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posted by Cactus on Tuesday February 18 2014, @02:05AM   Printer-friendly
from the plays-with-fire dept.
danomac writes:

Earlier this month, a Tesla parked in a Toronto garage caught fire. This does not seem to be charger related, as the Model S was not plugged in to a charger at the time. While Tesla fires have been in the news lately, this one was unique in that there was no collision involved.

Tesla said it has definitively determined that the Toronto fire did not originate in the battery, the charging system, the adapter or the electrical receptacle, noting that these components were untouched by the fire.

 
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  • (Score: 4, Insightful) by stormwyrm on Tuesday February 18 2014, @02:32AM

    by stormwyrm (717) on Tuesday February 18 2014, @02:32AM (#1298) Journal

    And the garage just happened to contain a Tesla when the fire occurred?

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  • (Score: 4, Interesting) by paddym on Tuesday February 18 2014, @03:14AM

    by paddym (196) on Tuesday February 18 2014, @03:14AM (#1343)

    Wondered about Tesla and Boeing Dreamliner. Does the Tesla use composite components? Does anyone know if driving these composites through the earth's magnetic sphere could induce currents that cause shorting? I find it strange that we've had these phantom fires in the cars/planes with batteries. Most planes are an aluminum faraday cage, so this should not happen. But the Dreamliner is different. I read that Tesla uses composite panels, but I would think the aluminum chassis would prevent something like this, unless there's not enough chassis to prevent such currents from occurring.

    • (Score: 1) by lubricus on Tuesday February 18 2014, @08:17AM

      by lubricus (232) on Tuesday February 18 2014, @08:17AM (#1478)

      Can't say anything about moving composites generating currents, but if that were the cause, wouldn't the fires be correlated with travel? The Tesla was in a garage, and (if I remember correctly), 3 out of the 4 Dreamliner fires were while the planes were on the ground. Doesn't this suggest some other cause?

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      ... sorry about the typos
      • (Score: 2, Interesting) by tastech on Tuesday February 18 2014, @11:25AM

        by tastech (251) on Tuesday February 18 2014, @11:25AM (#1535)

        I remember reading somewhere the Dreamliner fires were the result of overcharging. A poorly designed or missing charging regulator can cause this. The Tesla EV's use Lithium batteries, These are sensitive to overcharging and can and have caused fires. Otherwise Lithium metal (Used in the battery) can react energetically with water. So probably a moisture issue, or a problem with the charging system implemented.

        • (Score: 1) by mmcmonster on Tuesday February 18 2014, @11:42AM

          by mmcmonster (401) on Tuesday February 18 2014, @11:42AM (#1542)

          Is this up for vote?

          If so, I vote for jealous girlfriend/neighbor.

          Based on prior history from the company, if there was a fault in the Tesla electrical systems they would call a mandatory recall to settle it or an over-the-air update to mitigate it.

    • (Score: 1) by danomac on Tuesday February 18 2014, @04:32PM

      by danomac (979) on Tuesday February 18 2014, @04:32PM (#1686)
      Submitter here - I submitted this article because there was no collision and the charger was not being used at the time. As I do not know the layout of the car (is the front a storage area? battery area?) I thought this could be more interesting than the "car crashed and caught fire" stories.

      Pretty sure the fire department would have indicated something if they thought the fire was caused by something else. I really like the idea of a Tesla and would love to own one (fires be damned! have to wear a couple layers of Nomex ;-) ), but they're way out of my price range. Some of these are growing pains for electric cars no doubt, and I hope that they sort them out ASAP.

      I've known a regular vehicle to catch fire after sitting for a while, there was a carburetor fire, so it's not like this happens only to electric vehicles.

      I hope Tesla sorts this one out, and fast.
      • (Score: 1) by DECbot on Tuesday February 18 2014, @10:09PM

        by DECbot (832) on Tuesday February 18 2014, @10:09PM (#1969) Journal

        The battery is the underside of the car, somewhere between 5 to 10 cm thick. Placing the battery pack under the body will allow you (some time in the future) to drive to a battery swap station, and in 5 to 10 minutes, the entire battery pack for another one with a full charge.

        Petty much all of the Tesla fires are either the result of a puncture to the battery pack (large, metal road debris or various types of collisions) or related to the charger. The fires burned in a controlled manner and put out by untrained firemen not prepped to combat a lithium fire in a vehicle. Most of the charging issues have not been fire related, but rather dead batteries after a night of charging, or vampire charging of unreasonable magnitudes (leading to bigger than expected electric bills). The charging issues have been address so far with software updates, and in a few cases new hardware.

        When it comes to construction, the body and the side panels are all aluminum, joined by rivets, spot welding, MIG welding, and ridiculous amounts of adhesive. These things are build like aluminum tanks. I don't recall seeing any significant amount of composites on the body.

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