While searching for parts machines, I was surprised at the number of units that were junked because they caught on fire..The larger units have fire supression systems..not the smaller ones..A hand held extinguisher seems of little use when a fire breaks out in an enclosed engine compartment with hydraulic oil spraying and being picked up by the fan and blowing everywhere. What do you folks have on your equipment..and do you use dry powder, Halon or CO2..Some of the machine I looked at were filthy to begin with and maintenance was bad..however Murphy's Law seems to follow some of us around.
Most of the machines I have worked on with them use dry chemicals. The machines I typically see them on are our HD785-7 100 ton haul trucks and BOMAG BC1172RBs operating at local landfills. They do get pretty dirty but the nozzles are supposed to have thin rubber caps that easily blow off when the system activates, how ever some mechanics will knock them off and not put them back on or they simply fall off. I think the biggest reason they are not seen on smaller machines is cost of the system compared to cost of teh machine and also lack of places to put the charge canisters.
You see them on most medium to large size logging equipment nowdays. I have seen problems though when machines are shutdown at night and the woody debris cooks off. I've also seen lots of dead batteries because the systems are left armed over prolonged shutdows.
One thing to keep in mind, for the most part, fire suppression systems aren't meant to put the fire out. They are primarily to knock the fire down to give the operator a chance to escape off of the machine. Most times, they will knock the fire down to the point of extinguishment if it is a pressurized fluid fed fire as soon as the machine is shut off. But if it is a fire that has taken hold, there isn't much hope. Brian
A little piece of mind Ditto Brian I have had 2 Cats go up in flames, nothing to do with maintainace. #3 I had a Fire Suprecion system installed. I was told it would help on ins. NOT! Looking back at the 2 fires I think they would have both re-ignited. One re-ignited 6hrs after a hand held unit and 8 gal of water was used. It did give me piece of mind although I never had to use it.
wish you could get halon still. Had two 100lb tanks for my boat.
i learned from an uncle running a custom cutting operation along time ago. IF it has full insurance on it and it starts to burn wait till it really gets rolling and then empty the extinguisher in the direction of the fire. No such thing as a small fire in a combine. If its one of the grain tractors or transport trucks you get off your ACE ASAP and put that fire out any way possible, if you hear fire fire fire on the radio you better figure out what direction it came from and get your azz over there the quickest way possible with an extinguisher in hand.