ebony

[Dan S]

Just passing along something I just learned. If you are crazy enough to power carve ebony, wear a mask! Good lord, it's almost as bad as the CS gas we trained with in the army.

[Dileon]

Thanks for the information, I am getting some ebony quote when I get good enough to carve it.....and god knows when that will be, but it helps major when you are working on it. May I ask what kind of ebony? As I do remember I have a few pieces laying somewhere around here....thanks Di

[Steve Reed]

Dan, this is true of most exotic woods. Partly the reason, is that they are foreign to us. Cocobolo is also extremely bad, and personally I can't work Zebra wood even with a mask! Also, a decent respirator is much better than a dust mask. Most of them don't really do much except give a false sense of security.
Happy Carving
Steve

[Dan S]

Hey Di,
I jsut have the reglar black Gaboon Ebony. If you want to carve it wear a mask. Steve is right about exotics. I have reactions to bloodwood and Cocobolo as well. Better to stick with the common stuff!

Take care,
Dan

[Goody]

SInce I now have pulmanary problems I was told to quit carving and turning. Most of the exotics can make you pretty sick and I seem to have touble with certain speicies of walnut. The dust you can see in your shop is not whats bad for you Its the microscopic stuff that does the worst damage. A dust collector moves the dust from your immediate work area then traps the big particles and blows the microscopic stuff back in the room. A dust collector with .5 micron bags and a lot of ventilation in the shop helps this problem. I recently invested in a Trend Airshield. I wish I had bought it years ago. It filters down to.03 microns and works great even with my full santa beard. The face shield doesent fog up and there is a cool clean air blowing across your face even on a hot day. A little pricy but worth it in my opinion. The best dust collector in your shop is your lungs. Their main draw back is you can't tkae them out and clean them.
P & R Distributing - Trend Airshields

[cut up]

Those dust particles have been a major topic on other woodworking forums, and there have been some people told not to work in their workshop until all the dust was under control. On one of the forums, Bill Pentz tells about his delimma dealing with this and tells how he worked to get it under control. There is several pages to this, so it will take some time to read through it, but it is the best information there is on dust, IMHO. It is worth reading, it'll make you think about how much dust you breath in and what its doing to your health, but dust control can be expensive. Here is the link
Bill's Cyclone Dust Collection Research - Home Page