Big vapor under the hood.
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joeparaski
Posts: 1,865
So I arrive at work this morning just as a VW Jetta pulls into the parking lot with lots of smoke coming from under the hood....I figured it's a blown radiator hose of something. I tell the customer we'll be opening soon and we'll have a look at it....but what was weird is that I wasn't familiar with the odor...it sure didn't smell like a coolant leak.
Sent the tech out to get the car and he said it wouldn't start and it smelled like gasoline. So we push the car into the shop and pop the hood and find a busted hi-pressure fuel line. Also, the car didn't start because it had run out of gas.
Amazingly the customer had put $80 worth of gas 10 minutes before getting to the shop with the problem!
How on earth you can dump that much fuel onto a hot engine without catching fire is amazing. The busted hose was high up on the firewall and sprayed raw fuel right on top of the engine and onto the exhaust.
I told her to buy a lottery ticket and that she had a guardian angel watching over her.
WOW....gas turning to steam!!!!!! I don't think I've ever seen this problem on a car before.
Joe
Sent the tech out to get the car and he said it wouldn't start and it smelled like gasoline. So we push the car into the shop and pop the hood and find a busted hi-pressure fuel line. Also, the car didn't start because it had run out of gas.
Amazingly the customer had put $80 worth of gas 10 minutes before getting to the shop with the problem!
How on earth you can dump that much fuel onto a hot engine without catching fire is amazing. The busted hose was high up on the firewall and sprayed raw fuel right on top of the engine and onto the exhaust.
I told her to buy a lottery ticket and that she had a guardian angel watching over her.
WOW....gas turning to steam!!!!!! I don't think I've ever seen this problem on a car before.
Joe
Amplifiers: 1-SAE Mark IV, 4-SAE 2400, 1-SAE 2500, 2-SAE 2600, 1-Buttkicker BKA 1000N w/2-tactile transducers. Sources: Sony BDP CX7000es, Sony CX300/CX400/CX450/CX455, SAE 8000 tuner, Akai 4000D R2R, Technics 1100A TT, Epson 8500UB with Carada 100". Speakers:Polk SDA SRS, 3.1TL, FXi5, FXi3, 2-SVS 20-29, Yamaha, SVS center sub. Power:2-Monster HTS3500, Furman M-8D & RR16 Plus. 2-SAE 4000 X-overs, SAE 5000a noise reduction, MSB Link DAC III, MSB Powerbase, Behringer 2496, Monarchy DIP 24/96.
Post edited by joeparaski on
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Wow.
Sure the VW wasn't on the track, but here's a Corvette that got some fuel into the intake manifold (or so they suspect that's what happened).
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joeparaski wrote: »So I arrive at work this morning just as a VW Jetta pulls into the parking lot with lots of smoke coming from under the hood....I figured it's a blown radiator hose of something. I tell the customer we'll be opening soon and we'll have a look at it....but what was weird is that I wasn't familiar with the odor...it sure didn't smell like a coolant leak.
Sent the tech out to get the car and he said it wouldn't start and it smelled like gasoline. So we push the car into the shop and pop the hood and find a busted hi-pressure fuel line. Also, the car didn't start because it had run out of gas.
Amazingly the customer had put $80 worth of gas 10 minutes before getting to the shop with the problem!
How on earth you can dump that much fuel onto a hot engine without catching fire is amazing. The busted hose was high up on the firewall and sprayed raw fuel right on top of the engine and onto the exhaust.
I told her to buy a lottery ticket and that she had a guardian angel watching over her.
WOW....gas turning to steam!!!!!! I don't think I've ever seen this problem on a car before.
Joe
I had the same thing happen on a Jetta. Only the fuel pressure regulator popped just as the fuel rail split. Blew up in my boss' face while I was sitting behind the wheel cranking the ignition. He was wearing safety goggles though. When that happened, it just started dribbling fuel down the firewall. Thankfully, no fire and no fog or spray of gas. That poor girl found out why VW has the reputation it does concerning breakage. She dropped roughly $3800 on fixing that car and it was only worth about $2600. But, sentimental value. Her "papa" gave her that car when she came to America to go to school.Expert Moron Extraordinaire
You're just jealous 'cause the voices don't talk to you! -
Yup. VW taught a young bobman all about how high repair costs can be as well. Wish I had dumped that car the first time it broke.If you will it, dude, it is no dream.
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That's a crazy story Joe.
