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Here I go again poke in the finger tip with an Exacto Knife. This time I hit the jackpot, it went rite under the finger nail and poured blood like a river. As always wife noticed and almost had a stroke.

Welcome to the risk of modeling

You should try cutting away from yourself?

I was cleaning up mold lines on a Cadian Shock Trooper arm ( small ).

And! Was cutting away from myself.

I think you need to think through how you use the tool. This should not be a risk if used properly.

I use a surgical scalpel, a lot sharper than an exacto and have no problems.

It seems appropriate to throw a link to this up here

http://www.dakkadakka.com/wiki/en/War%28gaming%29_Injuries

Might I suggest something in a Kevlar glove perhaps?

http://www.amazon.com/NoCry-Cut-Resistant-Gloves-Small-Medium/dp/B00IVM1TKO/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1427221197&sr=8-1&keywords=kevlar+gloves

If all you are doing is removing flash, get some needle nose fine files

Works REALLY well

and if you use rattle can primer it can smooth out any rough spots nicely.

Ouch! For me this is one of those things that you do badly (or see done) once, and you never do it again. I used to cut with very similar knives in print-making, and after having to first-aid someone who embedded the blade in the bone near her knuckle whilst cutting towards her own hand, I can say I've been a lot more respectful of the metal pointy end. Brr.

Now closing folding-knifes across my fingers, and pin-drilling into my own hand, I am yet to learn from.

I still have a half inch scar on my left hand where I stabbed myself on these plastic monsters - like 15 years ago. Since then, I have probably cut myself 5 times, the most recent being last year where I murdered one of my cuticles.

It should be rare to cut yourself badly unless you are doing it wrong.. It's been years since I last cut myself and all my cuts can be traced back to "I should never have been doing that in the first place". I use my knife 95% of the time when cleaning mould lines and don't cut myself, you must be doing something wrong.

My worst cut was when I sliced up the side of my thumb, the cut was about an inch and a half long, it wasn't massively deep and didn't bleed too bad, but it was an awful angle and so sliced out a really large portion of flesh and created a bad scar and it reopened when doing some heavy lifting a year or so later. But again, that was me doing something stupid, trying to cut a part that was too thick and had my thumb in a bad spot.

You have to learn to pay attention to where you're placing your fingers, ALWAYS consider that if the knife slips, where is it going to go? If the answer is "through my hand", move your hand!!

I feel your pain dude, I too learned the hard way. I once slipped with my scalpel and sliced deeply into my leg.... yes I really was that stupid... it went deep enough that I could see the layer of fat under the skin and blood was actually running down my leg and onto the floor/sofa etc. I ended up supergluing the cut closed and still have a scar to remind me.


NEVER CUT TOWARDS YOURSELF AND BE EXTREMELY CAREFUL WITH SHARP BLADES.

Eh, just drop some super glue on it. It is more or less the same stuff they use in the ER. Whenever I get a nick while modeling I just seal it up and keep going. Plus the wife dosent find out, so that's a plus.

I use an exacto for everything, be it desprueing, mold lines, or converting. Literally everything. I have found that even if you have cut towards your hand, try and curve it upwards, itll help to stop the follow through from going into your hand. Backdrops work pretty well as well.

americanzero wrote:Eh, just drop some super glue on it. It is more or less the same stuff they use in the ER. Whenever I get a nick while modeling I just seal it up and keep going. Plus the wife dosent find out, so that's a plus.

If you're using superglue I recommend only doing it on the surface, not in to the wound. Hold the cut closed and put it over the surface. You don't know what else is in the glue you're using and if it actually gets in to the cut itself it can actually slow down healing.

Jollydevil wrote:I use an exacto for everything, be it desprueing, mold lines, or converting. Literally everything. I have found that even if you have cut towards your hand, try and curve it upwards, itll help to stop the follow through from going into your hand. Backdrops work pretty well as well.

One useful thing I have is a desk I don't care about that has rounded corners. If I need to support something at a point I can hold it against the rounded corner of my desk instead of my finger so if the knife goes through with great velocity, it just goes in to the desk.

For scraping mold lines, the back of the blade works as well as the front.

However, as a mechanic and electrician... you just get used to pricks, cuts, etc on your hands.

Yeah it happens what can ya say lol. As long as I don't anger my wife it's all good!

Thanks for all the replies!

Ouch time? Been there, done that. Imagine the fun (and the missus' shock) when you do all your pinning and magnetizing by drilling the holes with a power tool...

 Silent_Tempest wrote:
You should try cutting away from yourself?

Whenever I did that, I ALWAYS used to cut myself. There's much less control over the follow-through on the cut-away.
Cutting towards yourself, it's smaller movements. I've learned how to do it. ONCE the blade starts to dull, swap it for a FRESH one. Dull blades cause injury.

Did the same the other night

Generally goes like this;
*Cutting away from myself but having to hold object in a fiddly position and I can foresee my injury coming*

I tell myself, "just need to make this cut"... push, push, push....slice.

I catch myself out every week, I know what I should be doing, I just got lazy and think 1 more cut!