Just a short story with a couple of reminders. Since fall is well uppon us I decided to take advantage of a nice october day with the predicted high in the mid 80’s, very nice for october in Minneapolis. I decided drive my black 429CJ to church and then enjoy the afternoon.
Needing to top off with fuel a quick U turn (4 lane controlled intersection) apparently overstreesed a brand new power steering hose spraying fluid on the exhaust manifold causing a small but smokey fire. A quick blast with my fire extinguiser easily put out the flames but left a powery mess all over about 1/2 of the engine compartment.
Actual damage cause by the fire was minimal - spark plug wires and power steering hose. The main mess was caused by the fire extinguisher itself. Apparenly the chemical is rather caustic and can cause corrosion on natural metal finishes. My mechanic and the insurance adjuster are recomending pulling the engine with a redetail of the engine and the engine compartment.
Lessons learned
Carry at least one fire extinguiser, and check to be sure it is still adequatly charged. Keep up on the values on your insurance policies, be sure you are adequately covered in the case of a complete loss.
The funny part is The cars is still running, no power steering though and after spending about 4-5 hours under the hood cleaning etc. that you can hardly tell - my understanding is that the chemical can continue working on surfaces, anyway better a mess than a burned out shell.
I don’t have the final numbers from the appraiser yet but when he was taking picturs he was estimating 10 maybe 20 hours which basically adds up to 1000.00-2000.00
Fire extinguishers are right up my alley. I fill extinguishers on my days off from the fire department. I would recommend a clean agent extinguisher rated for BC fires (electrical, flamable liquids). Co2 extinguishers can do the job or a halotron will work great. Dry chem extinguishers work but the powder will corode metal and they are a pain to clean up after a fire. I attached a link below. Hope this helps.
Blackcat I hope everything goes well with for insurance and getting your cat back on the road.
Steven
Amen, Jean. One of the “issues” that I knew that I had to deal with early on after getting my Cougar was that the carburetor and intake needed to be seriously cleaned out, as there was a “timing issue” that caused a great backfire and flames from the carb throat when the engine was first fired after it’s rebuild (as part of a Junior College class). With the instructor’s shouted encouragement, the PO and his buddy blew a 15 lb extinguisher ful of “Purple K” - the really caustic stuff - straight into the carb. Fortunately, the engine never fired, so it should have not ingested anything too far beyond the intake; and the carb and intake were “cleaned out” before it ever was fired up. Trusting nobody, I pulled the carb a year-and-a-half later (when it became my car) and scrubbed the living H*ll out of it down to the smallest parts. What I would have given for a parts washer loaded to the bilges with good old-fashioned Berryman “Chem-Tool” solvent; but it wasn’t/isn’t quite the same stuff that it was “back in the day”… I even used several toothbrushes, and it didn’t “melt” them in the least!
The carb is now bagged in a three gallon Ziplock “Freezer Bag”, along with an oily rag to keep the gaskets from drying out; and it sits up in the back corner shelf in my closet. (Shhhhhh - Don’t tell my wife! )
I just replaced that hose - not more than 6 - 12 months ago. Purchased from NAPA - it appears to have leaked around the compression fitting. Held until there was a little extra strain - it wasn’t that I was out doing shittys with the car or anything either.
Seems to be a pretty common problem with these cars. I had one let go too. But it was such a small stream of fluid hitting the headers that it only made for a hellacious smoke show. LOL!
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