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Third Tesla Fire Means Feds To Begin Review
cartechboy writes "In early October, a Tesla caught on fire in Washington state — and that created a little bit of a stir. Then just before Halloween a second Tesla caught fire. Yesterday, a third Model S caught fire in Tennessee. With the third fire in the books, all happening in similar fashion, today federal investigators are saying they are going to take a look at the situation more closely. As electric car maker's stock shares continue to tumble, some are saying the fires aren't a big deal."
How many Tesla S's have been delivered?
Anybody?
Best # I can find is 5500 last quarter, from Forbes.
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
In the UK there are only 15,000 car fires per year (discounting arson). Obviously gasoline is safer.
http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20120919132719/http://www.communities.gov.uk/pub/894/FireStatisticsUnitedKingdom2003PDF1724Kb_id1124894.pdf
Model S fires are extremely photogenic, but as far as I can tell, all three of these fires involved debris (or firefighters) puncturing the battery shield and hitting the battery, rather than something spontaneous. I'm not an expert by any means, but I'd hazard a guess that the results would have been similar with a gasoline powered car.
Whats the rate of regular cars catching on fire vs. Teslas?
Anyone have any statistics handy?
Tesla has made a statement (8:49pm):
“We have been in contact with the driver, who was not injured and believes the car saved his life. Our team is on its way to Tennessee to learn more about what happened. We will provide more information when we’re able to do so.”
Source: http://insideevs.com/third-tesla-model-s-fire-in-past-5-weeks-breaks-out-after-accident/
Maybe he can get the Boeing engineers to help him figure it out.
Each of these accidents have defined causes, and the resulting fires are not unreasonable based on the cause. Puncturing a battery with tons of force might just cause a fire. These are not spontaneously combusting. No one was hurt, even the guy that crashed in Mexico. Investigate away, but there really is nothing to see here. The upside is that I can afford more stock now.
Our great computers fill the hallowed halls
http://www.greencarreports.com/news/1082007_tesla-ceo-musk-boeing-787-batteries-inherently-unsafe
Utterly meaningless, unless we see info like number of incidents per car of that make and model on the road; and what the root causes are. Until then, I'm holding judgement.
The lack of mention makes me think this is a media beatup.
Just ask anyone that races R/C. You must treat them with respect, charge them carefully, and never puncture them. Once you break any of these rules, they catch on fire. In spite of this, you only rarely see a lithium battery fire in R/C racing because most racers know how to maintain them properly and when to dispose of them (properly).
Then again, Tesla, in their drive for performance, built these cars with their batteries mere inches from the surface of the road. No gasoline car has their tank that low and even R/C cars have them higher in the chassis and more protected from the surface.
That's apples an oranges.
Sure gas cars catch on fires after crashes, but how many of those catch on fire after running over road debris without crashing?
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
If you think Gasoline is dangerous.... you should see how dangerous desktop screen savers can be.
Listen to fire department radio traffic in any medium to large city and you will undoubtedly hear calls for car fire on a regular basis. Most of those are the result of poorly maintained, older vehicles - fifteen year old cars that have never had any fuel lines inspected, much less replaced. A few accidents spark fires, but that isn't common. Newer vehicles, not so much.
Too early to tell if there is some inherent problem with the Tesla, but it certainly warrants an independent review.
Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
According to a fairly old NHTSA study in the 90's, roughly 3% of gas cars catch fire in an accident, with a lower incidence in non injury events. Now, next question, how many tesla's have been in an accident? http://www-nrd.nhtsa.dot.gov/Pubs/807675.pdf
Whenever you store a lot of energy in a small space and have the potential for rapid release then there will always be a fire risk.
Gasoline, electricity, kinetic energy -- it all poses a fire risk in the event of an uncontrolled release of that energy.
If you want 100% safety then walk.
Uh-oh, I forgot about the risk of spontaneous human combustion!
We're stuffed!
Damn, they even confiscated my asbestos underwear!
What are we to do now?
So now feds are the experts on high-tech cars?
Someone is sure an expert on electric car fires, gas car competitors?
The mind conceives, the body achieves, the spirit manifests.
Looks like there are less than 20,000 tesla s out there. I don't know what the rate of fires is for gas cars, but if you take a town of 20,000 people, you are not likely to see 3 gas car fires in 2 years. They happen but are pretty rare.
In the U.K., there are 15,000 car fires per year, and ~28.7 million cars on the road. Tesla has had 3 car fires out of 21,500 cars on the road. The fires:car ratio is about 4:1 overall:Model S. That said, most of the Model S's haven't been on the road a full year, but if we assume they've been in service an average of the three months, then the overall rate of combustion is essentially identical.
$_ = "wftedskaebjgdpjgidbsmnjgcdwatb"; tr/a-z/oh, turtleneck Phrase Jar!/; print
I'm not typically prone to suggesting conspiracies, but we've already seen cartel-like behavior from establishment car manufacturers and dealers as they lobby states to ban direct-from-manufacturer car sales. Considering the bizarre timeline (3 in a couple months, all of a sudden?), the tolerances and safety features surrounding the batteries, and the publicity that all of the victims milked with copious amounts of photos and interviews, could this be an illicit attempt to get Tesla banned?
Recalls due to manufacturing defects that cause car fires have happened many times.
Narrator: A new car built by my company leaves somewhere traveling at 60 mph. The rear differential locks up. The car crashes and burns with everyone trapped inside. Now, should we initiate a recall? Take the number of vehicles in the field, A, multiply by the probable rate of failure, B, multiply by the average out-of-court settlement, C. A times B times C equals X. If X is less than the cost of a recall, we don't do one.
Business woman on plane: Are there a lot of these kinds of accidents?
Narrator: You wouldn't believe.
Business woman on plane: Which car company do you work for?
Narrator: A major one.
100% of internal combustion engines catch fire, somewhere within the car.
signature is pants
Give a man a fire and he'll be warm for the night. But give a man a Tesla Model S and he may be warm for the rest of his life!
The third accident link is nothing more than some incomprehensible Twitter gibberish rather than a real article, but for the first two fires, each one involved a serious, high speed collision, which in most gas cars probably would have resulted in injuries for the driver or worse. In both cases, the driver walked away even though the battery pack caught fire (which did not spread to the passenger compartment).
This is much ado about nothing.
When's the last time you heard of a gas powered car catching fire because it ran over something without crashing.
Quite a handful of cars just lit up seemingly at random in regular traffic. I think last time I saw picture of one in the news was last month.
A town of 20,000 people isn't likely to have 3 high speed crashes in 2 years either. This isn't a good way to look at statistics.
Yes and most of these vehicles are 10-15 years old that haven't kept up with preventative maintenance.
Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
They were good enough to put a man on the Moon (the single most important achievement ever according to most slashers), but they can't review an electrical problem?
This is the very same government project where the crew compartment had a flammable 100% oxygen environment and the hatch had to be pulled inward against internal pressure, a pressure that increases during a fire. Where three astronauts were trapped and killed during testing. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_1
Also in more modern times where the government agency involved was more concerned with politics than flight crew safety. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_Challenger_disaster
I remember back around 1991 or so a friend of mine was looking out at the parking lot from our building at a burning car. It was over a half mile away and he said "some poor son of a bitch is going to have a bad day." About 30 minutes later the security police turned up looking for him, he was the poor son of a bitch. The electrical system on his Ford Bronco had caught fire and it burned to scrap in a few minutes. It turns out it wasn't an uncommon thing either, a lot of them did that. We had fun telling him his Bronco was really a Blazer.
They were good enough to burn the crew of Apollo 1 to death, too. I'm sorry but what is with all this fed worship coming from the US lately? You guys want big, central government? Be careful what you wish for...
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Good thing they don't do aircraft that way. You can't get out of the damn thing if it catches on fire, at least not and live to tell about it.
Call me when someone is actually injured by these fires.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
I have personally seen 5 cars on fire that were not in crashes. Seems common enough to me.
Learn to love Alaska
Hell I had a Chevy catch fire going up a hill in reverse. No debris required.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUuWiOc0j7E
Mazda CX 7s were first produced in 2007.
Fed = grownup. ROFLMAO
Well there was this one time. Although it was over a landmine.
The bad wiring, the large amount of flammable materials, and 100% O2 environment was obviously an exercise in bad judgement. But the inward hatch design itself, though dangerous in hindsight, was to originally used improve safety for modules landing in the ocean. IIRC an outward opening door design almost got one of the gemini pilots killed.
But that's besides the point. The government didn't build the Apollo 1 command module, that was contracted out.
I read TFA and all I got was this lousy cookie
They've got a 1/4" plate of steel shielding the battery ...
I'm not 100% sure but isn't such a skid plate protecting a gas tank normally only found in off-road vehicles? Seems like the Tesla offers more protection than a normal gasoline car.
Electrical fires are common in gas cars too. Many times new ones. Check the recall lists.
I've seen relatively new cars catch fire while parked. It happens more often than most people think. A quick google image search for "car fire" will show a bunch of cars either parked or sitting on the side of the road without any visible damage (aside from the fire of course). My fire dept has gotten called out a few times for a "car fire extending to the house" because a parked car burst into flames for whatever reason.
However, my experience doesn't mean that there isn't something wrong with the Tesla, just that I wouldn't be surprised if an investigation didn't find anything.
Also, Tesla does have an emergency response guide and Fire Dept's need to start reading up on these cars. It even has a nice little note at the bottom of the pages reminding us to wear our goddamned SCBA at a car fire.
The other auto manufacturers did much to interfere and even sabotage the Tucker. While the Tucker had enough of its own problems, some were suspect and other problems came from the outside when it came to resources for materials and a bit of bad press.
I acknowledge that the fires could very well be from an actual problem in this car, but with as much other crap Tesla has gone through, I wouldn't entirely rule out various forms of sabotage. We've already seen what Texas Auto Dealers Association can do.
How many people have been injured in a Tesla? Would a fellow that runs a successful rocket company not know a little something about hydrogen? You have done nothing to invalidate Elon's claims.
Two of my imaginary friends reproduced once
I had a minivan that burned a year after I sold it. My brother bought it, and his roommate wanted it--my brother advised against, but eventually sold it. His roommate was taking a church group to a ski resort, and the vehicle leaked oil and caught fire. They put it out, but it reignited. The ski lodge called the fire department and used up several of their fire extinguisher-- after each one, it reignited. The fire truck used up its fire extincuishers-- and it reignited, then burned.
My brother ran into such a fire on the interstatee; a young woman was near the car. He didn't have a fire extinguisher, but he did have a soda cup and there was a muddy puddle near by. So he started scooping water on the fire--it reignited repeatedly, but each time, the mud baked on and sealed the oil leak more. In the end, the car was saved.
There's a lesson there.
Correct Horse Battery Staple: 72 bits of entropy. Enter "Correct H" into google. When it generates the phrase, that's
Car manuals will warn you not to park over dry leaves or grass because the catalytic converter can become very hot. You don't have to hit anything at all to burn up a gas powered car.
A dude from the 90s called, mumbled something about a hydrogen fuel cell BMW tech demonstrator.
So now feds are the experts on high-tech cars?
Someone is sure an expert on electric car fires, gas car competitors?
Those competitors are also offering all electric vehicles:
General Motors: Spark
Ford: Focus
Fiat (Chrysler): 500e
Toyota: RAV 4
Honda: Fit
Nissan: Leaf
Would a fellow that runs a successful rocket company not know a little something about hydrogen?
What does running a company have to do with technical knowledge? I'm sure a CEO of a "rocket" company would have to have some knowledge about hydrogen, but I would not quote them as an expert on the subject.
I believe it's actually aluminum, but they've also designed the battery compartment to point any fire forward away from the passenger compartment. If a gas tank ruptures you're in a very dangerous situation and have very good odds of not living let along walking away unharmed. In the case of a Tesla, 3 for 3 have been able to walk out unscathed. The Mexico fire was from a Model S that had blasted through a concrete barricade while exceeding 100MPH and coming to rest smashed against some trees. I challenge you to find any car of any year, any make, gas, electric, etc. perform as well. No one thinks twice about these very common incidents in gas autos.
Two of my imaginary friends reproduced once
So far all of these have been caused by the car striking a piece of metal that pierces the battery and viola... fire. Makes sense to me. I don't really like the company and Elan Musk is an arrogant prick but I'm pretty sure that if the same thing happened to my gas car, and metal pierced the gas tank, the resulting fire would be a hell of a lot worse that what I've seen in the Tesla cars.
Why does everyone seem to think fuel cells can only run on pure Hydrogen? Why not use a methanol fuel cell?
When's the last time you heard of a gas powered car catching fire because it ran over something without crashing.
Ford Expedition. One pulled in to the parking lot next to me some years ago. When I came out of the store, it was smoking pretty badly from the engine compartment*. By the time the fire trucks got there, the front end of the vehicle was fully engulfed in flames.
*I called 911 and moved my truck away. When a cop showed up and I told him that, he just chuckled and said all that crap about vehicles exploding was just TV stuff. Right then, there was a loud 'Bang' and one of the Expedition's pneumatic hood pistons exploded, launching the steel rod about 100 feet across the parking lot. The cop said, "We'd better get further away."
Have gnu, will travel.
I'm not 100% sure but isn't such a skid plate protecting a gas tank normally only found in off-road vehicles? Seems like the Tesla offers more protection than a normal gasoline car.
Yeah, I was going to say, "good luck comparing a 1/4" steel plate to a .035" fuel line wall, but there may be a confounding factor - the Model S has an awesome air suspension that allows the car to sink down to (IIRC) 2" above the road surface at highway speeds, to maximize fuel efficiency. That's like a Formula One race car, but government roads suck and Formula One tracks don't. And it's unlikely that many fuel lines are that close to the road.
Maybe they just need to firmware upgrade the things to be slightly less efficient - there's a manual override anyway for people who understand what they are doing.
My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Go to Youtube and watch the video of him taking a camera crew on a tour of SpaceX. He litterally walks through saying what components are and what their function is in the big picture. I doubt any other CEO or the head of NASA could do that. Best part is none of it is patented. So yeah, he probably knows more than you about hydrogen. Besides, you'd still have to get around the problem of hydrogen making steel brittle.
ring ring
Honda Clarity FCX
I hate printers.
ALL THE DAMN TIME.
I've seen nice new vehicles just driving down the street suddenly start having smoke and flames coming up around the hood. I expect the fuel lines were faulty and simply burst, but the fuel pump dutifully keeps pumping gasoline onto the hot engine, and it ignites.
I've had a rubber gasket fail in a fairly new oil filter, which caused oil to be spurted out all over my engine, and a cloud of smoke rising up. Fortunately this was shortly after it was started-up on a cold winter morning, so things weren't hot enough for ignition.
Conventional cars don't need ANY good reason to burst into flames. The slightest little component getting stressed can cause a disaster.
Slashdot gets worse every day... Pipedot: News for nerds, without the corporate slant
The difference here is that the Tesla's didn't crash, they ran over something.
"This was a significant accident where the car was travelling at such a high speed that it smashed through a concrete wall and then hit a large tree, yet the driver walked away from the car with no permanent injury.”
Slashdot - "We don' need no stinking facts"
It gripped her hand gently. 'Regret is for humans,' it said.
To be fair, they did test the flammability of the materials. They just didn't do it right... in a pressurized O2 environment. After the fire, they did the tests correctly, and to their horror, found several things to be "highly flammable". (the glue on the back of the massive amount of Velcro for one)
The inward opening hatch was to improve safety in space, where, under no circumstances do you want that door to have any way of accidentally opening.
Wiki says there are 50 available (to lease only) in the whole US. Partly because only Southern CA has the hydrogen refill stations.
Honda believes they could start mass producing in 2018.
This is also the time of the year when people park on piles of leaves and turn their cars into BBQ.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
Every technology has growing pains, and EVs are no different. I'm sure that there are more than a couple Oil and Combustion automotive people making a whole lot out of this story, like those that bitched that if the cars were submerged for over a day the batteries would catch fire.
Do you really believe that Tesla does not have it in their best interests to "Fix" the problems? Come now, I think you are one of those suckers PT is attributed (incorrectly) talking about.
Feds want to jump in? Sure, why not! They help investigate issues with Boeing, Northrop, etc.. More eyes on the puzzle will help find the cause so they can fix it.
The real issue here, I hinted at above. People want you to believe that Oil is the only way that the world can run. They spend billions of dollars that they fuck people over to get telling you how much you have to have it. Anyone with a brain realizes that Oil is both finite and screwing up the environment. Letting companies fix issues that remove our dependencies helps everyone except those fuckers that start wars for more oil.
My advice, be patient and let them fix it. Help them fix it if you really feel like you want to jump in and do something. By whining and complaining about the evils of EVs you maintain the status quo, which has quickly been leading us down a nasty stink hole.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
As opposed to a country without a government agency to review poor product designs and force recalls in the interest of public safety?
You want small, decentralized government? History already shows us what a shit show that was.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
I gave a guy a jump start one day and watched his car catch on fire.
His voltage regulator was damaged and literally burned up before our eyes. I was able to disconnect my cables which put out most of the fire(it being electrical and some plastic).
I felt sorry for the guy I tried to help him and watched his day turn much worse.
Car fire happens all the time. they will happen with lithium batteries too.
i thought once I was found, but it was only a dream.
As an engineer, I can tell you my manager, who is not technical at all, could walk you through everything I've done and what it's function is in the big picture. Because I told him. He might even be able to tell you how it works. Because I told him. He couldn't design it himself. He doesn't have the understanding of why it was done that way.
Total production of the Model S is expected to reach 24,000 units worldwide, by the end of the year. Three fires in 24,000 units for the Tesla is the same as 4,688 Toyota Corolla fires, if the total production here is accurate (and that's being slightly fair to Tesla, given that we haven't reached the end of the year yet.
Now, the Corolla has been on the market for 47 years. Let's be overly fair to Tesla again, and pretend the production has always been constant. That's still 100 Corolla fires a year, for 47 years, worldwide.
I think if 100 Corollas spontaneously burst into flames each year (and realistically, more like 2-300 given that production in the 60s, 70s, and even 80s will be far lower than in recent years)... we'd probably have heard about it by now. Don't you?
So now feds are the experts on high-tech cars?
Why yes... I read it on the web.
As I think about the issue I am reminded how dangerous
large battery assemblies are in submarines and also in
central offices of POTs telco companies.
I suspect there will be a lot of pressure on Tesla. Tesla
is in the best position to upset the auto makers apple cart
and to some degree big oil, yep a lot of vested interest folk
will be after them.
Still it make sense to review the product. A big pile of
batteries should be well protected.
The NTSB does a good job on aircraft accidents....
but this is new turf... who knows.
Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't. Mark Twain.
That it burns rubber *before* you hit the accelerator.
Musk is an exception to this. He is pretty technical.
-Will P.
From my understanding they used 100% O2 because that's what the used when the thing actually went into space. They used 100% O2 in space because that meant they could use less pressure which means they could make the capsule lighter. (Since the heavier it is the more fuel you need which makes the whole thing more difficult.)
Did you know 80 to 90% of the moderators on slashdot wouldn't recognize a troll even if one dragged them under a bridge.
Too early to tell if there is some inherent problem with the Tesla, but it certainly warrants an independent review.
1) Buy some Teslas
2) Short some TSLA shares
3) ???
4) Profit
Well, if you want anecdotes, the only car I've ever seen catch fire wasn't in an accident at all. It wasn't even moving. A pizza delivery driver left his car running at the curb while he brought the pizza we ordered to our door. As we were paying him, flames started shooting out of the hood. He ran to the car, had enough time to grab one thing out of it as smoke was pouring into the cabin, and then the interior caught fire as well. The whole car was engulfed in a matter of seconds.
They are so photogenic because they aren't dangerous. Regular car fire with gasoline and everyone is standing 200' away because of how dangerous car fires are (they frequently explode when enough fuel has vaporized from the temps). With the Tesla you can probably stand 20' away and take nice pretty pictures without fear of having a piece of car embedded into your forehead.
Heard of it? I've seen it.
It's like shark attacks, they happen all the time, but infrequently enough (per vehicle) that they aren't something to even worry about. That is until the news starts running around talking about all the shark attacks. Tesla's have a lower car fire rate than gas cars yet the media is pushing each fire like it's happening to every driver.
I have personally seen 5 cars on fire that were not in crashes. Seems common enough to me.
Throwing Molotov cocktails at cars to get them to catch fire does not count.
I've seen a car catch fire while parked.
Happened to a neighbor and a friend, both with similar models. Neighbor's brand new garage and hundred-year-old tree got toasted too (luckily it was detached and the house survived); friend had his transcript put on hold because he failed to obey campus police order to move his vehicle (which was entirely melted {the whole vehicle, not just the tires} and the wheels locked, and the insurance company told him to leave it there until their scraping crew arrived). Insurance agent told my neighbor that that model was well known for having the power door locks short out and burn down the car.
sPh
That's not true...if it's not on.
"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be."
Good thing they don't do aircraft that way. You can't get out of the damn thing if it catches on fire, at least not and live to tell about it.
These guys disagree... A plane full of skydivers got hit by another plane and caught fire. No fatalities.
I'm not a complete idiot... Some parts are missing.
But I thought fuel cells were what was unsafe not Tesla cars? Isn't that what Musk wanted us all to believe?
Fuel cell cars are extremely safe -- since nobody can afford to buy one, nobody can get hurt in one.
I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.
Yes and most of these vehicles are 10-15 years old that haven't kept up with preventative maintenance.
Excepting diesels with soft return systems, there are no ten or even fifteen year service interval items in the fuel system or the electrical system, which are the sources of most fires in conventional vehicles powered by internal combustion engines. Return system leaks in diesels rarely cause fires due to the low volatility of diesel fuel. I don't suppose you have any salient points to make about automotive technology, or service intervals?
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
"Fed worship"? Strawman off the starboard bow, Captain!
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
...in her Nissan years ago. It shot through the floor and barely missed her, she's lucky she wasn't killed. In a Tesla, the skidplate and battery will protect you. Sure, the car will catch on fire, but you can escape. So a Tesla is actually safer than a conventional car, it will sacrifice itself to protect you. Better have good insurance.
Never let a lack of data get in the way of a good rant.
I had a friend lose a car to parking it on grass, and the exhaust system set the grass on fire. I watched two cars burst into flame (separate incidents) from overheated brakes. One was a little sticky, and managed to overheat driving in a straight line until the brake fluid boiled and bad stuff happened (brakes still worked because the overheating was only on one line) - left rear wheel. The other was lack of engine braking descending a mountain. The car in front pulled over at the end of the descent and flames shot out from under the right-front wheel well. I've passed by a number of cars that were fully engulfed, no idea what started it, but they were a total write-off.
Learn to love Alaska
Not sure if "campus police" qualify for that however.
Unfortunately, the public are thoroughly ignorant about automobiles.
Vehicle fires are VERY common but when a gas-engine car lights up it's considered routine. The insurance co pays off the total loss (even small fires quickly put out are typically totals), the vehicle goes to salvage, and no one thinks much of it.
Tesla should ignite one of their vehicles to demonstrate the KIND of fire you get with a battery puncture vs. an automoblie engine fire and fuel tank fire. Remove the mystery, because when Jane and Joe Dumbass hear "fire" they THINK "Hollywood action movie inferno".
"This post is an artistic work of fiction and falsehood. Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact."
I think if 100 Corollas spontaneously burst into flames each year (and realistically, more like 2-300 given that production in the 60s, 70s, and even 80s will be far lower than in recent years)... we'd probably have heard about it by now. Don't you?
Sure. But we're not talking about cars "spontaneously bursting into flames", we're talking about cars catching fire after having been damaged in an accident. I wouldn't be at all surprised if 100 Corollas a year do that, and nobody bats an eye.
I don't care if it's 90,000 hectares. That lake was not my doing.
Wow. All these bizarre electric car fires are a big deal. Soon, we're going to see a weird new kind of insurance called Vehicle Fire Insurance. Also, car manufacturers are going to have to start installing these new-fangled firewalls into cars.
Ironically, it was Gus Grissom who's Mercury capsule sank on landing after its hatch bolts inexplicably blew. The investigation and redesign resulted in the Apollo 1 hatch, which opened inward. IIRC the cabin was not just pure O2 but was actually over-pressured for a completely different test for leaks in the cabin. [WTF?] Of course once the fire started heating the air, the overpressure would have been insanely high. No human could have opened the hatch against that force.
"Will future ages believe that such stupid bigotry ever existed!" -- Ivanhoe
...ten Ferrari 458 Italias burst in to flames in the first few months?
"False hope is why we'll never run out of natural resources!" - Lewis Black
Big, central government? Well, excuse me, Mr Cruz. Have any political leanings do we?
I really don't understand why every fire in a Tesla car is so news worthy. According to the NFPA (http://www.nfpa.org/safety-information/for-consumers/vehicles) there were an average of 152,300 car fires between 2006 and 2010. That's the same as 417 per day, and about 17 car fires per hour.
Cars catch fire. There have been somewhere between 15,000 and 20,000 Telsa Model S's on the road. (3/15000) * 100 = 0.02% failure rate.
Meanwhile there are about 250 million cars on the road in the US last I looked. (152300/250000000) * 100 = 0.06% failure rate for cars on average.
So even with there being 3 fires, they are below the average. Additionally, there have been zero injuries in the 3 fires so far.
So... why is this news?
The cop said, "We'd better get further away."
awww. Story was good up to that point. Next time you tell it, change the last line to
The cop said, "I'm too old for this shit."
Who logs in to gdm? Not I, said the duck.
I see cars on fire on Google traffic reports quite often. I had to make a detour earlier today because of one. Otherwise I have only seen one in my life, when my professor at Brooklyn Polytech forgot to put the oil cap back on his engine. He rode into the parking lot with a lot of smoke coming from under the hood. Then it ignited. We couldn't say for sure whether or not he was better of keeping the hood closed.
"Will future ages believe that such stupid bigotry ever existed!" -- Ivanhoe
Actually I've personally seen at least 3 cars spontaneously catch fire while sitting in traffic or driving. No crash or impact or driving over anything required.
My God can beat up your God. Just kidding...don't take offense. I know there's no God.
That's apples an oranges.
Sure gas cars catch on fires after crashes, but how many of those catch on fire after running over road debris without crashing?
Far more gas cars catch fire for road debris strikes than Tesla cars. Look, its happened exactly ONE time, yet car fires happen every other day on average.
U.S. fire departments responded to an estimated average of 152,300 automobile fires per year in 2006-2010. These fires caused an average of 209 civilian deaths, 764 civilian injuries, and $536 million in direct property damage.
And Tesla fires happen long after the strike or the crash, NOT instantaneously. And they don't explode.
The ONLY reason this is news is that it is hard to put out the fire.
No one has died in a Tesla.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
It is a quick way of getting a read on the situation. It gives a reasonably comparable sample size and accounts for time. We are not likely to get a fire rate per mile for gas cars under 3 years old, which would be the best statistic to compare, but if you have a suggestion please supply....
If the feds could investigate Toyota over "unintentional acceleration" and make a year-long farce out of old people hitting the wrong pedal or using cheap aftermarket rugs just in time to help a flailing GM, then the same Detroit money can be used to "investigate" Tesla.
I thought of this. Easy way to turn $80K into a few million, assuming you can borrow that much TSLA or buy enough call options.
We couldn't say for sure whether or not he was better of keeping the hood closed.
Reminds me. Gasoline (and Diesel) cars are "expected" to catch fire. You should leave the hood down. Modern cars have an insulation layer under the hood. It's not there to protect the hood, but to help smother the fire. The mounts melt under fire temperatures, dropping the fire blanket on the engine. No idea if it works, but it's there and designed to work that way.
Unless you have a fire extinguisher handy, in which case, open the hood and spray. Despite the warnings, water works great on oil-based fires, so long as the spray is fine enough (misty). Throwing a cup of water on a grease fire in a large pot of grease is likely fatal, but a fine spray over the top would help.
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It isn't comparable, because a town of 20k people isn't going to have the same demographics as a suburb of 20k Tesla owners. These are all incidents which were caused by something flying up from the road and puncturing a reinforced steel plate - in a regular car there would have been injuries in the passenger compartment because they don't have the shielding.
Help I am stuck in a signature factory!
Hmm, can you tell me how all the private corporations were pressurizing their Moon spaceships in the 1960s?
And they were all fires after a reinforced steel plate was punctured in an accident. Big whoop.
Help I am stuck in a signature factory!
This is going to be tough for Tesla now that the feds are involved, and I can relate. My alternative fuel car, based on a glyceryl trinitrate fuel, would be blowing the Tesla off the road if it weren't for a minor fuel storage and shock absorber problem. Damn feds with their quibbly little safety regulations won't even let me drive the prototype on public roads. Progress is not about perfection.
Highly flammable... somewhat of an understatement.
In the environment inside the capsule you could burn aluminum like wood, cloth goes up like it's soaked in gasoline, plastics will burn like they're made of wax.
The materials inside the capsule weren't highly flammable so much as the environment itself was.
Depends on the university, specifically, if they are private or public. At Cleveland State University, campus police are government agents that carry the full force of law (and unlike some jurisdictions these are good guys looking out for people and not jack-boot thugs). They can pull you over and write tickets, student or not, as long as you are in their 22 or so block area. They can arrest you for peeing in the Engineering building, and you will spend the night in a pound-me-in-the-ass county jail run by Cleveland Police (who really don't fuck around, they police the ghetto).
And some campus police out in the country have to deal with stuff like "dropped my donut, have to grab another."
24 beers in a case, 24 hours in a day. Coincidence? I think not!
Parked cars catch fire all the time. Electrical shorts can heat up wiring and nearby components until they ignite. The manual in every internal combustion car tells you not to park on top of dried leaves or debris because the ridiculously hot catalytic converter can light them on fire, which spreads to the car.
Hydrogen goes for $5-$10 per Kg, and the Honda FCX gets about 60 miles per Kg. You're paying the same recurring costs as a similar gas powered car, the the car itself is far more expensive ($600/month).
I pay $300/month for my Nissan Leaf electric car, and it costs $17 per 1000 miles to charge it.
Take a look at the tail pipe of a diesel Ford pickup. They added a soot trap to the exhaust system for emissions. Diesel fuel is periodically injected to the trap by the computer to burn off the soot and prevent the trap from getting too clogged up. Ford had to recall them to add a flame arrester to the tail pipe because the trucks were starting grass fires.
You'd seriously go 10-15 years without at least changing your fuel filter!?
You're twisting the truth a little. This last fire is a twitter pic and the car has obviously been in an accident, that's it. The first was the puncture we all know about. The second was a guy who went through a concrete barrier and hit a tree. In both of those the passengers walked away, an impressive feat for the second one.
Point is there's been nothing "spontaneous" about these fires. If anything it shows a great track record for protecting the passengers.
You see that guy who lit a cigarette while charging his car a while back....
The plate is aluminum. There are vents in the middle of the plate directed down towards the ground in case a fire should break out to direct it away from the passenger compartment. There are additional fire safety features as well. The battery pack is broken down into 16 separate sections with a firewall between them and the batteries are surrounded with a substance that reacts indothermically to fire to produce a fire resistant foam.
In any event, it takes a lot of force to penetrate the aluminum plate. The aluminum plate also adds significant rigidity to the passenger compartment to help in the case of an accident.
Also, unlike most cars, the underside of the Tesla is very smooth, making it much less likely that things can get lodged up under the car. Some cars such as the Tesla I own have active suspension that lowers the car on the freeway which might increase the odds of damage from debris though it isn't lowered as much as many cars I've seen.
As the owner of a Tesla model S I do not have any fear of fire from the car. It's a lot safer than any other car I've owned.
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The car isn't that low when it's lowered. It's still a lot higher than many cars I see on the road. At standard height I have fewer problems scraping with my model S than I've had with my Prius, for example.
This post is encrypted twice with ROT-13. Documenting or attempting to crack this encryption is illegal.
Parked cars catch fire all the time
That's not true. One time I parked my car and it didn't catch fire.
I would if it didn't need cleaning. Since I drive a classic diesel, there's no real penalty for a clogged filter. You just can't make as much power. Then you replace the filter.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
No shit, their stock has been taking it on the chin. Down from 175 from when the story hit to below 140.. Analysts think it's more appropriately valued at this price while others like Deutsche Bank are bullish at $200/share.
Buy on the rumor, sell on the fact.
Harrison's Postulate - "For every action there is an equal and opposite criticism"
How would he describe the function of that useless apostrophe you added for no reason to the possessive pronoun "its"?
Pedantic troll bait?
Yup - pressurized 100% oxygen will burn virtually anything that isn't already oxidized. Oxygen just loves electrons.
Stick a piece of food in a bomb calorimeter, pressurize with 100% O2, and ignite, and when you open it up about the only thing you'll find inside is a hint of condensation and a tiny bit of rusted fuse wire. The astronauts themselves were highly flammable materials in that environment.
Sure, less flammable material was a good start, but operating the capsule at above atmospheric pressure in 100% oxygen was a mistake. In space it would have been below atmospheric pressure. They should have maintained the same partial pressure of O2 - probably would be better for the astronauts health as well.
No such thing as an auto deployed engine fire blanket in modern cars. Not sure where you got that one.
Self awareness - try it!
Once a vehicle is associated with a church, it's doomed. Over the years, I have seen so many reports of church vans going over cliffs, crashing and burning, etc etc. Whenever I am near one on the road, I make sure to put some distance between my car and the van as quickly as possible.
Self awareness - try it!
Trash a $70,000 car just to get rid of a viola?
Yeah, that's a fair trade. Now, let's talk about saxophones...
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
Please do not compare the government of the United States of America back in the 1960's to one that is now.
It is totally unfair.
The government of the United States of America of today can't even launch a website properly.
The two following stories which appeared in Slashdot can tell you how bad the United States government has turned out to be ...
http://science.slashdot.org/story/13/10/28/125207/why-cant-big-government-launch-a-website
http://yro.slashdot.org/story/13/11/07/154201/healthcaregov-official-resigns-website-still-a-disaster
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
-It isn't comparable, because a town of 20k people isn't going to have the same demographics as a suburb of 20k Tesla owners.
This statement makes no sense. The type of person driving a vehicle has no bearing on this discussion.
- in a regular car there would have been injuries in the passenger compartment because they don't have the shielding.
This statement has absolutely no basis, and might only apply to one of the Tesla cases.
Correction....I should have said 10,000, or a town with about 10,000 vehicles that are regularly, because that is closer to the average number of Teslas on the road over the last 2 years, assuming they have been selling at a steady rate.
Several years ago on my way back from the Sierras I watched a car burn, it had pulled over off the road onto a field of dry grass.
San Francisco in the '90's, every time the 49'ers won the Super Bowl there would be dozens of car fires.
Talk to a lawyer that specializes in auto fires. You will never park your car in an attached garage again.
I had a vehicle catch fire and burn up after just sitting idle for three days.
Oh come on, there are plenty of reasons to not use fuel cells. Terrible power density, severely complex storage of fuels, inefficient decentralization of power generation.
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How many Teslas are on the road versus how many gasoline cars? How many tesla-miles are driven versus Gasoline-miles?
Support my political activism on Patreon.
So to pass emissions tests they just collect the soot only to send it out into the air at a later time. Seem about right even if it is pretty messed up!
-- ssoorrrryy,, dduupplleexx sswwiittcchh oonn.. -Quote found on actual fortune cookie.
As anyone knows, when tech danger threatens, the warp core can be ejected and/or the saucer section separated.
Why not follow this idea in designing autos powered by finicky unstable batteries?
If the temperature in one or more individual cells passes a critical threshold, and it threatens to burn up your garage, home and property, then a system should be able to rapidly eject the battery core safely onto your neighbor's property.
-- I break fur animals!
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
What would have happened if that chunk of metal would have come through the floorboard of a non-armored car? People have been seriously injured and even killed by that.
Ran over something? Like a concrete barrier and a tree?
Most people would call that a crash.
Chuuch. Preach. Tabernacle.
(and same thing in the Luxembourgish city Esch-sur-Alzette, next to the French border...)
Far more gas cars catch fire for road debris strikes than Tesla cars. Look, its happened exactly ONE time, yet car fires happen every other day on average.
Except, it happened not 1 time, but 3 times, in a short period of time, to a car thats pretty unpopular simply because they can't produce that many at this point in time (not due to lack of buyers).
Compare the ratio of Tesla's that have caught fire in America to the number of ratio of petrol powered cars in america that have done the same.
