Fire extinguishers

[AlaskanNoob]

I got a couple of fire balls. One is a knockoff of the “reputable” brand. Fun to have and in the right place may be great.

I wonder off an old fashioned bucket of sand is a good idea for the fires we might see.

They have a shelf life don't they before you're supposed to replace them?

 

[JRH]

I went with a dry chemical ABC rated (2-A:10-B:C) 5lb. I am contemplating however picking up a fire extinguishing blanket designed for lithium battery fires. Of even just a good fiberglass welding blanket.

I bought a 6 x8 ft fiberglass welding blanket last spring for my solar trailer to line the 5 sides of my whole battery box area and a smaller one to cover the bottom of the Lid… IIRC its seems it was around 100 bucks. they say it’s good to about 2800 to 3000F…. I have a small one I use for plumbing soldering near wood.
it was meant to retard and slow any possible fire. It was easy to work with, well made with grommets.
If fire ever happened all the batts would be toast…..my only hope was that it would allow me a bit of time to grab the big wire cutters, start cutting and snatch all the Victron stuff and whatever else I can off the walls and throw it out in the yard..

I really don’t have a great game plan for lithium fire….

 

[AlaskanNoob]

I bought a 6 x8 ft fiberglass welding blanket last spring for my solar trailer to line the 5 sides of my whole battery box area and a smaller one to cover the bottom of the Lid… IIRC its seems it was around 100 bucks. they say it’s good to about 2800 to 3000F…. I have a small one I use for plumbing soldering near wood.
it was meant to retard and slow any possible fire. It was easy to work with, well made with grommets.
If fire ever happened all the batts would be toast…..my only hope was that it would allow me a bit of time to grab the big wire cutters, start cutting and snatch all the Victron stuff and whatever else I can off the walls and throw it out in the yard..

I really don’t have a great game plan for lithium fire….

After reading Will's thread on LifePo4, I'm actually much less concerned about a fire risk. Thank God. All the solutions seemed like they would be a pain in the butt. But I think I'll add some welding blankets along with fireboard in my setup just as another layer. But I'm actually not too concerned after reading this thread.

@upnorthandpersonal even tested charging a LifePo4 at 1F temps and it didn't cause a fire. My Victron equipment makes sure not to charge the batteries any more than they want based on temperature and I'm going to install NodeRed to control a DC generator in the future using the parameters specified by the battery, so I think the risk of fire is pretty low. Especially when I put the batteries in the root cellar in a super insulated rack with some heaters.

But welding blankets seem like a relatively cost effective why not layer of defense. Thanks for the tip.

 

[dianea]

In a hazmat training class, half the class serviced nuclear warheads and they described how a nuclear detonation would be extinguished. They described the mechanism worked as a large ceiling mass of gravel, which would collapse on top of them if a warhead detonated. Simple, effective.

There's a method to extinguish everything these days, including demon cores...

 

[eric1]

I keep thinking bags of sand that just live on top of the batteries wouldn’t be a bad plan. If one were worried. Or big pieces of sheetrock rested on top.

I made my battery case out of Durock. Instead of a paper liner holding it together it has glass fibers holding it together so it's suppose to hold together through both water and fire better than sheetrock. I don't know how well contained the fire would remain since I have the copper wires coming from the cells to the BMS to a fuse and then on to the inverter (presumably the fire could follow along that wire), but I do have the inverter mounted on a piece of Durock too. It's cheaper than metal, and nonconductive to boot - but I'm not sure how it really would compare to a metal box in terms of fire containment.

The fire balls mentioned earlier seem interesting - but what if one of those goes off with you in the room? They sure seem to have quite a bit of force behind them when they go off.

 

[Max Canterbury]

I made my battery case out of Durock. Instead of a paper liner holding it together it has glass fibers holding it together so it's suppose to hold together through both water and fire better than sheetrock. I don't know how well contained the fire would remain since I have the copper wires coming from the cells to the BMS to a fuse and then on to the inverter (presumably the fire could follow along that wire), but I do have the inverter mounted on a piece of Durock too. It's cheaper than metal, and nonconductive to boot - but I'm not sure how it really would compare to a metal box in terms of fire containment.

The fire balls mentioned earlier seem interesting - but what if one of those goes off with you in the room? They sure seem to have quite a bit of force behind them when they go off.

The fire balls are an intriguing concept - but sadly, are not reliable. As tested by a fire department:

, also featured on "Testing The WORST Fire Extinguishers From Amazon!"

 

[AlaskanNoob]

The fire balls are an intriguing concept - but sadly, are not reliable. As tested by a fire department:

, also featured on "Testing The WORST Fire Extinguishers From Amazon!"

That's good info to know. Not the info I'd like to know, but glad somebody tested it out.