The Official "How Not To" Thread

Here's one that's SERIOUS!

I cleaned my front wheel bearings in solvent on a lift at the station where I was working. (40 years ago, on a Saturday. Nobody there but me, pumping gas.) To dry the first one, I put it on my finger, sort of like a ring, and shot air at it. The whirling sound it made as it spun was "cool", so I sped it up.

In the next instant, it exploded, tearing the finger next to it, knocking a lens out of my glasses, and one ball went across the shop, through the office and made a BB hole in the front window.

Moral: Never spool up a caged bearing. It needs the race to contain it and keep it from going KABOOM!! It also "may" have exceeded it's designed speed limit. :rolleyes:

Nobody ever said anything about the BB hole in that BIG, EXPENSIVE window!

NEVER, EVER do that! :eek: