car caught on fire

[RJTY]

Looks like I have to call a dive already that was planned for Saturday. My brother came into town to dive this weekend. He is travelling the rest of the summer so this was his last chance. Yesterday he went to play disc golf. Hole #14 he saw a fire truck putting out a fire. It was his ford expedition. After doing some research this morning, seems there have been a lot of fires started with this vehicle due to the cruise control. There was a recall he didnt know about. He bought the car used two months ago. Wierd. In park, turned off, no key, fire starts.

 

[Jcsgt]

I've heard of this happening. Someone will park their rig in their garage and turn it off. Sometime during the night, it just sparks up and catches everything on fire.

I'm surprised Ford didn't send your brother a recall notice.

 

[RJTY]

He bought it use two months ago. I guess previous owner or dealership did not do the recall.

 

[Jcsgt]

Ouch! Too bad you can't hold those folks responsible for informing new buyers. That is such a huge safety issue that you would think the owner would have the necessary (and I'm guessing pretty much free) repairs to prevent a fire.

Was it a total loss? My Jeep caught on fire, a couple years ago, while I was driving it. Luckily, it wasn't as bad as it initially looked and I was able to afford the repair (still several hundreds of dollars). I still smell the odor of smoke, sometimes, just driving down the road.

 

[RJTY]

Ouch! Too bad you can't hold those folks responsible for informing new buyers. That is such a huge safety issue that you would think the owner would have the necessary (and I'm guessing pretty much free) repairs to prevent a fire.

Was it a total loss? My Jeep caught on fire, a couple years ago, while I was driving it. Luckily, it wasn't as bad as it initially looked and I was able to afford the repair (still several hundreds of dollars). I still smell the odor of smoke, sometimes, just driving down the road.

Yep!! Total loss.

 

[Jcsgt]

Did his insurance take the loss minus his deductable?

 

[RJTY]

Did his insurance take the loss minus his deductable?

He is working on that today. Looks like what he owes 15000 and book value is 12000 so he is in a little trouble. I guess thats what happens when you pay too much for a vehicle.

 

[Airborne!]

I had a Ford Taurus that caught fire once while just sitting and idling. There was no recall, but some research with other owners did find an issue with the High Pressure side of the Power Steering Pump Line. The line would sometimes rupture at the pump and being right over the manifold bad things would happen since the fluid is flammable. Kind of put me off Ford, but really I know they are no better or worse than any of the rest. My Insurance company investigated and tried to prove it was Ford’s faulty design, but a fire has a way of destroying useful evidence in such a case.

There is one thing that your bother can do, and I shudder to advise it, is contact a Lawyer who specializes in this area and do some research. The initial Ford Voluntary Recall came about in Sept of 2005 after intense pressure from the Feds and Consumer Groups. Ford had up to that point been dragging their feet with this issue even though there was ample evidence to show a real danger, including some deaths. The sad part is that the Switch in question, built by Texas Instruments, was never designed nor intended to be used in the way it was installed by Ford. I would not sign anything yet with the insurance company and ask them about an investigation into the fire. Of course this only works with the bigger insurance companies with the clout and resources to do such a thing.

 

[Kwbyron]

I heard this story a while back, probably an urban legend, about a lady's brand new Mercedes caught fire in the parking lot while she was in the store. She had problems with insurance because it was a brand new policy, or something like that, but then it turned out the cause of the fire was a crystal rear-view mirror ornament the insurance company gave her that magnified the sunlight onto a stack pf papers...or something like that...
While working at a Dealership near Chicago, one of our techs set one car on fire like 3 times in a day...there was a fluid leak(first time was on a diagnostic-test drive, had to open the hood and shovel snow on it to put it out..) and he couldn't find it without running the car, which would set the fluid on fire... lol, it was a 3-stooges type day, smoke; fire-extinguisher; smoke; fire-extenguisher....