Fire Extinguishers:changing requirements?

[Hawk]

I asked this question in another thread but it got buried in political comments; let me try again.

Liquid fires, like gasoline, are normally handled by a type "B" fire extinguisher.

Now our fuel is changing with 10 to 15% ethanol being added. This may change the requirements of fire extinguishers.

Anyone having knowledge in this area please share.

Here is what I came up with so far via Google:

Re: ethanol fires, google came up with several hits, this appeared the most succinct:

http://www.cstone.net/~sfcav/2007News/e ... onse05.htm

Essentially, even in 10% concentrations (common motor fuel), there are issues with foam fire equistinguishers, a special alcohol resistant polymer is necessary to prevent the foam from "burning through" and the fire extinguisher failing, especially in terms of the fire flaring back up when it appears to be out.

The quantity of fuel makes a difference as to the results as well as the ethanol concentration.

For small spills it may be that a combination B, C fire extinguisher may work, but there are issues to be resolved.

[NAIAD]

Hawk,

I'm a retired firefighter / fire marshall. You've posed an interesting question, but an important context is missing. Are you referring to a home shop/garage type of work space? Limited amounts of fuel spills possible? Assuming a positive response I'd say don't worry about a special extinguisher, type B or C will be adequate. Possibly more important question may be related to size...don't go with the smallest size of home extinguisher commonly sold at Home Depot and other hardware stores. The relatively small amount of ethanol isn't a problem...it's not like the "invisible" fires from the pure methanol and exotic fuels used in race cars.

If you want to upgrade, consider using an old extinguisher for a practice drill. NOT inside your garage ... Use a drain pan or some other small open container out in your yard or driveway. Light a SMALL fire, then use your practice extinguisher by aiming at the base of the fire and using a sweeping sort of motion to extinguish. Make sure your a good ways away from other combustibles while doing this drill. You can use charcoal lighting fluid (NOT GASOLINE) or perhaps some used motor oil in your fire pan. The relatively few incidents that I was involved with over the years where there was a failure of an extinguisher was operator error. Extinguisher must be aimed at the base of the fire, not at the flame column. Other failures were usually related to too large a fire for the size of the extinguisher. Oddly enough, the best training I ever had with extinguishers was at the school bus yard where I worked while attending college. Bus company director insisted that all his drivers have live drills, we used a large pan of oil (bottom section of a 55 gal. drum), and all of us (ladies included) had to put out a fire 3 times to pass the directors "test".

Extinguishers generally should be located away from your work area in an easily accesible location. Wall mount adjacent to a door way is usually a good spot. I like to mount my garage extinguisher near the door into the house at eye level so the guage is easily checked by a glance now and then. As long as the pressure remains good I don't worry about them too much, though I do replace them about every 5 years or so. Over abundance of caution I suppose...but that's the way we old, retired, fire marshals think.

Please let me know if you have more questions...

Ciao, BJ

[Hawk]

Thanks Naiad, yes I am primarily concerned with shop fires, the BMW holds about six gallons of gasoline so it's not like fighting a "big" fire.

Our fuel here is the 10% mix most months of the year and I was uncertain how it would affect fire extinguishers.

I tend to buy commercial fire extinguishers from a local supplier, they are larger, and are A-B-C rated so it sounds like I am o.k.

Eye level mounting is my preference as well.

If my truck catches fire (36 gallons) I think it would be time to "make tracks"

Your information and suggestions much appreciated!

[NAIAD]

You're most welcome...

And even if "only" six gallons of gas in a confined space was involved...I'd beat feet pronto!

One of the stupidest (real word?) stunts I ever saw was at a Texaco bulk plant in a small town in Nevada. Brilliant guy there decided to use a torch to do his weed removal. Around a wood frame storage shed that contained about 200 oil barrels. The wood framed/floored structure was about 40 years old. Can you guess how much oil had seeped into the wood in 40 years? Our local volunteer fire department was fighting a losing battle when we were saved by the fire trucks from our nearby Naval Air Station. Without those heavy crash rigs and their foam we would have seen 4 above-ground storage tanks (10,000-20,000) go up.

I've personally extinguished a number of vehicle fires, I'd be extremely concerned about a vehicle fire in a confined space. If I have to remove my Beemer's gas tank, I always do that outside. Somehow I just don't trust things to not leak!

Have a good day sir. BJ

[Airman]

Sometimes even a large extinguisher is not up to the jobif you don't use it properly. In this video you'll see that the guy fighting the fire does not sweep or aim at the base of the fire.

http://podcast.sankei.co.jp/movie/news/ ... na_air.wmv

[NAIAD]

Airman,

EXCELLENT video! Of course I believe the guy wouldn't have had much success with a fire of that size with a handheld extinguisher. But waving it around discharging it in the air is THE way to make sure it's ineffective!

Thanks for that link!

