Alabama over the weekend. Though I only intended to take a few tentative swipes at it, I ended up spending over an hour on it, chipping away rock with my airscribe, then smoothing out the matrix with my Dremel.

Anyone who has ever worked on this kind of material will see where this is going.

The rock that comes from this deposit really is chalk. When dry, working on it with any tool, but especially a grinding tool, creates a lot of very fine dust. And since I hadn't really planned on working on it for more than a few minutes, like an idiot I didn't put on my dust mask.

Later that night I woke up from a sound sleep to discover that my sinuses were a disaster. Running, stuffed up, and a bad raw burning sensation all the way into my throat. Since then I've had a couple of nights where I didn't sleep for more than two hours at a time, I've become very well acquainted with my Neti Pot, suffered several nose bleeds, have taken enough Sudafed to run a respectably-sized meth lab, and burned through more than one box of tissues.

Finally, I think the worst is over. I'm down to merely frequent sneezing and nose blowing. Essentially, I believe I had the equivalent of bad road rash inside my sinuses, caused by the chalk dust irritant.

What did I learn from this? Well, probably nothing. I'm kind of dense, apparently.

But hopefully others will learn to wear a dust mask when working with this kind of material.

[siteseer]

Yeah, I've sat next to a big compressor and even the smaller ones are noisy. It's not just annoying. It's bad for your hearing. I wore headphones for that.

Eye protection is always necessary. I wear safety glasses just to mow the lawn. On two separate occasions while prepping with a scalpel the tip snapped off and then bounced off the glasses. Always listen to an old man about stuff like that.

Let's not forget hearing and eye protection. The eye protection is pretty obvious as a flying chip impacting your cornea has an immediate effect. Dust is to lungs as noise is to ears. Hearing damage from compressors and scribes is a slow and irreversible process. I have significant hearing loss in one ear due to a hunting accident almost 15 years ago and do everything I can to keep what I have. As the Cinderella song says... "You don't know what you got 'till it's gone."

[Wrangellian]

I am really new to fossils but occasionally cut and polish agate etc, and in lapidary work i've learned to always work wet, whether cutting, shaping or polishing.

Is it normal practice to do fossil restoration work like grinding while the specimen is dry? If so, is just a standard dust mask usually sufficient or do you use special filters?

The others are right - in the fossil world, we rarely grind. It's usually trimming and prepping with airscibe/air-abrasive, and some materials do not respond well to wet..... There are dry-cutting blades (for tile saws and the like), and I always trim my shale without water. Yes it's dusty, but you wear a dust mask of course. I find the simple dust mask is sufficient, but then I'm not usually face-deep in the dust cloud for hours on end.. The others will have to comment on the scribing/abrasive as I don't do any of that.

Edited July 25, 2016 by Wrangellian

[Lori LuvsFossils]

I'm not an expert in the field as most Florida fossils are ready right off the shovel, but I once posted a photo of myself working with a Dremel, covering my face with just a paper nurse type mask. I had 2 friends jump right on that to tell me I might as well wear nothing. I bought a package of heavy material masks with a little vent. As if Florida isn't already hot enough, these things are too much to deal with most days.

I work with my tools in a sand blaster type box with a fan blowing from behind me (using the light mask again). I hope it's enough for a casual user.

Thank goodness you're feeling better!

[jpc]

Glad this is only temporary. I do almost all my air scribing in my sand blaster box with the air suction on. The box provides protection from flying eyeball slicers, noisy ear drum rattlers as well as floaty nose, throat and lung irritators.

[Raptor Lover]

Also beware of "Valley Fever" , it's known at Shark Tooth Hill. It's caused by breathing in spores stirred up by digging. It causes a severe fever that will last about a week