Warning to others - FIRE RISK

spacey2012

Spaying flammable oil in to something that makes sparks (electrical motor)
And you think people need to be warned about this ?

Why what could possibly go wrong ?

sunshinetours

I guess that would come under "misuse of electrical equipment" then.

Genuinely glad your son is OK and i guess if it stops people spraying oil products inside electrical equipment then its a good idea as you say to post - never underestimate what some people will do I guess

stejobeth

This happened to us earlier this year. In the middle of the night I woke up because I heard the extractor fan on in the bathroom but the light wasn't on. I just assumed my daughter had been the toilet and the fan still hadn't switched off and went back to sleep. About an hour later me and my husband both shot out of bed because the noise coming from the fan was terrible. He switched the bathroom light on, there was a loud bang, sparks and flames came out of the fan and the smell of burning was awful. It also blew all of the lights. The extractor fan was melted :eek:. Our friend (an electrician) said if we hadn't been in the house would have set on fire. The scary thing though is that our daughter slept through it all.

Another thing to be careful with are dishwashers. My husbands aunty put the dishwasher on and then went out for tea. For some reason the water didn't drain into it and it set on fire. They were out of their home for 12 months while it was being repaired. The worst thing though was that the dog was locked in the kitchen at the time and died .

Scarab

sunshinetours wrote: »

I guess that would come under "misuse of electrical equipment" then.

Genuinely glad your son is OK and i guess if it stops people spraying oil products inside electrical equipment then its a good idea as you say to post - never underestimate what some people will do I guess

Thank you, but I think you and the guy with the rapier wit above you are (perhaps willfully), missing the message, it is not 'spraying oil products inside electrical equipment' that is the issue here.
Extractor fans catch fire for a variety of reasons as listed above and whilst the spraying of WD40 weeks before wouldn't have helped the situation other than to reduce the noise temporarily as it did in this instance, no one knows what part, if any, it played on this occasion as there was an underlying fault already evident, who knows what components were exposed to this lubricant!
The fact remains that ageing and/or faulty extractor fans will cause fires if left unchecked, unless of course you believe that extractor fan fires can only start following the application of a lubricant such as WD40!

Reams

Thankyou Scarab. In a previous home I had a screeching fan which eventually stopped, I did nothing about it. When you think of what accumulates in them, the fire risk is great as dust and fluff is highly inflammable, even without WD40! Didn't a smoke alarm give warning?

Sorry about your relative's dog stejobeth, that must have been horrible.

WestonDave

Trouble is WD40 is highly flammable and has a much lower combustion temperature than most of the fan components. Screeching means something is rubbing - friction means heat, heat is one of the key components of fire (fuel and oxygen being the other two). Chances are the WD40 that got onto the bearings initially helped lubricate it, however its a poor lubricant as its very thin, and wears off quickly. What you'd then have is the bearings running dry again but residual WD40 still being around from the indiscriminate spraying. Bearings start to heat up again, you've already got plenty of oxygen around, but now you've got a very flammable fuel source.

If he hadn't put WD40 on it he'd have probably got a very hot plastic smell long before any actual fire, and if its a fan that only works periodically, it would possibly never be on long enough to reach plastic combustion temperature.

That said obviously any electrical device can fail, and the nature of electricity is that when it fails it will often lead to sparking or overheating, and then fire. So yes check all electrical appliances periodically, but also don't spray something highly flammable on something which is demonstrating a tendancy to overheating!

stejobeth

Reams wrote: »

Sorry about your relative's dog stejobeth, that must have been horrible.

Thank you. Yes it was awful. He was an old dog that was much loved by the whole family

Reams

Scarab wrote: »

Actually sunshine it wasn't a friend but my son as mentioned and I never said that extractor fans were the biggest cause, I said they were 'one of the main causes of fire'. This is what the fire service told my son at the time and is borne out by information you can find online regarding household fire hazards.

I would imagine they are one the main causes because we were not aware of their danger!

We run the vac brush over them, but they obviously need taking apart and cleaning thoroughly. If the motor is straining through dirt, that is what starts the fire? Yes?

I've just remembered another fan that was making a strange noise. Looked up and saw twigs and straw sticking through. It was a recessed fan which created a shelf outside and Pied Wagtails had built their nest. Of course it was out of bounds until they had left.

Scarab

Reams wrote: »

I would imagine they are one the main causes because we were not aware of their danger!

We run the vac brush over them, but they obviously need taking apart and cleaning thoroughly. If the motor is straining through dirt, that is what starts the fire? Yes?

I've just remembered another fan that was making a strange noise. Looked up and saw twigs and straw sticking through. It was a recessed fan which created a shelf outside and Pied Wagtails had built their nest. Of course it was out of bounds until they had left.

One of a number of causes Reams, regarding your aforementioned smoke alarm, I don't think it was 'operational' hence they were presented with two new ones by the fire chief. :cool:

sunshinetours

Scarab if nothing else your thread will have highlighted:-

1. Check smoke alarms regularly
2. Look for any burning smells or excessive dust/dirt around the fans
3. Definitely do not willy nilly spray WD40 into anything connected to electrics. WD40 is perfectly suitable for spraying onto the motor arm where fan connects once its been dismantled and cleaned andthen wiping over any excess

Sounds like your son was lucky this time thankfully