Recently Restored 246 Caught Fire in Calgary AB

Very, very sad. How would it start a fire on the inside. Would it be caused by the AMP meter gauge.

 

That second photo looks like some type of foam or chemical was used in extinguishing the fire. Hope corrosion (to the car) is not added to the damage list.

 

He should have had an element extinguisher …

Maybe it could have been saved

sad event

 

Never leave your open Dino unattended in a parking lot and go inside to eat.......especially when you took two parking spaces.

 

While very unfortunate incident (luckily the fire station was across the street and the crew saw it), this reminded me of another freshly restored vintage (non-Dino or Ferrari) vehicle fire about 20 or so years ago.

I was helping a new client with his quite rare (less than 1000 made) 1950's collectible car which he had extensively restored to a very nice (concours ?) standards over several years and having done the disassembly/reassembly work himself, but wanted my assistance for final sorting of getting it started, running, drivable and dialed in.

I had just had it in my shop for few days, got it running and moving on its own but it was still far from finished/sorted, when the owner suddenly called Friday and asked me to have it transported back to his house (in L.A. area) before Sunday evening. Apparently he had listed it for sale weeks before (which he had not mentioned earlier) and now some potential out-of-state buyer was to flying in first thing Monday morning to inspect the car.

I suggested it might be better if he brought the potential buyer to my shop and show it there, as it would not only give me more time to work on and finish few more of the numerous issues the car still had, but also make it easier for both of them to negotiate values of yet-to-be-unfinished work, etc, while having my immediate input available, if needed.

Well, he insisted showing the car at his house, so I worked on it until late Sunday night and with my trusted flatbed operator transported it back to L.A., dropping it off at the clients house little before midnight, got back to Riverside around 1 am and went home.

Well, I got to my shop little later than usual that Monday, around 9:30am and as I got in, saw a message light blinking in the answering machine.
After hitting the "Play" button, I heard a following voice mail, which I'm just para-phrasing it a bit, but you get the idea:
"Hey Timo, this is so-and-so with the ****** (the car). It's little before 9 am and the potential buyer is supposed to be here any minute, but I think (the car) is on fire. Could you please call me a.s.a.p.!"

He left another message around 9:15 am asking for my immediate call back, but also indicating the car apparently was no longer in imminent danger to burn itself or his house down, as he had managed(?) to put it out.
The buyer candidate had been quite furious and left right after this second call, because he wasn’t able to test-drive the car, which he had flown in for and the seller didn’t want to do anything before consulting me.

Turned out it was an electrical short on the power window wiring inside the rear quarter panel and had nothing to do with anything I had worked on (The client had wired them himself).