With the car fire I posted previously, I've been wondering if it would have been worthwhile to direct both extingushers UNDER the car, hoping that the draft would pick up the material and snuff it out like putting out a chimney fire. It's too late now.
Parking EVs indoors
- Thread starter 3930dave
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bdhsfz6
Veteran Member
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- Kubota MX5800 HST & L6060 HSTC Formerly L6060 HST B7100 HST, L2550, L3010 HST, L3430 HST
No loss of human life but the fire took 2 cats and a parrot. It happened mid day when most were at work, otherwise, it could have been much worse.
MAX-24-Dean
Veteran Member
That's the same information I just got out of a continueing education class.
INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF FIRE FIGHTERS says that fully electric vehicles are 10x LESS likely to catch fire than conventional vehicles.
this makes me feel good.
Mathematically, X times less than something without hard data always makes me wonder if someone is trying to pull the wool over my eyes.
So lets say that of the approx. 170,000 vehicle fire per year EV's are 10 times less likely to catch fire.
An average ICE vehicle fire takes about 30 minutes to extinguish and uses the resources of one company engine with a 700 to 1000 gallon tank. A back up engine usually arrives and is not typically utilized in putting out the fire. So lets say it takes 2 units to work this call.
An EV fire takes a up to 4 units and 3 hours or a little more to extingish the fire. Most of the water is being directed to cool the batteries so there is less thermal run away. The trucks have to go to hydrants to refill, this is why they need more units to respond.
Then someone has to hang around and watch in the case that "stranded energy" in the batteries does not restart the fire when the tow vehicle moves the EV. Then some EV's need the firetruck to follow the Tow vehicle in case the fire restarts. Once the EV is on the ground the fire unit can return to station. So a fire unit can be considered "on site" or in "mop up" for 5 hours or more depending on the make of the EV and the manufacturers written guidance.
Why do you think a major EV manufacturer is switching to a safer Lithium chemistry for thier cars?
ponytug
Super Member
Once you have hot metal that exceeds the flash point of the fuel, directing fire extinguishers under the car won't do anything much, especially if the extinguisher is a dry powder type.
A few years back, we were standing around a small flammable liquid fire (unplanned) that we had managed to gently puff out with a CO2 extinguisher (it was a couple of quarts burning in a container on a hot plate,
...don't ask). The rather full of himself boss ran in, said something like "WTF? Why haven't you idiots grabbed the container off the hot plate?" and then proceeded to reach out to do so before anyone could say anything. As I said, he had a strong, and, I think, unwarranted belief in his abilities. At which point his movements wafted some fumes down toward the hot plate and "poof!" the fumes reignited, sending a Hollywood worthy flamethrower back up toward the ceiling, nearly taking his eyebrows off. None of us actually laughed, but the general smirks were definitely along the lines of "Oh, yeah? Just who exactly is the idiot here?" He was the author of the SOP that had enabled the fire... He retired a year or two later, but I swear that I had nothing to do with it. As Sgt. Schultz used to say, "I know nothing. I didn't even get up this morning..."The point being with a flammable liquid fire you have to either cool it below the flash point, or completely cover the surface with foam or powder. With an under hood fire, there isn't a great way to do either.
@Jstpssng I think that there was never any hope for the car with tools at your disposal. With a closed hood, I think that fighting a fuel fire is next to impossible with a handheld extinguisher.
All the best,
Peter
MAX-24-Dean
Veteran Member
Once some lithium chemistry batteries over heat and catch fire (and thermal runaway happens), they can create there own oxygen and the fire can get much hotter very fast. That's why the manufacturers direct firefighters to cool the batteries with water.
Used to work with Lithium additions to Aluminum smelting cells, some of the guys would "play" with it mixing it with other chemicals that were available just to see what would happen.
It wasn't pretty, I can rememeber driving the ambulance and a guy literally screaming for the whole 30 minute ride to the hospital. Chemical burns are horrible.
Used to work with Lithium additions to Aluminum smelting cells, some of the guys would "play" with it mixing it with other chemicals that were available just to see what would happen.
It wasn't pretty, I can rememeber driving the ambulance and a guy literally screaming for the whole 30 minute ride to the hospital. Chemical burns are horrible.
Grumpycat
Elite Member
The problem with lithium fires is the cells provide their own oxygen for combustion. You can't "snuff it out". Massive volumes of water consume heat util hopefully below the combustion temperature.
Grumpycat
Elite Member
If you think lithium fires are bad just wait until "the hydrogen revolution".
TheMan419
Veteran Member
They make fire alarms you can put up in garage like conditions. They also make them connected to each other meaning if one alarm goes off they all do. They even make specific ones for dusty environments like a horse barn. So I think pretty easy to put one in the unheated garage and have it connected to another one in the house so they both go off at the same time.
ponytug
Super Member
I think that there are some specific issues with garages and the upper limits on temperature alarms. Many household versions will trip at temperaturs encountered in an unconditioned garage.
@3930dave You might also look over at Mike Holts forum;
e.g.
All the best,
Peter
@3930dave You might also look over at Mike Holts forum;
e.g.
Heat Detection for Energy Storage Systems
I have been volunteered to canvas and (hopefully) find out how other California jurisdictions are handling this wide-open-to-interpretation “reasonable alternatives”. Storage System operating conditions for ambient temperature are usually well above the 100-degree F mentioned in the bulletin...
xenforo.mikeholt.com
All the best,
Peter
ning
Elite Member
Hydrogen fires are overblown
(bad pun, but really)
Hydrogen does ignite very easily, but it also disperses very readily because it's so light. It's so small that it will readily leak out of the slightest cracks in a tank that you'd never notice when holding other fuels.
In addition, it requires a more substantial concentration in air before it becomes flammable (petrol is flammable in air concentrations of 1.4% to 7.6%; hydrogen/air doesn't become flammable until there's more than 4% hydrogen - and remember how easily it disperses! ... caveat: it remains flammable up to 75% concentration...)
Remember, the Hindenburg burned as it did because the ship was made of cotton that was sealed with a mixture that was actually pretty flammable. Had it been made out of some hypothetical non-flammable material, the H2 would've gone *boom-poof* (sound effect for the initial detonation of the H2 that the airship experienced) and then... no more burn as most of the hydrogen would've gone up into the atmosphere before even catching fire. It's even possible that the ship wouldn't've hit the ground, or not that hard, because without the covering being flammable, not as many of the hydrogen compartments would've blown up without the subsidiary fire opening them up and successively catching them on fire too.
I'd take a hydrogen fire over a Li-ion fire any day.