Kevin Varney has Passed Away
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Rip Kevin
chris
chris
I never met him, but he was always quick to answer any questions i asked, even if they were dumb. RIP Kevin Varney.
Joe
Joe
Rip
Thanks kevin for all the cues you made me ,you always took that little extra for me. To young and to early to die. Rich aka the skunk.
Thanks kevin for all the cues you made me ,you always took that little extra for me. To young and to early to die. Rich aka the skunk.
Wow, way too young. RIP Kevin.
Kevin is the one that got me hooked on this site after he posted a picture of my old Scruggs cue that I sold to friend in Charlotte.
Kevin is the one that got me hooked on this site after he posted a picture of my old Scruggs cue that I sold to friend in Charlotte.
R.I.P. Brother you will be missed.
Of course it is speculation but you can possibly add Jerry Franklin's name to that list, he died at 42. Although his cause of death is listed as heart attack, his wife told me he was getting sick from the cue work. This was even before he died. Her main concern was the finishing.
Timmy Scruggs told me a story about CA glue for. He said they were experimenting using it as a finish for a while. One day a cue with the CA finish was being sanded and getting ready for final polishing when a customer who was in the shop was overcome by the dust so fast he just dropped. He had to be taken to the hospital. Timmy told me that stuff is really dangerous.
Having known many cue makers who work at home, in basements and garages. I think they may be exposing themselves and their families to some real dangers. The ones who use exhaust fans out the window for dust and fumes from spraying finish may want to rethink what they are doing. Beyond it being hazardous to themselves and their neighbors it may even be also being illegal.
Much of this stuff is also highly flammable and explosive. If you are working illegally out of your house and something happened there is a possibility your insurance may not pay because you are running an illegal business that caused the fire or explosion. There would be a lot of evidence. In many cases it would not be hard to prove with people having websites, calling themselves professional cue makers. Posting cues for sale on their website, on ebay and forums like this one. Is it really worth it just to build some cues? At the very least I hope people try to protect the health of themselves, their families and neighbors they may also be exposing to this bad stuff.
Just some thoughts
Folks should do their research on the products they use & expose themselves to. Internet is easy to use & full of info for those willing to read. Of all chemicals used in making cues, cyanoacrylate is one of the least harmful. Seriously look at the MSDS of all the adhesives & sealers & finishes you use in building cues, and compare to the MSDS of the cyano that you use. Folks might be surprised at what's really killing them.
CA glue carries a hazard rating of 2, meaning it's barely a threat. It's also one of the only chemicals in a cue shop that isn't listed as a carcinogen. Below is a excerpt from an article I read. I removed the identifying words & terms that would let the reader know what chemical they're reading about.
"Most contain chemicals that pose a health hazard, especially for those who work with them on a regular basis. Among these chemicals are urethane and cyanide compounds that can be particularly hazardous if inhaled in any significant quantity. These chemicals penetrate the lungs during inhalation and accumulate on the fibrous walls of these vital organs, causing irritation and swelling. Symptoms of chemical inhalation include coughing, sore throat, wheezing and difficulty breathing. When you inhale large quantities of isocyanates, your health may be adversely affected. Dizziness, headaches, or vision problems may sometimes occur. It is important to apply only in a well-ventilated area, using a respirator mask, to avoid inhalation."
Anybody guess what it's describing? It's not cyanoacrylate. It's common sanding sealers you find at the local hardware store. It's the stuff we all use to seal our woods with between cuts, and then hang in the same shop we're working in. The chemicals continue to evaporate for hours, filling our shops with danger. This is by far more likely the culprit of a lung infection or cancer than cyanoacrylate, yet cyanoacrylate is the one chemical every cue maker is most fearful of. Ironically, it's the least hazardous. The most dangerous is the most common & most ignored, sanding sealer. Cue makers please do yourselves a favor & know the chemicals you're working with. Don't buy into myth & heresay, but actually do your own research on the products you use, and take precautions accordingly. Cues aren't worth dying for.
CA glue carries a hazard rating of 2, meaning it's barely a threat. It's also one of the only chemicals in a cue shop that isn't listed as a carcinogen. Below is a excerpt from an article I read. I removed the identifying words & terms that would let the reader know what chemical they're reading about.
