UKC

Over the past 6 months or so I have found quite a number of what look like very small iron filings in my fingers or palms. I have no idea from where I am picking these up. I usually notice them as I get the splinter like tingle when moving and notice it. They are very fine around <.25mm and about 2mm long but they vary a little. I am only concerned in case one works its way in and causes problems.

I only ever notice these at home and I don't think it likely I am picking them up outside and either driving or putting a coat on without noticing them. The other half hasn't had a single one. I am currently discounting this as being spouse-poisoning but am running out of alternatives I have tried running my hand round any metal fittings and paid special attention to anything only I tend to use or can reach (garage door is my job for example). I'll go through a spate of these splinters and then none for a while.

Are there any usual suspects to look for in a home that can shed these, maybe as they wear? I've got to the point I am checking my palms like one questioning his sanity after touching anything metal in the house.

In reply to ultrabumbly:

Definitely iron? Not perished rubber off bike handlebars or similar?

In reply to ultrabumbly:

Sounds a bit like.... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morgellons

?

In reply to Tom Last:

its hard to tell. They look like iron and I tried picking one up with fridge magnet it seems to stick but it might just be surface tension as they are so small. I considered it was something on my bike or lock but I have got them on days when I haven't used it.

In reply to ultrabumbly:

Should be easy to tell if they're iron. Try them with a magnet. Seems highly unlikely that they are though IMO.

In reply to ultrabumbly:

It must be your magnetic personality...

In reply to ultrabumbly:

What do you do for a living? Assuming you're a good judge of size: .25 x 2mm is pretty sizeable, more like stranded wire offcuts than dust or filings. Are they magnetic?

Breakfast cereals contain iron dust but not filaments like you describe. Rubber seals on electrical equipment, computers for example contain metal (usually Monel) filaments like you describe.

jk

In reply to ultrabumbly:

I once had this problem, but I was working in a machine shop at the time cutting brake disks.

Does this happen after you do anything in particular? e.g. if you mash a screw head with an electric screwdriver little metal filings are produced

In reply to ultrabumbly:

Are you sure you aren't Iron Man?

In reply to jkarran:

Most of my work these days involves being on a keyboard or phone. I come into no contact with anything mechanical or the like work related. I have though even given the keyboard a good hoover in case it was something in there from production.

They look very similar to some splinters I got once from a corroded bolt when replacing the loo seat except they are absolutely straight and finer. 0.25mm I would say is the largest I have found them, I can only get them out with the tweezers on my penknife. I washed any tools I used when I noticed this as well as us cleaning the floor thoroughly many times since and neither of us has had any in a foot past the first week after that. I've looked for anything else in the bathroom that was fitted at the same time to see if it is something similar.

In reply to ultrabumbly:

I used to occasionally get these from the ropes at the climbing wall. But I could never see them as they were too small. I assume it was from wear of the krabs through which the rope runs.

In reply to ultrabumbly:

Despite living in a building site, working with electrical wire in a building with a manual machine shop and making stained glass in my spare time I don't seem to get many if any inexplicable splinters, not that I notice at least. It's probably just something you've picked up on some clothing or from something you do or somewhere you go that your partner doesn't. It could even be you have sweatier hands than she does and pick these things up where she doesn't. I wouldn't worry about it.

jk

In reply to ultrabumbly:


Are nanobots involved?

In reply to ultrabumbly:

Are you getting these from a rope? I'd be worried for the rope's condition if you were

In reply to blurty:

nope. it is always at home.

In reply to ultrabumbly: Door locks wear, hinges wear, even some older drawer runners can produce metal bits. Check anything where metal moves against metal, even your computer chair may have something that is wearing away.

In reply to ultrabumbly:


Try putting it on a piece of paper with the magnet underneath, if you can't move it through the paper it isn't.

In reply to ultrabumbly:

Do you have a metal cock?

In reply to johncook:

I thought this the most likely that a spring or hinge or something is ejecting "bits"

and on looking it looks to be the mechanism that returns the back tilt lever on my chair. cheers

In reply to Punter S Thompson:

no but i have been worried about taking a whizz before noticing one was there

In reply to ultrabumbly:

I get these after climnbing at some indoor walls. I thought it was tiny shards of aluminium off krabs/belay devices.

In reply to ultrabumbly:

I've had lots of these in the past, I got mine from black drywall screws while converting mills into apartments.

In reply to ultrabumbly:

Have you saved the offending articles, I'm sure they could be examined forensically ?