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Basics, Accessories, Attachments

Safety:

It's no fun getting hurt. It can ruin your whole day and maybe your project too. So we all want to be careful and do things the right way.

The best place to start, is to read all that important safety stuff that came with your new HSRT. The manufacturers try to think of everything that may help you to work safely with their tools. Read that and I'll add some additional safety tips here:

Note: If you have any good safety tips, please send them in here. Thanks. Or email to jm@how2usehsrt.com or Post on the BLOG.

1. Try to see what might go wrong, and fix it before something happens. If common sense makes you feel a little uneasy about some particular action with your HSRT, stop and look at the situation. Is there a way to make it safer. Clamp your work more securely? Stand in a different position? Cut from the other side? Adjust the speed? Learn the correct operating speed for each attachment or tool bit you are using.

2. Safety glasses are important for you AND anyone who wants to watch! Especially children! Protect your eyes AND your ears. Most work with your HSRT will be reasonably quiet. Some are not! If it seems a bit loud, use ear protection. I like the really big ear-muff type: comfortable and easy to put on and off. Tip:. If you enjoy music while you work, you can wear ear-bud speakers from your favorite sound system, inside the large ear-muff type hearing protectors.

3. Use a fan, blowing sideways (across your work) to blow the dust away from you. This is the easiest and way to keep your air clean.

4. Certain materials require breathing protection: Sanding paint! Almost all old paint contains lead, and while your HSRT will do a great job of removing it, the dust is very harmful and you must use a respirator (breathing protection). Check with a reputable hardware, or safety-supply store to be sure your respirator will protect you from lead dust.

Red Cedar is a common wood and nice to work with but the fine dust created when sanding can cause lung illness. Use a respirator, or get a different wood. Pine, Spruce, or Maple are just a few of the common woods that are almost harmless, except in rare cases of an allergy.

5. Children are wonderfully creative and can do some tasks with a HSRT, but they must be under adult supervision. Please, lock up your tools where the children cannot get them and use them, unsupervised.

6. A good friend just mentioned another safety tip, that short-haired men rarely think of. If you are focusing carefully on some intricate work, and your lovely long hair gently falls over your HSRT, be aware that your hair can become wound around the working bit or collet, in an instant, and it hurts like anything!! (and can cause injury) Take care not to let your hair or any loose fabric come in contact with any rotating tool. Thank you to Val for this safety tip.

Just what is a HSRT anyway?

A High Speed Rotary Tool is a tool to help you do a wide variety of tasks in a wide variety of materials. The most common type of hand-held HSRT is an electric motor in a cylindrical case about 2 in. x 6 in. and when you switch it on, it rotates about 30,000 rpm (rotations per minute). There are compressed air powered HSRT (often called "die grinders") that turn much faster than this, but 30,000 rpm is considered "high speed" because a typical electric drill turns about 1000 rpm.

An accessory is connected to your HSRT to enable it to do the desired task. If you wish to carve wood, a "high speed steel" wood carving accessory bit would be connected. To etch glass you would attach a diamond coated steel bit. To sharpen steel, use a grinding stone. To cut steel, use a cutting wheel. To polish silverware, use a cloth polishing wheel and a buffing compound. To remove dry paint, or sand wood, or trim your dog's toenails, use a rubber sanding drum with the correct grit sanding sleeve. And much much more.

People have been doing all this and creating wonderful craft and art for thousands of years, so why do we need a HSRT now? Speed!. A HSRT will help us do similar work, much faster, easier, and sometimes, more accurately.

To get your HSRT set up to do some work, jump to BASICS

Size and Measurement??

I believe that the METRIC system of measurement is a wonderful tool that will help our young people solve some of the really big problems in this world. I apologize to them for being lazy and falling back on the old cumbersome British system of measurement. If there is enough interest in using metric, please let me know.(e-mail) I'll be happy to switch.

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