Talk Morgan Forums Community Vehicle Talk (non-Morgan) Time for Electric Power?

Nick ... phew! ... just posted the link blind without thinking what else might be on the same channel .... at least it sounds like nothing involving leather or chains!! .... you never can tell with my friends 😁

K

I see that we now have a long cable to Norway so that we can import more electrons. I hope ultimately that the French can stuff their.

Another from Facebook today. Warning contains Australian language.

https://www.facebook.com/story.php?...mp;id=100040157352519&scmts=scwspsdd

Apologies to our Australian members, it's New Zealand.

Petrol cars do this to....

Indeed Peter .... what struck me about the bus vid was the speed and ferocity .... cars do burn out and petrol tanks explode ... but, failing malicious demolition, there's almost always a build up in the form of a small fire for some time that then escalates to full on inferno giving people time to scramble out and get clear ..... most car fire fatalities involve people trapped by a collision .... if that bus had been occupied even able-bodied and alert passengers would have failed to survive.


K

Yep - I lost my beautiful Beluga Black Range Rover Vogue SE to a fire. Emptied two industrial CO2 extinguishers under the bonnet to no avail.

Quite impressive to watch it melt, especially when the tyres exploded. Fire Brigade got to it just in time - the petrol cap had just started to melt (had a full tank of petrol). However, there was very little left......

Of course they do Peter, as do diesels.
We had a Mercedes van go up when I worked at a previous employer, fire brigade investigation stated electrical/battery fault as the initial cause.

I liked the "snap crackle and pop" comment as each of the cells starts to pop. It would be interesting to understand how much the fire service has been trained around the new challenge of electric cars as it represents quite a risk not only in fire but also fumes from the cells? Anyone able to comment ?

TBM .... having tried to help a smouldering car on the hard shoulder of the M62 only to have it constantly reignite every time I knocked it back until my extinguisher ran out, I hate electrical fires (this was a short in the main cable to the starter and would have needed a long set of bolt croppers to disconnect in any useful timescale) .... one reason why I've put a big competition cutout switch in the earth side main cable on the Morgan. As yours and Gordon's example also suggest, the onset of the fossil fuel fire wasn't overwhelming enough to prevent escape and even quite lengthy (if unsuccessful) intervention before catastrophe.

K

Some years ago I owned an automotive test facility that amongst other things had 14 engine test cells. These had automated fire suppression systems as it was not unusual for a prototype engine to have escaping parts which could break fuel lines and lead to fires. It was relatively drama free when it happened as the automated systems would take over shutting off the fuel supply, air supply and filling the test cell with CO2 and it would all be over in minutes. The test cells were located in a building where a lot of other types of testing work was carried out but nothing ever broke out from inside the test cells.

I have been out of the testing business for a few years now, but my understanding is, that battery testing facilities must be in their own remote facility and can not be integrated within a multi purpose building and require a much higher level capacity of fire suppression system than an engine test cell. If a battery does let go, it is not over in minutes it can take some hours to suppress the fire.

I also subcontract assemble vehicles and for the hybrid vehicles I have had to set up an isolated storage facility for the batteries as the insurers will not allow me to store them in the main building.

I am sure as the technology develops so will the ability to mitigate the risk, but at the moment it does appear to me that there is a view that a battery fire is more difficult to manage than a petrol fire. Of course if you want to go for a lower fire risk the answer would be to get everyone to drive a diesel............