GEOFFs125
Free Member
:Sad: We had a lucky escape at the weekend when we had an electrical fire in the engine compartment.
We had travelled about 30 miles to a local motocross meeting, which was held in a field on the outskirts of West Kennet in Wiltshire. We had just parked up, my wife and son had gone off to walk the dogs while I put the kettle on. After filling the kettle and and putting it on the stove I noticed smoke coming out of the bonnet.
I quickley grabbed the fire extinquisher, ran round to the drivers door and popped open the bonnet. The flames were coming from the right hand front wing, just behind the vehicle battery. Thankfully the fire extinquisher did the job it was designed to do.
The fire was caused by what I think is the battery isolator/emergency starter relay over heating. What caused it to overheat, I do not know. The house battery was melted at the negative terminal. I disconnected the vehicle battery postive supply to the relay and the positve cable from the relay to the house battery, however the rv would not start.
The RAC were fantastic, they tasked the recovery firm Greenmeadow Commercials, based in Swindon. The low loader was unable to get to us due to small hump backed bridge. So they towed the RV out of the field with a 4x4 and then winched it onto the low loader with no damge.
The most frightening thing is that normally when we arrive at a race meeting, my son and I take the dogs for a walk while my wife makes the coffee, thankfully due to a hip injury I was tasked to make the coffee. She admitted to me that she would not have known what to do. With 200 litres of LPG and 70 litres of petrol on board I dread to think what the outcome would have been.
I now await the estimate for the cost of the repairs and I would advise anyone to check the condition of their fire extinquisher and make sure your partner knows how to operate it.
We had travelled about 30 miles to a local motocross meeting, which was held in a field on the outskirts of West Kennet in Wiltshire. We had just parked up, my wife and son had gone off to walk the dogs while I put the kettle on. After filling the kettle and and putting it on the stove I noticed smoke coming out of the bonnet.
I quickley grabbed the fire extinquisher, ran round to the drivers door and popped open the bonnet. The flames were coming from the right hand front wing, just behind the vehicle battery. Thankfully the fire extinquisher did the job it was designed to do.
The fire was caused by what I think is the battery isolator/emergency starter relay over heating. What caused it to overheat, I do not know. The house battery was melted at the negative terminal. I disconnected the vehicle battery postive supply to the relay and the positve cable from the relay to the house battery, however the rv would not start.
The RAC were fantastic, they tasked the recovery firm Greenmeadow Commercials, based in Swindon. The low loader was unable to get to us due to small hump backed bridge. So they towed the RV out of the field with a 4x4 and then winched it onto the low loader with no damge.
The most frightening thing is that normally when we arrive at a race meeting, my son and I take the dogs for a walk while my wife makes the coffee, thankfully due to a hip injury I was tasked to make the coffee. She admitted to me that she would not have known what to do. With 200 litres of LPG and 70 litres of petrol on board I dread to think what the outcome would have been.
I now await the estimate for the cost of the repairs and I would advise anyone to check the condition of their fire extinquisher and make sure your partner knows how to operate it.
)))
