Can we talk about fire suppression on DD's?

In the last few years I've witnessed about a half a dozen car fires. Not counting seeing burnt out hulks along the highway or whatever, and after witnessing another earlier this week, I've decided I need to install some kind of suppression system in the vehicles that my family rides around in.

The cars already have automotive fire extinguishers onboard, but I'm talking about automatic fire suppression. Either my wife or I would be worried about getting the kids to safety first so the fire extinguisher would be an afterthought, even though it might be what was needed to keep the kids safe. Thus the desire for an automated suppression system. Ideally the system would extinguish a fire entirely, but realistically, as long as it buys enough time to get everyone to safety it would be worth whatever it costs.

I've seen the systems that use a thermoplastic tube and have a pressurized suppressant, either in the tube or a separate cylinder. When the tube gets to a certain temperature, it melts, creating a nozzle of sorts, and allowing the pressurized suppressant to be released towards the source of the heat. I've also seen systems that use fixed nozzles and some kind of detection wire/tube.

Does anyone have any experience with these types of systems, or any recommendations for DD automated fire suppression?

At the risk of being contrary:

I would ask what caused the fires?

In my experience cars fires are usually preventable (non accident related). Over the last 30 years or so I think I've seen 4-8 of them, including putting two out, and most of them seem to be the results of massive fluid leaks (fuel, oil etc).

In the accident related fires; we had two high profile ones locally in the past few years and the impacts were so severe that it's doubtful anything short of the fire department being on scene would have helped.

My .02

I don't know what caused all of the fires, I stopped 2 years ago, grabbed my extinguisher, and helped with one that started when a wire shorted in the engine compartment. The one the other day was also caused by a short of some kind.

If the cost of suppression was extremely high, I might be less committed to the idea, but at $250-$500 for most of the systems I've looked at, it seems like cheap, potentially life-saving insurance to me.

Edit to add: Electrical shorts may be mostly preventable, but since the stuff they cover wires with these days is tasty to mice, rats and squirrels, I'm gonna say that with living in the woods, saboteurs abound.

Here are some quick numbers I could find. 

https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a40163966/cars-catching-fire-new-york-times-real-statistics/

At 0.04% chance, and of course that counts all kinds of unsafe heaps on the road, that is so low I wouldn't be worried about it. You're 7-8x more likely to have a heart attack than your car catch on fire. 

Realistically, automotive racing fire systems are specifically designed with the sole and specific intent of helping a single occupant that is already 100% covered by fire retardant clothing the most possible time to escape. Assuming it would function the same outside of these parameters is bit of a stretch. If you're just looking for something to cover the engine bay, MAYBE you could run something (preferably NOVEC) not too obtrusive... But if you're looking to cover the people too, assuming 4 people- you're looking at 2-3 fully systems, and significant intrusion and modification, depend on how 'right' you want to do it... Even though nothing will actually be 'right' anyway.

Honestly, I think it would be easier to simply buy some used racing suits for the whole family, and make everybody suit-up every time they get in a motor vehicle... In fact this would be even better by extending their protection to while riding in other peoples cars and even on the school bus too.

Serious question though... Of those 1/2 dozen fires you witnessed, in how many cases did it look like the people inside didn't have enough time to safely stop and get out before the interior of the vehicle was engulfed in flames?

As I see it, most car fires start small and take a while to get up to "blazing inferno" leaving plenty of time to get the hell out.  The exceptions are those that involve broken fuel lines, because pumping gasoline into a fire makes it get really big really fast.  OEM fuel systems are usually pretty good about not doing this, if for no reason other than the various big liability lawsuits (Pinto, side-saddle fuel tanks, etc) over the years.  The cars that quickly turn into infernos usually have heavily modified aftermarket fuel systems.

So if I'm feeling paranoid about safety, that's my dividing line.  With an OEM fuel system normal clothing and no special fire suppression system is acceptable.  If the car has an aftermarket fuel system (especially on the race track) then I want the fire protection.

I agree that a racing-oriented automatic fire system isn't a good fit for a family street car.  IMHO the better option there is to make sure that that the family drives around in a relatively modern vehicle with a stock OEM fuel system.