This is only 3 cars, it is entirely possible that its just a really rare coincidence. Correlation is not causation of course ... but it sure as hell points its finger in a direction we need to have investigated to be sure.
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
Well, if it wasn't a smug ass Tesla driver, they wouldn't have hit the massive object laying obviously in the road ... like all the other people that managed to not get impaled.
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
Do NOT open the hood on an engine fire to deploy a fire extinguisher unless it has just started, spray through the front grill or from underneath. Gas, oil, and melted plastic/rubber vapors in an oxygen starved environment is the perfect recipe for a flashover.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
Hey, there is some space to have a government not at either extreme end of the spectrum...just saying...
We are not likely to get a fire rate per mile for gas cars under 3 years old
Ask an auto-insurance actuary, I can guarantee you they have the data or can compute it from their records, probably with a simple SQL query.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
The raw number isn't very meaningful. There are over 250 million passenger vehicles registered in the United States. That comes to one fire per 1641 vehicles. There are something like 12 thousand Teslas, but also only three fires, which comes to one fire per 4000 vehicles.
So with those numbers, they still seem better off than combustion driven vehicles. However, fleet size isn't the only variable. The majority of Teslas are less than a year old, while overall only 13.5% of passenger vehicles are under two years old, and 60.6% are at least seven years old. Teslas are also a luxury vehicle with a base price of $69,900 (before tax credits) and allegedly stringent manufacturing standards, compared to the overall market with an average new sale price of $24,764 and varying quality. And finally, maintenance needs to be taken into consideration. Not only are Teslas newer and almost certainly under warranty, the average owner is relatively wealthy and presumably can afford proper maintenance.
But even that is not necessarily the right set of stats to look at. The three Tesla fires occurred after an accident, so it may be more informative to look at the liklihood of accidents to result in fire. According to the NFPA, only 4% of automobile fires were the result of a collision or roll-over; most were caused by a mechanical or electrical failure. There were about 5.4 million accidents in 2010, so at 4% of 152300 accident it comes out to approximately one fire per 900 accidents. There are no hard statistics on precisely how many accidents there are for Tesla specifically, but it would have to be a significantly high number to have a lower fire to accident ratio. And that isn't even taking into account the relative severity of accidents into account.
Of course the real problem is that there simply isn't enough data available. Three times in as many months could be a fluke. Or it could be a pattern.
I read elsewhere that the plate was steel - that was mentioned in the reporting on the one that had struck metal debris at highway speeds.
For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
Maybe people just need to stop running over steel beams, or driving through concrete barricades.
For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
It didn't just run over something. It ran over something with just the right angle, allowing it to punch a 2" hole in a 1/4" steel plate. That's not a fucking pothole, and it would have mangled any other car just as badly. The other one involved driving through a concrete barricade. Enough said about that one.
Stop trying to downplay these accidents, because they were not minor.
For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
I call BS on the $17/1k miles, the Leaf has a 24kWhr battery pack and a rated range of 75 miles meaning .3125kWhr per mile meaning 1,000 miles would take ~312kWhr of electricity, at the average US residential rate of $.125 per kWhr that's $39, more than twice the number you gave. It's 1/3rd the price I pay in fuel in 28mpg gas vehicle, but if you expect both to go 200k miles the difference in purchase price ($30k average versus $18k average) basically equals out to the difference in fuel price ($7,800+1,000 for home charging station vs $23,400).
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
I call BS on....average US residential rate of $.125 per kWhr
So in order to be telling the truth (as you claim he can't be) all he needs is :
- to live in an area with cheaper than average electricity
and/or
- have some renewable source in his house. Not that unlikely, we are talking about someone whose interests include sustainable/renewable enrgy and transport, and he has enough money for a brand new car
I'm amazed that we don't have more gasoline fire incidents. It's really everywhere and extremely flammable. This would seem to be a testament to the ability of all concerned to design all the gasoline handling systems very well.
It's also a sign that the gasoline internal combustion engine is a really mature and ubiquitous technology. The designers of all the systems involved know what works.
Relatively portable high energy content batteries are much less mature, and the lithium batteries even more cutting edge.
I have a tech/nerd's (maybe over) confidence in tech/nerds tesla that they can reduce the likelyhood of future fires. We'll see.
For one data point or an anecdote my mom's gasoline car spontaneously caught fire while she was driving it. Turns out a rodent had built a nest on the manifold. The car was totaled and no one was hurt.
A few probably came up while working on his physics degree.
Modern cars have an insulation layer under the hood. It's not there to protect the hood, but to help smother the fire. The mounts melt under fire temperatures, dropping the fire blanket on the engine. No idea if it works, but it's there and designed to work that way.
What? No such thing exists. Your post is 100% bullshit.
No such thing as an auto deployed engine fire blanket in modern cars. Not sure where you got that one.
So you are asserting that there is nothing attached to the under-side of the hood of any modern car.
You are wrong.
I got it from under the hood of every modern car. I tried to find an authoratative link, but the makers and dealers seem to call them insulation, with no fire purpose (probably for liability reasons), but I could also find test reports on the performance of the fire blanket http://www.mvfri.org/Contracts/Final%20Reports/R05-13b%20Underhood%20Insulation.pdf so it is or isn't it?
I found piles of forums with debate on the issue. You are entitled to your personal opinion, but not your personal facts. The fact is, it's designed to fall off at fire temperatures and act like a fire blanket. It's also designed to insulate the hood paint from the engine temperatures. Which of those you want to call it is up to you, but claiming it doesn't do the other is contrary to available facts.
Learn to love Alaska
That. Carbon fuel cells are much cheaper, much more efficient and much more reliable than hydrogen fuel cells. But the cars will fare better on diesel, not methanol.
It's still a net gain if it improves the efficiency of the engine.
Rethinking email
That's true. Although, since the extremes are anarchy and communism, I don't think that we're in much danger of being pushed over the edge by having a government agency that makes sure products are safe.
What? No such thing exists.
So there is nothing attached to the underside of the hood in your car? Sometimes black, but often shiny silver in color as well. What year make and model is your car?
Learn to love Alaska
Except, it happened not 1 time, but 3 times, in a short period of time, to a car thats pretty unpopular simply because they can't produce that many at this point in time (not due to lack of buyers).