"Most contain chemicals that pose a health hazard, especially for those who work with them on a regular basis. Among these chemicals are urethane and cyanide compounds that can be particularly hazardous if inhaled in any significant quantity. These chemicals penetrate the lungs during inhalation and accumulate on the fibrous walls of these vital organs, causing irritation and swelling. Symptoms of chemical inhalation include coughing, sore throat, wheezing and difficulty breathing. When you inhale large quantities of isocyanates, your health may be adversely affected. Dizziness, headaches, or vision problems may sometimes occur. It is important to apply only in a well-ventilated area, using a respirator mask, to avoid inhalation."
Anybody guess what it's describing? It's not cyanoacrylate. It's common sanding sealers you find at the local hardware store. It's the stuff we all use to seal our woods with between cuts, and then hang in the same shop we're working in. The chemicals continue to evaporate for hours, filling our shops with danger. This is by far more likely the culprit of a lung infection or cancer than cyanoacrylate, yet cyanoacrylate is the one chemical every cue maker is most fearful of. Ironically, it's the least hazardous. The most dangerous is the most common & most ignored, sanding sealer. Cue makers please do yourselves a favor & know the chemicals you're working with. Don't buy into myth & heresay, but actually do your own research on the products you use, and take precautions accordingly. Cues aren't worth dying for.
Thats fine if the product is being used as intended. Putting on like CA as a finish and being exposed to that amount at one time and doing it repeatedly is out of the ordinary. Not to mention then sanding and converting it into a fine dust that can be breathed in or maybe absorbed through the skin.
CA is perfectly safe as long as you don't inhale it. It's generally medical grade stuff, even. I think they invented it to spray wounds in Vietnam.
Using CA as a finish seems incredibly dense to me, as there are hundreds of safe and fantastic finishes out there already, and I would imagine those would all be cheaper, too. CA != cheap.
Still very sad.
A lot of the woods used in cues are really nasty, to boot. KQ is using a wood I know a lot about, Pernambuco, which is super-duper-mega toxic to inhale. You can add bloodwood, ebony, and many other common cue woods to that list as well.
Regardless of how it's used, CA doesn't have the chemical makeup to be that dangerous. I'm not arguing that CA isn't dangerous. It is. It should be taken seriously. What I'm saying is that it is one of the least dangerous chemicals in your shop, and that the sanding sealer you use daily is FAR more dangerous. We seal woods much more often than we finish cues. How many times did he seal the woods in a cue before the cue was finished? You think he wore a respirator while sealing and then kept it on for the several hours following? No, he likely didn't. Being that many chemicals used in sanding sealers are independently carcinogenic, while CA is not, would it make more sense that the culprit was sanding sealer? Hey, i'm merely issuing a word of caution & common sense. We all need to be aware of our practices & the chemicals we use. And when something does go wrong, it's foolhardy to assume blame based on myth rather than considering the most plausible cause.
Kevin's demise was more than likely a culmination of years breathing toxic air that was contaminated with numerous chemicals. To say the CA finish killed him is ignoring all of the vastly more dangerous chemicals he was exposed to. My point isn't so much to debunk the CA myth, but more to bring awareness to the more serious dangers we so often ignore.
I agree, I was just commenting on it in general. I don't think I saw anything that suggested he was killed by CA. Having said that, a respiratory illness such as can be brought on by working with wood and solvents like with cue work I would not wish on my worst enemy. It is very hard to recover from and almost always leaves permeant damage.
If you ever live with someone dying from lung disease it will scare you to death. You watch them spend their entire day just gasping for the next breath till they never take another. The thought that doing this to yourself is so preventable and not doing anything about is just plain stupid. All these guys with their Porper lathes working in a spare bedroom venting out an open window with a box fan better get their heads out of their asses. It is a fun hobby but not worth getting sick over.
