Porsche Enthusiasts Club Forum

Hi Folks -

I have always carried a decent fire extinguisher in the car but it just rolls around somewhere between on the floor behind the front seats or elsewhere. It has a bracket to be abled to mount it securely but whereabouts? I have thought of drilling thru' the drivers floor pan - any danger of doing this?

Dave

I've got mine located behind the passenger seat. It's mounted on the vertical bit under the bottom half of the rear seat.

Unless it's a decent size and can be plumbed as in a race car, it's probably safer to leave the car to burn and get out of Dodge, tbh.

Thanks DarrylH - will look 2mrw as you suggest...
Dave

I've got mine mounted on the centre console behind the oddment tray. Looks quite neat.

Stuart

Im not sure that a plumbed in AFFF extinguisher is the zenith of in-car fire fighting.

Its horrible stuff, but BCE powder has a far higher knock down ability than AFFF and it will give you more extinguishing for the size/weight. Id suggest a minimum size of 4kg and I would extend the hose sufficiently to enable the bottle to remain upright whilst the nozzle is directed under the sill and upwards. Larger extinguishers can be secured in vehicles using plumbed in bottle mountings, but you'll need a little trial and error as there aren't any standard bottle diameters.

Don't make the mistake of thinking that a competition car extinguisher will be better. Both plumbed-in systems and hand held extinguishers use foam and they're intended to suppress fires and cool until you can be rescued.

I remember a clown (who couldn't be helped) on Pistonheads being particularly proud of his installation of a small AFFF clubmans' system on his TVR. He had decided that an electrical fire was the most likely occurrence, so he had directed the nozzles onto the fuse board! A lot of fires are electrical, of course, so I would also suggest an electrical cut off. You can wire a simple isolator into the positive cable (as close to the battery as possible), or better still, you can use an isolator which includes a resistor which will enable it to be used when the engine is running without damaging the vehicle's electrics.

I think that tyring to mount an extinguisher to-hand is a common mistake. A quick look on Google Images shows lots or barely attached 1kg/2kg missiles mounted in inappropriate locations. Hand held extinguishers need to be within reach in competition cars, but this so that you can put your legs out until help arrives!

Id suggest on the floor behind the drivers seat, secured using a proper mount, and sufficiently large to require proper mounting too. In a car other than a 944 Id suggest in the boot and the bigger the better: 6kg BCE in a saloon car and 9kgBCE in a larger vehicle.

Regularly take them out and shake them too - BCE compacts when carried in vehicles.

If anyone is interested, I have the details somewhere of the original manufacturer of Sparco's solid potassium salt extinguisher, which you strike like a flare. They're brilliant but you have to buy a carton of them - half the price without 'Sparco tax' though.

http://www.elise-shop.com/sparco-fireat ... p-344.html

Oh i agree with that but my point is that you don't really want to be hanging around with a hand held extinguisher near a car fire. You will get caught up in the fire and won't be far enough away. A hand held extinguisher won't be big enough to put out the fire.

A plumbed in extinguisher probably won't be either but you are better off pulling the handle and leaving the car to get to a place of safety. Having a hand held extinguisher in the car may give a false sense of security and encourage people to be near the fire when they should be as far away as possible.

I will echo some of these comments, I've had one car fire & dealt with quite a few over the years on other peoples.
Extinguishers are heavy & unless properly mounted will be dangerous in an accident. As for using one, I've done a variety of training courses both as a marshal & with a local fire service. With a hand held you need to be pretty quick. A proper battery isolator is critical as well. One I dealt with was a fuel fire on a Fiesta. The police car's extinguisher was useless & a local shops one worked OK. t this point it could have probably been repaired. BUT because we couldn't isolate the battery the melted wiring flared again. Once the fire brigade arrived & filled the cabin with water & cut through the battery cable it was a write off.