BJ

[Airman]

Airman,

EXCELLENT video! Of course I believe the guy wouldn't have had much success with a fire of that size with a handheld extinguisher. But waving it around discharging it in the air is THE way to make sure it's ineffective!

Thanks for that link!

BJ

You'll notice that everyone with any sense was fleeing that fire. The fuel tank had been punctured above that right engine and he could have easily been caught in the fireball. The firefighters were late arriving and I though too cautious getting started. Probably the aircraft could have been saved if they had got there sooner. The foam did seem very effective on the fuel fire.

[NoRRmad]

It looked to me like he wasn't trying to put the fire out, but to save the fuselage, or delay it's ignition. The area he was spraying is probably the exterior of another fuel tank. Were that to go, anybody inside would be toast.

[NAIAD]

Spraying a hand held extinguisher on the skin of the aircraft won't do anything....all he's doing is putting himself in extreme risk. A 500GPM hose stream on the wing would help, even without foam. Obviously he didn't have one of those big hoses in his pocket so trying to do his best. Good intentions, but not really doing anything useful. Glad he got away safely.

A well trained airport fire crew would probably have saved that aircraft. It's absolutely incredible how much fire a properly deployed foam system will extinguish. In about 3 seconds.

Nobody had a fun time there...

BJ

[Daryl_stamp]

Let me chime in; long winded but humorous.

I was aboard the USS Forrestal 2 years worth of underway (away from home-port) time in a helicopter squadron during the 80's.
The FID, as we referred to her, was most famous for a fire on the flight deck in the late 60's; John McCain happened to be on the flight deck at the time of the fire. Everyone in the Navy saw training videos that had plat-camera and island clips of the fire. I believe in excess of 160 men died. Every at-sea sailor in my day was taught live fire-fighting before going to sea; usually with people you had never seen before. By the end of our first day, every one of us had the confidence in AFFF & PPK to be able to put out a fire. On a ship there's no alternative, put it out or else.

Back to motorcycling; I had an '82 Virago at that time that I had rebuilt the engine on. In the process I damaged the carb diaphragms with carb cleaner; being underpaid & under-resourced I discovered that a piece of non-lubricated condom & some contact cement would work for a while as a repair. I also learned that petcocks have to be turned off else the cylinders can flood. I became accustomed to various ' maintenance' requirements of the bike, including checking for spark while grounding the removed plug on the cylinder. One can imagine a gush of gasoline coming out of a plug hole, peaking at the same time the plug sparks.

Thanks Uncle Sam for live training. Keeping calm & level headed is the best you can hope for in most situations. I melted part of my seat, singed some of my hair and found out the hard way that you shouldn't do stupid stuff. I rode the bike an hour later, no harm no foul.

It was when I was told that BMW's had removable diaphragms that were not permanently affixed to the slide; thereby supposedly being much cheaper that the diaphragm / slide assembly on my Virago, that I decided if I ever got another bike, it would be a Boxer. When I was looking the R over I couldn't find the petcocks; the seller didn't know what I was talking about (his first bike), and then I realized that w/ fuel injection there would be one less box to check at the end of every ride.

DLS

[Beemeridian]

55

[NAIAD]

Dave...

Sorry been out of town for a couple of days...

They may still work okay, with "powder" type extinguishers I like to turn 'em upside down about once a year and give 'em a good shake. It's been documented (but rarely) that the powders can conglomerate and pack down. They'll still work, but may not give a smooth delivery the first time the nozzle is fully opened, ya know, like when there's a real fire. I'm a bit surprised that they still read in the green if you've cracked the seal on them, most often that leads to a slow leakage of the propellant gas. That's why it's recommended you never "test" them by partially opening the valve. I suppose a guage could be stuck (heard of that happening as well) but if they're in the green they should work.

If they're the disposable type of extinguisher, I generally keep them about 5 or 6 years and then get new ones. But that's my natural Scot's heritage skepticism showing up! I am "thrifty", but willing to pay money for something like a trustworthy extinguisher. Many of the larger (and older) in the 10-20 pound or so range can be serviced by a reputable fire protection company, smaller ones are usually just tossed out and replaced.

Hope that helps...BJ

[Beemeridian]

44

[NAIAD]

Servicing depends on the particular type of extinguisher. Generally they inspect the cylinder for any visual defects, de-pressurize it, if a chemical type they will weigh it to make sure it has the proper amount of suppressant, amd make sure the gauge is actually functional/accurate. And repressurize it of course. Old style CO-2 extinguishers are inspected for physical damage and merely weighed to see if they still contain correct amount of carbon dioxide.

As a ex-fire marshal I frankly don't have a clue about how much they charge these days. (10 years since my early retirement ) My suggestion would be to check cost of new extinguishers in the same capacity/rating, then call at least a couple of companies and ask what they charge. Old days it was always cheaper to service extinguishers that were over about 5 pounds or so. But we have such a throw away culture these days I'm not sure about that any more... Big Box hardware stores usually have pretty good prices...

Again...hope that helps!

BJ