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Element fire extinguisher?

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Tucker74

Tucker74

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Wow - great conversation! I understand the value of the chemical fire extinguishers, and have one in my FJ40 and boat (both have carburetors!). The concern I have is the capacity, if you’ve ever used that small Kidde 8-12 sec isn’t going to buy you much. These discharging 50-100 sec is a big deal if they work. I’ve reached out to manufacturer on their performance on EV fires, keeping in mind no hand held is going to extinguish a full on battery pack fire. I’m looking on prevention before it gets to that 😉
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WattTruckMatt

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It is great for very small fires that are just "going due to fuel". It would be of absolutely no use for an EV battery fire. *MAYBE* the recent charge port one, if it was caught quickly enough.

A fire needs three things - fuel, oxygen, ignition. This interrupts oxygen.

As demonstrated in that video, a big enough fire that it can't completely put out (the grease fire in a big bin,) it interrupts oxygen while it's actively pointed on it, but the grease fire is big enough that it just re-lights. The wood fire still has ignition (the coals) and fuel (the wood,) so again, you're just interrupting oxygen. As soon as you take it away, oxygen becomes available again, and it re-lights. (Hold it long enough, and it will cause the flames to die down enough that the coals won't be enough to re-light. If the fire were bigger (proper campfire size) that little stick wouldn't be enough.)

If you ever get a fire that is an actual battery pack fire - nothing you can carry in your vehicle will be enough to put it out.
9/10 any recovery equipment will be used for another vehicle so I'm fine carrying an extinguisher for that purpose and am well aware there's really nothing we can do for a battery fire. Just get out of the vehicle and walk away.

I might put the Element back in the offroad kit as a "backup"/2nd extinguisher.
 
 




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