I was very lucky in my VW ownership. 130,000 miles over 9 years on my B5 Passat (it was still German assembled at that time) and I never had any major problems. 3 sets of tires, changed the brakes only once. Oil changes every 5k, plugs and air filter every 40k, timing belt/water pump, tensioner, etc., at 105k. Other than that, the only real problems were an ABS module that needed to be rebuilt (~$100+ DIY removal/replacement), tie rod ends ($50 DIY replacement +alignment), the CD changer crapped out after 4 years, and then CV joints at around 120k (and that was only because I chose to let it go with bad boots for 40k miles). Towards the end, it had a PITA check engine light which gave an erroneous 'bad CAT' code. Just had to reset it before emissions test every year and it passed fine.For rig details, see my profile. Nothing here anymore... -
Just traded my VW Jetta (97) for a Honda Accord (07). I loved that car. 180K+ and ran like a top. Thing is, I was about to have to sink $2k into suspension, brakes, tires and a starter. Had to let her go.-Kevin
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Wow.
Sure the VW wasn't on the track, but here's a Corvette that got some fuel into the intake manifold (or so they suspect that's what happened).
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I suspect that less then talented wrenchers were fooling with the vette since it clearly wasn't stock.
Very surprising how the hood got bend like that. weird. -
How on earth you can dump that much fuel onto a hot engine without catching fire is amazing. The busted hose was high up on the firewall and sprayed raw fuel right on top of the engine and onto the exhaust.
Gasoline needs a spark or open flame to make it ignite.Political Correctness'.........defined
"A doctrine fostered by a delusional, illogical minority and rabidly promoted by an unscrupulous mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a t-u-r-d by the clean end."
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Gasoline needs a spark or open flame to make it ignite.
Gas vapor does not need an ignition source if the vapor can reach more than 540 or so degrees. That's it's autoignition point where gasoline doesn't need spark or flame present to ignite. An exhaust manifold can easily top 750 degrees at idle. Your O2 sensors need at least 600 degrees of exhaust gas heat to work properly An engine being run hard for a long period of time can exceed well over 1000 degrees, closer to 1500. Sometimes, when the engine is not running right, it can reach much higher temperatures, closer to 2000 degrees. Since steel melts at around 2600 degrees and iron at around 2700 degrees, when you start hitting those temps, things get very dangerous.
Still, the point is that a standard exhaust manifold can reach temperatures well above the point where gasoline vapor needs no ignition source to reach combustion.
Gasoline liquid on the other hand, not so much. Then again, gasoline's flash point is about -45 degrees. The flash point is where a liquid gives off enough evaporated gases to form a combustible concentration. Hence the reason you aren't supposed to smoke around gas tanks.
What you really need to be concerned with is the air to fuel ratio. Just like in a car engine, the A/F is critical. Too rich in fuel and it won't blow up and burn all of the fuel. Too rich in air and the mixture is too lean to ignite and explode. It's likely that Joe was saved by the fact that the fuel rail was blowing out so much fuel that the vapor concentration levels were so high they were quenching any ignition from spark, fire or autoignition from temperature. The only other way to ignite gasoline is from pressure from either compression or friction, building heat. But you need something along the lines of 150+ psi. To put that in perspective, atmospheric pressure is typically around 1 BAR or 14.5 PSI. So if you compress a gas to an indicated 14.5 PSI, you have effectively doubled the pressure on that gas from what it's normal state in the atmosphere would be at sea level. 150+ PSI is over 10 times the amount of pressure found in the typical Earth atmosphere. The only place under the hood of a car where that kind of pressure is found is a combustion chamber at TDC.Expert Moron Extraordinaire
You're just jealous 'cause the voices don't talk to you! -
Stuff it, John.Political Correctness'.........defined
"A doctrine fostered by a delusional, illogical minority and rabidly promoted by an unscrupulous mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a t-u-r-d by the clean end."
President of Club Polk -
Amplifiers: 1-SAE Mark IV, 4-SAE 2400, 1-SAE 2500, 2-SAE 2600, 1-Buttkicker BKA 1000N w/2-tactile transducers. Sources: Sony BDP CX7000es, Sony CX300/CX400/CX450/CX455, SAE 8000 tuner, Akai 4000D R2R, Technics 1100A TT, Epson 8500UB with Carada 100". Speakers:Polk SDA SRS, 3.1TL, FXi5, FXi3, 2-SVS 20-29, Yamaha, SVS center sub. Power:2-Monster HTS3500, Furman M-8D & RR16 Plus. 2-SAE 4000 X-overs, SAE 5000a noise reduction, MSB Link DAC III, MSB Powerbase, Behringer 2496, Monarchy DIP 24/96.
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joeparaski wrote: »And this thread was going so well, so pleasant, so informative.....until your "wonderful" cute little snide remark that just appeared out of nowhere, for no particular reason, and without provocation...it just blows my mind. You just couldn't help yourself could you? Or perhaps you just needed to up your post count?
Joe
John and I are friends. As such, he knows I'm just messing with him. It's a shame you were so quick to pass judgement, but then again I guess you couldn't help yourself or perhaps you just needed to up your post count.Political Correctness'.........defined
"A doctrine fostered by a delusional, illogical minority and rabidly promoted by an unscrupulous mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a t-u-r-d by the clean end."
