I cut my finger buying the duct for a video about duct.
Picked up a six inch elbow, spun it straight the way you do, and it came apart in my hand. Bled on the way to the truck. Took a picture of it because at that point it is either a picture or a bad mood.
That is sheet metal. Sharp and waiting for you to be a little careless.
What I wear
Wells Lamont HydraHyde leather work gloves. Leather where you need it.
I am not going to tell you it is the only glove that works. It is the one I keep buying.
What makes them work is where the leather sits. Leather on the palm and over the back of the fingers, fabric across the back of the hand. The leather is where the cut is most likely to happen. The fabric is where your hand needs to let the sweath out, and a full leather glove does not give you that.
What gloves do not fix
Here is the part the glove companies will not write.
Moving fast and not being present is what gets people. Not the metal. The metal has been sharp the whole time.
Two of mine, and they are different problems.
The one gloves would have made smaller. I had just cut a piece down for an offset. The piece was out of square, which is why I was putting a screw through the snap lock near the edge in the first place. The screw slipped off and my knuckles slid across the raw end of the duct, the drive side and the s-cleat side, drive not bent yet. Thirteen stitches. The scar is a U about an inch and a half long. There was blood on a brand new concrete sidewalk and the superintendent was not happy.
I have gone back over that one plenty of times and I still do not know what I would have done different about the screw slipping. But I was not wearing gloves, and anything between my hand and those two edges would have meant fewer stitches. That is the honest version.
The one I could have. Lifting a piece of round overhead by myself, no gloves again. It rolled off the collar and opened my hand up. I was in a bad holding position and I should have had somebody on the other end. That is the whole lesson and it has nothing to do with gloves. Working alone has a size limit and I was over it.
That scar faded out eventually. It was ugly for a while. A healing cut on your hand does not help you on a date either, and I never heard from her again.
When I take them off
Word of the day: feel. Losing your sense of touch when gloves are on it common. The fingertips are bulking and make it harder to grab small items and roll and organize them in your hand. Gloves are not great for:
- Grabbing screws. Picking one screw out of a pouch with gloves on is a fight. Grab a handful
- Control wiring. The terminals are small and they are in tight spaces. The glove blocks your view of the port before it blocks your fingers
- The phone. The HydraHydes sort of work on a screen, you really need big buttons for them to work properly. Typing on a standard keyboard is not really happening
They make gloves with the fingerprint tips for the screen. The fabric on those does not hold up to metal for long, so you are picking which problem you want.
Be honest about what the phone is, though. You are not out there to text or doom scroll on the clock. You have to communicate and that is the whole job the phone has when you are working. Buy the glove for your hands, not for your screen.
Winter is a different reason
In the cold, gloves are not only about cuts. They hold the moisture in your hands so they do not dry out and crack.
Cracked hands hurt more than most cuts and they last longer. Get a hand cream and actually use it. Mine sits on the night stand so I do not forget. That one is called, Bloody Knuckles Hand Cream.
The short version
- The metal bites in the aisle at the supply house, not only on the job
- Speed and not paying attention cut people. Gloves can cover the rest
- Leather where the cut happens, fabric where it does not. An all fabric glove is not a work glove
- Some work cannot afford the feel a glove costs. Screws, control wiring, your phone
- If you are lifting something that wants a second set of hands, the glove is not the fix
- Winter is about cracking, not cutting. Hand cream counts as a tool
Everything else that goes in the bag is on the ductwork tools list, and which tool for which job covers what to reach for once it is packed.