Working g10 safety questions.

[Venom1956]

I planned on ordering some g10 blanks for some Projects to keep me occupied and on one site i noticed a disclaimer 'this product contains fiberglass use respirator. When working.' this is news to me.

I am more of the wood working guy. What steps do ibneed to take to keep my work area clean and safe? Lots of foot traffic. And dogs in my shop area (on the way to laundry room)

 

[dakota.potts]

Protection should be worn even when working wood as some types are toxic or can cause allergic reactions. From what I hear, once you have an allergic reaction to one type of wood, you're at risk for allergic reactions every time with every type of wood.

Although I never got to working with anything that hazardous (coral and bone are also dangerous as particles can embed themselves in your lungs), it's often recommended to use a powered respirator and some type of dust vac hooked up to your work station. When I worked as a machinist doing carbon blanks, we had vacuums hooked up about an inch and a half from the surface grinder to suck it all up and it worked quite well. The entire building was set up for that though and it was a very large system.

 

[Clark]

G10 is not toxic, I have worked around it all my life.
But take G10, some wood, or a rock, grind it up into dust and breath it, and you are in trouble.
Don't breathe any kind of dust.

 

[Bill DeShivs]

I see G 10 and carbon fiber being used quite a bit in knifemaking. IMO this is a very stupid thing. The dust from grinding G 10 is serious stuff, and you simply can't remove all of it from your grinding area. Therefore you need to wear a very good particulate respirator any time you are in your shop.
Any imagined advantage these two dangerous materials have over materials like Micarta are simply not worth it.
I won't allow it in my shop at all.