President of Club Polk -
joeparaski wrote: »Amazingly the customer had put $80 worth of gas 10 minutes before getting to the shop with the problem!
Joe
Dang I know gas prices are high but $80 to fill a Jetta up ???
I have a truck and it doesn't take that much. -
Vette C6.r wrote: »Dang I know gas prices are high but $80 to fill a Jetta up ???
I have a truck and it doesn't take that much.
He's in Canada. Gas is about $1.50 more a gallon up there. They measure it in liters too. So 80 bones Canadian for a car with probably a 50 liter tank is probably average at this point. I mean, the average Golf or Jetta has a 12-15 gallon tank. A 15 gallon tank is roughly 60 quarts. 1 quart is .946L so 60 times .946 gets you 56.76L
Say a tank fill-up at about 12.5 gallons is 50 quarts. You get 47.3L. So $80 divided by 47.3L and you get about a $1.70 per liter. That's a bit high. Multiply it by 4 to get a guesstimate and you're at about $6.70 a gallon. The national average is right around 145 cents per liter so that works out to about $80 if the car died at the shop because it blew all of it's fuel tank contents out the ruptured fuel rail. It the car has a 15 gallon tank then $80 divided by 15 gets you around $5.33 a gallon. Divide that by 4 and you're right at $1.33 a liter. Since a liter is smaller than a quart, $1.40 is right at the 144c/L national average for Canada.Expert Moron Extraordinaire
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^^^^ Son of a beeeeyitch, this is worse than Keiko's 'Brain Age' test !!
Are we going to be tested on this material ? If so, I'll start taking notes.
Sal Palooza -
One question here. Your tech smelled the gas and tried to start it without looking under the hood first? Wow. If this continues you may loose a tech.Vinyl, the final frontier...
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John was absolutely correct. The upper explosive limit (UEL) of typical unleaded gasoline is ~7.6%. If concentration is greater than that, the mixture is too rich to burn/explode under normal atmospheric conditions. If there was a large vapor cloud trapped under a hood, it was probably well above the UEL and that is why it didn't burn or explode. If it were a small leak, it probably would have been disastrous.For rig details, see my profile. Nothing here anymore...
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John and I are friends. As such, he knows I'm just messing with him. It's a shame you were so quick to pass judgement, but then again I guess you couldn't help yourself or perhaps you just needed to up your post count.
I don't keep a tab on who is friends with who on the forum. I just noticed a pattern that when John posts something there is all too often some stupid remark made in response. A smiley after your post would have helped.
Joe
FYI....I had edited that response and just wrote "totally unnecessary remark" instead. I don't know how that original response got through because it wasn't meant to.Amplifiers: 1-SAE Mark IV, 4-SAE 2400, 1-SAE 2500, 2-SAE 2600, 1-Buttkicker BKA 1000N w/2-tactile transducers. Sources: Sony BDP CX7000es, Sony CX300/CX400/CX450/CX455, SAE 8000 tuner, Akai 4000D R2R, Technics 1100A TT, Epson 8500UB with Carada 100". Speakers:Polk SDA SRS, 3.1TL, FXi5, FXi3, 2-SVS 20-29, Yamaha, SVS center sub. Power:2-Monster HTS3500, Furman M-8D & RR16 Plus. 2-SAE 4000 X-overs, SAE 5000a noise reduction, MSB Link DAC III, MSB Powerbase, Behringer 2496, Monarchy DIP 24/96. -
One question here. Your tech smelled the gas and tried to start it without looking under the hood first? Wow. If this continues you may loose a tech.
By the time he got to the car the engine was cooled down and he cranked it for about 2 seconds and stopped. But yeah, it could have caught fire at that point too, although there was little to no gas left in it since it wouldn't start after the repair.
Weird though...after all these years I thought I knew every "odor" a car was capable of emitting. The fuel "steam" was certainly new to me.
JoeAmplifiers: 1-SAE Mark IV, 4-SAE 2400, 1-SAE 2500, 2-SAE 2600, 1-Buttkicker BKA 1000N w/2-tactile transducers. Sources: Sony BDP CX7000es, Sony CX300/CX400/CX450/CX455, SAE 8000 tuner, Akai 4000D R2R, Technics 1100A TT, Epson 8500UB with Carada 100". Speakers:Polk SDA SRS, 3.1TL, FXi5, FXi3, 2-SVS 20-29, Yamaha, SVS center sub. Power:2-Monster HTS3500, Furman M-8D & RR16 Plus. 2-SAE 4000 X-overs, SAE 5000a noise reduction, MSB Link DAC III, MSB Powerbase, Behringer 2496, Monarchy DIP 24/96.