Wrong. Do your homework.
Only one was road debris.
The other one in mexico was a high speed crash into a concrete barrier after the car went airborne at over 100mph. The driver walked away.
The Tennessee incident was also a crash, not road debris. Nobody was injured there either.
Most if this is due to improper firefighting technique. Go look a the twitter pictures. Fire fighters are just going to have to learn how to fight battery fires, because the problem is not unique to Tesla, it has also occurred in Chevy Volts.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
There is no state with rates as low as .0625/kWhr, and there is no small scale generation option that is that cheap either.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
Of course the real problem is that there simply isn't enough data available. Three times in as many months could be a fluke. Or it could be a pattern.
When you add in the other electric vehicles that suffered from battery fires, the problem is reasonably well understood. The fires occur WELL AFTER the crash event. You have a fairly long time to exit these vehicles.
No doubt Tesla and the other manufacturers will do something like Boeing did, and build thermal barriers into the battery and perhaps build in stronger penetration barriers. But I'm not sure you can protect against all fires when a car goes airborne and crashes into a concrete barrier. Nor does it even seem to be a priority in my view. That the driver walked away.
Sig Battery depleted. Reverting to safe mode.
Okay, fire.....
But seriously, the driver of fire #2 went over a roundabout, through a wall, and hit a tree and was uninjured.
I'm not sure the average car would have left the driver alive.
***
That said, I do think there may be a need for revision. But I am almost hoping this lowers their stock to the point I can buy some.
It was NOT old people hitting the wrong pedal. Sorry...
Besides, you'd still have to get around the problem of hydrogen making steel brittle.
No, I don't. I'm not trying to do anything with Hydrogen. I'm just refuting the idea that Elon Musk is an expert on metallurgy and hydrogen chemistry, just because he is CEO of a "rocket" company.
Sure gas cars catch on fires after crashes, but how many of those catch on fire after running over road debris without crashing?
Irrelevant. Accident data per unit distance is what needs comparing. Accidents, fires, injuries, fatalities.
If Tesla's do catch on fire more easily from road debris, it doesn't follow that they catch on fire more often than ICE cars, nor that the fires are as dangerous.
And some combination of the two is literally impossible, is it?
I hear of people in not particularly sunny parts of the world who can charge their car off solar panels on their roof.
Bear in mind, that's something that a goddam greenwash hippy faggot might well have had already
No, there isn't, nor in any car I've ever seen. Another poster already called you out.
You're also trolling me about insuring Bitcoins. Fuck off.
Parachutes! That's cheating!
Funny, I just checked my cars. They have it. As I said before, name the make model and year, so that others can confirm. Why not, are you lying about having a car, or lying about whether it has a fire blanket? (or is it an old car that's not representative of modern vehicles)
Nope, you'll lie and troll some more, but make sure nobody can prove you wrong because we don't know what you drive. My '67 bug didn't have one, but that doesn't mean new cars don't. It's a safety feature to delay fires to allow more time before fires penetrate into the passenger compartment.
And yes, I read more than one thread, and your idiocy isn't apparently aimed just at me, but you are a lying idiot to everyone.
Learn to love Alaska
So now feds are the experts on high-tech cars?
Someone is sure an expert on electric car fires, gas car competitors?
Those competitors are also offering all electric vehicles: General Motors: Spark Ford: Focus Fiat (Chrysler): 500e Toyota: RAV 4 Honda: Fit Nissan: Leaf
What about
Shell
Standard Oil
Aramco
BP
???
The mind conceives, the body achieves, the spirit manifests.
Except, of course, when competitors use and lobby for fake "safety" concerns in order to hurt competitors, or when politicians drum up fake "safety" concerns in order to get votes.
I had a similar experience. Drove my Nissan Sentra at 100 mph for about half an hour. (I was young and dumb.)
Suddenly, I had a James bond-style smokescreen in the rear-view mirror. Pulled over. Head gasket had blown or melted, and I had an oil fire on my hands.
I extinguished the oil fire with... I kid you not... a tea towel. That's all I had. I'd smother it out, and it would re-ignite. Repeat. Many, many times. Eventually, the engine cooled enough that it stopped re-igniting.
I drove to the next exit, bought several quarts of oil, and went on to my destination. Drove back home afterward, too, stopping occasionally to put another quart in. Fun times.
They should have maintained the same partial pressure of O2
Transitioning from an atmospheric pressure oxygen/nitrogen mix to low pressure pure oxygen is going to be a lot more complex than transition from atmospheric pressure pure oxygen to low pressure pure oxygen. Screw up that transition process and you could end up with the PPO2 dropping to deadly levels.
note: i'm known as plugwash most places but i screwd up registering that here somehow in the past and now can't register
So now feds are the experts on high-tech cars?
Someone is sure an expert on electric car fires, gas car competitors?
Those competitors are also offering all electric vehicles: General Motors: Spark Ford: Focus Fiat (Chrysler): 500e Toyota: RAV 4 Honda: Fit Nissan: Leaf
What about Shell Standard Oil Aramco BP
They'll supply the natural gas used to generate the electricity.
Like all those who do. Yes, this is a thing, you just didn't hear about it nationally until it happened to one of those evil communist electric cars.
Nevada has time of use pricing. I set my car to start recharging at 10pm, when electricity is less than 5 cents/kWhr.
https://www.nvenergy.com/home/paymentbilling/timeofuse.cfm
I never claimed that the LEAF had a significantly lower TCO than a gas car, just a lot lower than a fuel cell car. But your numbers are a bit off. I upgraded the stock 110V charger to 220V for $300. I should avoid a couple thousand bucks of maintenance and oil changes. The 10 year maintenance schedule in the manual lists nothing besides brake fluid and cabin air filters.
I have a 2003 Ford. Girlfriend has a 2010 Camry. No such fire blanket in either.
Hood insulation is not a fire blanket. It s not designed to fall out and suppress a fire. It is merely designed to contain the fire within the engine compartment. You're the one making the ridiculous claim that it's a fire suppression system. It's not. It's containment.
That you don't like my wording doesn't make it wrong. You state it's not a fire suppression system, it's just there to suppress the fire. You just choose to fight over the word "suppress". Why?
Learn to love Alaska