bureau13

I never really thought of engine oil as a fire risk. How has my car not burned to the ground?! Thinking about it, I guess the headers are the one area underneath my engine that's not got oil leaking onto it. I guess I've been lucky about that.

Alan

Best prevention is good maintenance. Next best is to know the car well and be able to detect when something isn't running right. Then have a good extinguisher that is easily to hand and quick to use. I believe Halon 1211 is by far the best, Halotron (CFC-11) works well too but is only ~half as effective volumetrically, another good option is CO2.

A flexible nozzle on your extinguisher is really a good idea (think CE panel fires), but especially important is a way to get halon (etc) into the engine compartment without opening the hood.

Other considerations are that when moving you have a lot of airflow around the engine & out - any extinguisher deployment at speed will result in losing all the extinguisher contents in a cloud behind you - not at all useful. Even when stopped if the fans stay running you will similarly lose most of the extinguisher contents out under the car. You need a way to ensure car and the fans stop before extinguisher deployment - the brakes & key do most of it - except for the fan after-running. For these reasons an automatic system is very problematic - to me a manual system is best.

You do need to have a way to jet halon along the top and across the engine - ideally starting near the fuel rails - from there it will find its own way downward. Having a full belly pan in place is probably much better than not - to avoid too rapid a downwards flow.

The other key item is that it is likely folks behind you will have a better idea if you are on fire than you will on the highway - so a detection system (absolute heat, rate of heat rise, smoke particulates, smoke ionization, raw fuel detection) would be good early warning systems - but smoke and fuel detection is prone to detecting environmental traces too... (...famers with fires in fields and 60's muscle cars...)

It's easy to go too far - I never did create a fire/fuel detection system. But I have the halon, flex hose and manual direct engine deployment system.

Alan

GregBBRD

One small squirt from a Halon unit like Rob has in his GTS will put out any engine fire you will ever have.

The entire bottle would put out am engulfed "car inferno" and still have enough left to put out the flames from your campfires for the next 20 years.

Halon is like a magic trick with fire. I've used it personally enough to be completely blown away at what it does with fuel and oil.

Find a Halon fire extinguisher, don't ignore power steering or automatic transmission leaks, use high quality flexible fuel lines (factory when available or mine when factory are NLA), clean you engine compartment, and keep oil leaks to a minimum.

If you do these things, your car is more likely to be swallowed up by an earthquake than have an engine fire.

SwedeInSiam

You guys in US are really lucky to still have Halon. The rest of us have to live with Drypowder as a CO2 extinguisher is to bulky to put in the car (at least the ones they are selling here).

jeff spahn

Especially you California folk.

RennPartsDirect

Can you point us in the direction of a good setup that is off the shelf or would we have to piece a system together?

Adk46

This discussion has made me think of jet engine test stands. The big water pipes and controls for putting out a fire are marked "DELUGE". That's a comforting word.

Anyway, if I have a fire, what should I do? I know the first parts: shut off the engine, and get out with the extinguisher. Oh - better remember to put in in park! But then what? Reach in and pull the hood release? Try to open the hood? If not, squirt the extinguisher into ... where?

GregBBRD

Go online and buy a 2.5 pound Halon 1211....if you are really paranoid, buy a 5 pounder or two 2.5 pound units.

You really don't need a system. Like Alan said, you really don't want to deploy on onboard system while you are moving, anyway.

If you ever have an engine fire, stop and shut off the engine, pop the hood release...do not open the safety catch....and spray down the open cracks on the side....just a quick sweeping blast.

Using Halon, the fire should be either completely out or very insignificant.

Then grab a rag or a glove (latch could be hot), flip the safety catch and open the hood completely.

Spray again, if required.

Be sure and watch under the car for flowing Halon gas (a lot heavier than air), it is amazing to watch it drop.

FredR

There is only one effective mitigation to prevent fires and that is to prevent leaks. The problem is the exhaust pipes and the surface temperature of them which in turn is influenced by air flow around them.

Even coolant, once the water has vapourised, the residual glycol can catch fire irrespective of how likely that may or may not be.

People get confused by the generic terms we use in the oil industry. The Flash Point is more or less irrelevant- it is the auto ignition temperature that is of most relevance and even that can be misleading given that most fluids are a blend of some kind or other and thus a range of auto ignition temps applies. Add to that the impact of the actual temperature of the leaking fluid [engine oil temps around 200C ?] and it does not take a lot to visualise the harsh environment that exists under the hood- especially where I live in the Middle East. For starters I would feel more comfortable if the hood had air flow slats to move more air through the engine bay assuming that does not create more problems than it solves [ground effect?].

The more one studies this concept the more one wonders why we do not see more of these types of things than we do. Makes me want to go through the power steering lines and the auto tranny fluid hose lines as well as the gasoline hoses.

The real danger comes when a pin hole develops in a pressurised system and one gets a hot spray that is in part atomised- this type of thing is a fire about to happen. A slight weep from a sealing surface that progressively wets the surface it falls on over time is much less likely to cause a fire but nonetheless leaks of any kind are not desirable- they can only get worse with time [I currently see such on my power steering lines from the header tank and need to do something about it] . The high pressure part of the hydraulic system is the bit too really worry about [causing a sparay] but nothing should be taken for granted.

Rgds

Fred

voskian

Safecraft sells the 2.5 pound halon 1211 extinguishers. They are expensive but will save a lot of rebuild/repair if you have a fire by extinguishing the flames quick. Best path though as Greg says is prevention by making sure all in the engine compartment is up to spec.

https://safecraft.com/products.php?c...at=motorsports

mike77

Halon seems to be banned here in the UK due to the ozone hole scam. FE 36 appears to be the ozone friendly replacement.

GlenL

This is very dangerous. Your approach is practical but it's when people open the hood that they burn their faces off.

The best approach is new, high-quality fuel lines.

Alan

Halon 1211 (BCF) is not longer manufactured in the USA - it is available now only by recycling existing commercial stocks - prices will continue to go up. Halon 1211 certified extinguishers are no longer made. Halotron 1 (CFC-11) was the first choice replacement but it needs twice the volume to be as effective, that is OK in a commercial fixed application but less good when you want small portable size. FE36 (HFC-236fa) seems to be more efficient - close to Halon 1211 - so will be my choice if I have to recharge and Halon 1211 is too expensive.

BTW I don't feel too bad about the Halon - I have no plans to deploy it - ever - but if I do it will be to prevent a huge amount of noxious emissions that would otherwise have happened....

Alan

GregBBRD

I read last night that although Halon 1211 and 1301 are no longer made, the FAA still requires this to be used in airplanes.

There's apparently a huge market in buying Halon, for this purpose.

Before anyone gets too upset about using/buying Halon, they really need to go and read about the gasses that are released by mother nature. Read the literature about Mount Pinatubo's eruption in 1991.

The things that governments do are not always the most intelligent path.....

davek9

This is the one I carry in the Blue car, need to get another for the bench.
I think 2.5 lb was/is the minimum requirement for the Track too?

http://www.summitracing.com/parts/htr-hg250c/overview/