I keep this list in my shop as visible reminder and reference.
http://www.wood-database.com/wood-articles/wood-allergies-and-toxicity/
http://www.wood-database.com/wood-articles/wood-allergies-and-toxicity/
fingazzz75
Registered
For the most part Kevin used nothing more than a common cotton dust mask when working in his shop at home which was just an extra bedroom turned into a shop with no exhaust fans of any kind.
I was pretty close to Kevin....one of the few friends he actually had and that could tolerate him and his ways....Kevin was definitely a one of a kind for sure...Kevin and I had not spoken in his final 9 months of living due to a little money he owed me even though I knew for a fact that I would never see the money again when I personally handed it to him, yet I still got mad at him and I regret that...It is sad that I let a little bit of money come between our friendship and I will regret that the rest of my life and I will regret not trying to do more to help Kevin with some of his personal problems he had in his final days...I definitely feel that I was his best friend he had at one time in his life yet I never even got to say my final goodbye to him because of my stubbornness over a little money....I wish I could go back in time and help him out more than I did....I was in total shock last week when his ex-wife called me to tell me the bad news and I am still in shock at this very moment almost wishing it were not true....I am going to miss my friend Kevin....may he rest in peace
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It might have been coincidental but he went downhill after having lung infection from sanding CA coats.
There are sealers that are not toxic or a lot less toxic than lacquer sanding sealer .
http://sealitgreen.com/cid-5-1/total-wood-sealants.html
http://www.rockler.com/enduro-sandi..._campaign=PL&gclid=COWSqOuYrr0CFRRsfgodPgUAMQ
Layers and layers of CA, sanding it and all that is really not necessary imo.
Epoxy is a much safer imo.
Try not to let it eat at you, Kevin wouldn't have wanted that, I'm sure. I, too, wish I could have done more but didn't know what to do. I gave him whatever encouragement I could through text messages and the occasional phone conversation. From the second time he got sick I tried to communicate with him at least once or twice a week. It was all I could do.
Thanks for the picture in the thread. Many months ago I got a short, very cryptic, reply to a text I sent asking Kevin's condition. It was the only communication I had in almost a year and I still don't know who it was who responded.
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I stay away from lacquer anymore, and stick to oil based sealers. If I can smell it & it is irritating, then I won't use it. As for CA, it's fine if you know how to use it. There doesn't need to be a lot of sanding, and there's no need even smell it or breathe vapors. The vapors weigh more than air, so as long as you have ventilation below the plane of your head, it should never be an issue. You must also consider that there are many, many types of CA formulated for various purposes, and various purities. Not all of it has that toxic, burning odor.
Regardless, it is a wake up call. It's too bad that it takes something like this to remind us of our fragile mortality. If I recall, he had young children. I couldn't even imagine it.
Thanks for saying this, but don't blame yourself. Kevin was a lot to blame himself because he was too proud to explain that he simply could not make good on his debts.
In the earlier days of phenolic tips, one time I just posted on AZ "where can I buy a phenolic tip?". I got a PM from Kevin wanting to know my address. He made and mailed me a couple, no charge. I wasn't even a customer.
So it was not in his heart to let people down. It was his probably his pride and his hope for a recovery that someday he would turn it all around and make good. Kevin wanted to be liked as a man and loved as a cue maker. Let that be the Kevin Varney we remember.
It's not fun to be in this boat but there are better ways to handle it. Many year ago, early in my career - almost 30 - I had a really bad year in business. I knew I could turn it around and I had a lot of business, but it seemed like everything went bad at the same time. I owed one creditor a lot of money. I had borrowed to the hilt just to stay in business, and I couldn't pay one large industry debt. I'll never forget this. The controller of the company I was dealing with called me. I reluctantly took the call and he asked about the payment. I was brutally honest and told him what had caused my problems and that I didn't know when I was going to be able to pay them. To my utter surprise he said "Chris, I'll tell you what. I'll call you once a month for an update, at the end of each month. In the meantime, we value your business. We won't extend additional credit, but we definitely want to retain the relationship." The turn around came hard and fast. We paid off that debt in a month or two and cruised to many profitable years after that. I'll never forget that man, believe me. He could have buried us, but I became their largest customer and 30 years later, we still are going strong with this company (although he retired 15 years ago).