Car Fires

[Fastchas]

Commuting on the M6 near Walsall last night I went past a car on fire.
Got me thinking, what causes fires these days? I guess years ago it was poor wiring or fuel leaks but nowadays a lot of these have been addressed.
Has anyone's car ever set on fire, recent or in years gone by and what was the cause?

Edited by Fastchas on Thursday 19th February 10:10

[The Moose]

Poor wiring.

Fuel leaks.

Oil leaks.

Cigarettes.

Arson.

etc etc etc

[thismonkeyhere]

I had a Defender once that caught fire, which just added more weight to the argument (or fuel to the fire!) that Land Rovers are a bit st, really.

Ok, it was iconic and unstoppable off road, but neither of those points helps your mood when you are watching flames coming out from under the bonnet....

[drivin_me_nuts]

Easily done. The oil feed hose to my saab turbo failed. Cue nice little oil fire. Shame, the only thing I had to hand to smother the fire was Spice girls t shirt used as a rag. I miss that t shirt.

[fourspoons]

When my M235 blew up on track the other week all the engine oil spewed all over the track temperature brakes, there was a lot of smoke but thankfully it didn't catch fire but I think it easily could have

[SuperVM]

One of my cars caught fire on a track day. I only noticed as I opened the bonnet to let it cool a bit and saw a puff of smoke and then flames behind the engine. By the time I had fetched water it had gone out thankfully. The cause appeared to be loose insulation tape from the wiring loom.

[V8forweekends]

SuperVM said:

One of my cars caught fire on a track day. I only noticed as I opened the bonnet to let it cool a bit and saw a puff of smoke and then flames behind the engine. By the time I had fetched water it had gone out thankfully. The cause appeared to be loose insulation tape from the wiring loom.

Water - that's meant to be a joke, right?

[schmalex]

My Series 3 has caught fire a few times.

The worst was when the bonnet support stay came loose and created a contact between the battery and the bonnet pin, igniting the old oil and crud behind the front grille when I was driving along a green lane at night. It quickly turned into a reasonably big engine bay fire. I stopped, grabbed a big bunch of nettles, thrashed the fire out, ripped off the bonnet stay and carried on.

It's been right as rain since. There're a few scorch marks under the bonnet and the oil bath air filter has a slightly warped and melted look, but no harm done.

[SuperVM]

V8forweekends said:

SuperVM said:

One of my cars caught fire on a track day. I only noticed as I opened the bonnet to let it cool a bit and saw a puff of smoke and then flames behind the engine. By the time I had fetched water it had gone out thankfully. The cause appeared to be loose insulation tape from the wiring loom.

Water - that's meant to be a joke, right?

Not really, it clearly wasn't petrol or oil, nor is there much chance for anything like that to be present in the area in which the fire was burning. The only bit of wiring that runs along there is from the lambda sensors, so the chance of a massive short with more flames was also minimal. I asked for a fire extinguisher, but without one available water was the best we could come up with. I thought it would be preferable to allowing it to continue to burn.

[R1 Indy]

My S2000 caught fire due to a oil filter leak. (amazing how fast it happens!)

Luckily it was on a trackway, so fire extinguisher on hand, otherwise it would have been toast.

[LittleEnus]

Interesting o hear these stories. Kind of puts me off track days!! They can and do spread very quickly, scary how so.

[SuperVM]

LittleEnus said:

Interesting o hear these stories. Kind of puts me off track days!! They can and do spread very quickly, scary how so.

Yeah, mine was on the hottest day of last summer and the car was running very hot.

[Swanny87]

fourspoons said:

When my M235 blew up on track the other week all the engine oil spewed all over the track temperature brakes, there was a lot of smoke but thankfully it didn't catch fire but I think it easily could have

Ouch, that sounds expensive...

[SuperVM]

Swanny87 said:

fourspoons said:

When my M235 blew up on track the other week all the engine oil spewed all over the track temperature brakes, there was a lot of smoke but thankfully it didn't catch fire but I think it easily could have

Ouch, that sounds expensive...

There's a thread on here about it somewhere, he got BMW to replace it under warranty.

[RobinBanks]

SuperVM said:

Not really, it clearly wasn't petrol or oil, nor is there much chance for anything like that to be present in the area in which the fire was burning. The only bit of wiring that runs along there is from the lambda sensors, so the chance of a massive short with more flames was also minimal. I asked for a fire extinguisher, but without one available water was the best we could come up with. I thought it would be preferable to allowing it to continue to burn.

I think the point is that water is fairly effective at stopping a petrol or oil fire, but the cause was bad electrical tape. Which means that you were about to pour water over (possibly burning) electrical components....

[V8forweekends]

RobinBanks said:

I think the point is that water is fairly effective at stopping a petrol or oil fire, but the cause was bad electrical tape. Which means that you were about to pour water over electrical components....

No. The point was that water used on a petrol, oil or electrical fire is exceptionally dangerous.

[MissChief]

V8forweekends said:

No. The point was that water used on a petrol, oil or electrical fire is exceptionally dangerous.

True but I suspect water is all he could lay his hands on at such short notice?

[SuperchargedVR6]

drivin_me_nuts said:

Easily done. The oil feed hose to my saab turbo failed. Cue nice little oil fire. Shame, the only thing I had to hand to smother the fire was Spice girls t shirt used as a rag. I miss that t shirt.

That happened to me too. Braided PTFE oil line supposedly up to the heat, but wasn't, compounded by having a turbo jacket which absorbed the oil, creating a wick effect. Luckily it was winter, so I pulled over by a big puddle down a side road, cupped the water (complete with twigs, leaves etc) with my hands and managed to extinguish the fire. Waited for the engine to cool down, nursed it back home very slowly, replaced crappy braided line with OEM hard line - never happened again.

[RobinBanks]

V8forweekends said:

No. The point was that water used on a petrol, oil or electrical fire is exceptionally dangerous.

My mistake there. I've used it on fires started by petrol before happily.

[SuperVM]

MissChief said:

V8forweekends said:

No. The point was that water used on a petrol, oil or electrical fire is exceptionally dangerous.

True but I suspect water is all he could lay his hands on at such short notice?

Indeed, the point was being made about using water on a petrol, oil or electrical fire. I was pretty certain it wasn't any of those things (I could see the fire, which was quite small) and I could only get water.