September 26, 2004
silver and black (formerly silver) 1986 bmw 325
She was a fine little car.
I was getting ready to take her to the carwash for a cleanup before donating to the local public radio and television station.
At least no one got hurt and I got to meet some of my neighbors who came out with garden hoses to keep the small blaze under control while we waited on the professionals of the Woodside Fire Department to arrive and put it out for real.
I learned one very important lesson. Those "emergency auto fire extingushers" are a joke. Don't waste your money unless the worst you're expecting is a cigarette on the floorboard.
I also learned that I'm capable of getting out of a parked car a lot faster than I would have expected :-)
Deanna, who was standing outside the driver's door, probably had a broader view to the first few seconds of the chaos than I did. She also walked away unscathed.
I'm still trying to find out now if the public radio station will take it or if there are any other charities or worthy causes that will take a slightly crispy car. If you live on the peninsula and know of anyone that would be willing to tow it away for a good cause, please let me know.
update: A few people have asked what happened. Well, I'm not quite sure yet. Something blew up and caught fire and it flamed a lot. I didn't see any big hole in the side of the engine so I suspect electrical. Maybe I'll look more closely in the morning.
Posted by asa at September 26, 2004 04:44 PMdamn.. glad you are ok asa
Posted by: Moparx on September 26, 2004 05:56 PMGlad you got out in time.
I had a similar thing happen to me in grad school, in a '79 Mustang-II (a 4-cylinder fuel-efficient 'stang). I had a bad oil leak, and one day the oil decided to ignite. The junkyard paid for the towing costs.
Any idea why your's ignited?
Dan
Posted by: Dan Bodoh on September 26, 2004 06:32 PMUm sorry to ask the obvious but what actually happened to the car? Was this some Anti firefox vigilante who fire bombed you? :D
Seriously I'm glad yu escaped unhurt! :)
Posted by: Paul on September 26, 2004 06:34 PMWow, glad you're OK. Like the others, though, I just have to ask: how did it happen? (And can it happen to me? :-))
Posted by: Robert Morris on September 26, 2004 06:48 PMI have a friend whose car was stolen, gutted and then abandoned. He donated it to some charity somewhere and he was able to claim something for it on his taxes.
Posted by: Stu on September 26, 2004 10:41 PMDid you see any M$ emplyers or Maxthon fanboyz around your house 8-) before it happened?
And I'm really sorry to hear that...so what car do you have in mind right now?
Posted by: Minh on September 26, 2004 10:42 PMWhy did you call a car a "she"?
Posted by: Anonymous Coward on September 27, 2004 02:02 AMThat surely was someone from Microsoft who hates Firefox :)
Posted by: Papuass on September 27, 2004 02:37 AMBoy, free software pays well. ;)
Posted by: Joe Grossberg on September 27, 2004 08:59 AMDamn that sucks. Good thing you got out fine, most likely it was electrical, but could have been a fuel related issue too. (Possible fuel leak)
Posted by: Nick on September 27, 2004 10:51 AMinteresting. I've been carrying one of the small fire extinguishers in my car recently and 2 weeks ago I passed a car that had just pulled over with a tire on fire. I stopped and used up my little extinguisher on it, putting out the tire, but by then the engine was on fire.
I and the others who stopped advised the driver to get anything critical out of his car since it was about to be seriously toasted (he hadn't known it was on fire until I stopped, he thought it was steam)... luckily about then a fire truck came up and used their 3" hose on it. That did the trick nicely. (my 7-yr old son was pretty wide-eyed, getting to watch all this from our van, safely up the road)
No, they didn't know what caused that fire either. Over the years I've seen a surprising number of cars burned out in our company lot. (6+ in 15 years?) People pull in and the car goes up. Sometimes it's an overheating thing. something cracks and coolant shoots onto the hot manifold, then whoosh. pretty impressive to see the results afterwards, especially the ones that spread to the whole passenger compartment... sucks if it's *your* car of course... or your girlfriend's - as was the case of the guy I stopped for. ;-)
fwiw, I now have the next size up of extinguishers - for home and car, though I don't expect them to put out a serious car fire... but perhaps to help give my family or someone else some more time in an emergency.
Posted by: Jeff Wilkinson on September 27, 2004 10:59 AMSo, what is your next car? I've heard G35s are popular at mozilla.org ;)
Blonker, my next car will probably be an early 90s toyota or honda. The little bmw of mine that burned up was a 1986 325 with about 200,000 miles on it. Over the last 15 years (since I was old enough to drive) I've owned 6 cars. I've never owned a car with less than 100K miles on it or newer than 8 years old. I'd put the average value of those cars at about $2,500 and I expect my next to fall in line with the previous (unless someone wants to donate a G35 to me).
--Asa
Hey Asa,
I'd recommend a Honda Civic. I'm driving around my wife's old 96 Civic these days, with 110K on it. Great car. No problems over its life, except for air conditioning last year and a cracked exhaust manifold this year.
Dan
Posted by: Dan Bodoh on September 27, 2004 06:26 PMGlad you're unscathed. I know a little bit about cars, and I think it was probably the flux capacitor that blew.
Posted by: absnath on September 27, 2004 10:01 PMnah, if it was the flux capacitor, he'd be posting this from next week... or last week... ;-)
Posted by: Jeff Wilkinson on September 28, 2004 07:53 AMGlad you're OK. For future reference.
Fire Extinguishers: either Halon or Dry Chem. Ask someone with your local Sports Car Club of America club about the recommended size.
DO NOT OPEN THE HOOD when there is a fire. It seems like the thing to do, but is likely to cause a flash that will engulf whoever opens the hood as the fire is usually starved for oxygen with the hood closed and inrush of air "does the trick". Very nasty.
It may well have been a problem with the flex lines in the fuel injection system. They are an item which should be visually inspected on a regular basis. Check with the local Bimmer dealer to see if there was a recall of some sort that you did not get the word about (don't mention the fire until after you get the information you want).
Posted by: Richard on September 29, 2004 09:50 AMMay want to look at this:
http://apache.org/foundation/contributing.html#CarProgram