Onboard fire suppression seems overkill for this application, but I like where your head is at.

My cars usually have 2 fire extinguishers on them. One is in the trunk with my IFAK and the other is mounted to the front of the passenger seat. Chances are I'll be able to get to one of those before the fire spreads.

I recently saw a drag nova at a cruise in that had a 1 lb, chrome fire extingusher mounted to the passeger side firewall, under the hood. Tiny, useless, and mounted exactly where the fire will be.

Some people are allergic to thinking.

I'm not sure where your $200-$500 price comes from. If you want a modern suppressant that doesn't leave a mess, you're looking at Novec systems. If you want automatic suppression, you need an electrically triggered one (AFAIK). My Miata-sized Lifeline system was over a grand. Adding a Pyrotect wire to do automatic triggering would be another expense. The bottles "need" recertified every two years IIRC which adds more to the price.

I think you could do a clean install that's fairly unobtrusive if you really wanted to. I don't think it would realistically be very feasible though. No system I saw had directions for back seat occupants, you'd have to reach out to a company like Lifeline and get their suggestions. Otherwise you're installing in some nonstandard config that may or may not actually perform as expected when you need it. You'd almost certainly need two systems I'd think...

Novec or any other clean agent won't work well in the engine bay, as there's too much airflow.  It's likely to knock the fire down, then re-flash as the agent dissipates.  If you can avoid winter related freezing concerns, the ideal engine bay suppression system would be to blanket the space with foam. 

ToManyProjects said:

In the last few years I've witnessed about a half a dozen car fires.

There's certainly nothing wrong with adding a fire suppression system, but in the same time period you've probably seen tens of thousands of cars (or more) that weren't on fire...it's really not a very common thing.

I appreciate the input from everyone here, and you're absolutely right that having a car fire is a very small risk. I probably shouldn't worry about it.  But I do, and I can't really help it.

The fire suppression systems I'm talking about aren't the SFI rated systems that require recertification, but rather the single use systems designed for things like passenger cars and age out in 5-10 years. There are a number of them, Here's an example:

https://augustamotorsports.biz/products/blazecut-tv300fa-auto-rv-boat-automatic-fire-system-9-tube?pr_prod_strat=use_description&pr_rec_id=c9d2a4151&pr_rec_pid=4479604326532&pr_ref_pid=7363977969825&pr_seq=uniform

And a little different example:

https://augustamotorsports.biz/collections/cold-fire-super-fire-systems-driver-racing-fire-protection-systems/products/cold-fire-super-system-racing-1-liter-fire-system

There are a number of other systems out there, designed for various applications.

Didn't know that type of system existed. Seems like putting one in the engine bay could, maybe, be helpful? At least it wouldn't hurt anything to have. There's a few forum posts around the web showing installs, basically just zip tied to the hood or around the engine. Not sure how well it'll work compared to "real" systems as its super low pressure and won't be able to spread the liquid very far before it sublimates. If it makes you feel better it seems worth it for the engine bay, with no real expectation other than "hopefully buys more time but car will probably be toast".

I'm going to be installing a Blazecut T200E in my '74 Beetle in a few weeks. This is a decent video of one in action:
BlazeCut T Series Automatic Fire Suppression for VW Kombi - YouTube

It's better than having to pull into someone's driveway and grab their garden hose, and at a minimum it'll tamp down a big blaze enough to get the hood open and hit it with another extinguisher if necessary. From what I understand it's basically a similar gas to Halon so it doesn't leave residue like some extinguishers. It's one-and-done, but still not bad cheap insurance for about $250.

In reply to eclecticalan :

Love how they did the test with traffic driving by. 

Any personal experience with that setup yet? 

Thanks for the video and links. I certainly hope it's never needed for anything, but I think it'll help reduce my anxiety about it significantly. Especially for when the wife is driving the kids around.

I always have a smallish fire extinguisher under the rear seat, in the console, or somewhere else I can get to it. Never needed it, but it's easy and cheap to carry. Not a full fire suppression system, but I figure it might give me the time I need to prevent a short or something from burning the car down, and if it's a really big gasoline fire or something, it probably wouldn't matter what I've got in the car anyway.