My Montana caught on fire-sad face John

[harleyrider]

I went up to my storage place,to get the Montana ready for the up coming season.I installed the batteries,opened up the slides.Turned the propane tanks on,lite the stove.So far every thing is going good.Then I deceided to turn on the fridge.I heard it click and then light.I putzed around inside for a while.When I went outside I saw smoke coming out of the top fridge vent.I opened up the bottom vent to see a fire on the right side as your looking at the vent opening.Right away I got the fire extinguisher and that did the trick in putting out the fire.I would say it was probably burning for no more then 3 minutes.Enough time though to melt lots of wiring and God knows what else.It doesn`t look like it effected any thing else other then the fridge.I was able to bring the slides in and all the 12 volt lights worked as usual.I have no idea why it started or if a new fridge is in order.I did have the recall done last year.I can deal I guess with replacing the fridge,my main concern is WHY it happened.

[bsmeaton]

Harley - so sad to hear.

This bothers me - I think I would contact Dometic and your insurance before you mess with anything! If that fridge caught on fire AFTER the recall fix was performed, then the recall just simply didn't work and it could impact nearly every RV out there with a Dometic fridge.

[SlickWillie]

In addition to what Brad said, please contact the NHTSA. I emailed them about this band aid fix, and they had approved it. From the flimsy aluminum I saw put on ours, it doesn't look like much of a fire shield to me.

[HamRad]

It certainly sounds like it was the ill fated burner unit on the fridge that caught fire. The "shield" was supposedly in stalled to prevent just that thing from happening! Sounds like someone did not install properly or the unit was just so bad that no kind of shield would have prevented the fire.

You would think that Dometic would make good on a replacement unit and the repair of the fire damage.

Sure glad it was no worse than it was. It could have been much worse.

This fire stuff sure has me worried. Guess I'll just have to keep checking and double checking.

HamRad

[Papalr]

Sorry to hear about your fire, but the fact that you had the recall done would be my first suspect. When we had the recall done last spring on our previous TT at the dealer, the mechanic got the wire coming from the elctronic unit to the ignitor unit pinched under the new base that was part of the recall. After I got it home, I tried to light the refrig and couldn't get it to light off. I went out and took the cover off to look for something obvious. The area smelled of propane and then I noticed the wire pinched enough to show bare wire. I would imagine several more attempts to light the refrig might had also caused a fire or explosion. The mechanic rushed up to the house immediately (on his own time) when I called him to explain the problem. He was quite relieved nothing more serious had happened.

[blamb]

Second the other advice - at least this didn't happen while you were sleeping in it! Or not even there.

[harleyrider]

Thanks every one for your thoughts and concern.I`ll give my insurance company a call in the morning.I left a message as their was no one their on sunday.Kind of looking back I`am really lucky that it didn`t cause more damage then it did.It was really just a fluke that I happened to go outside.I was in the process of taking off the vent to change over the hot water heater valve.For some odd reason I stopped and went outside to discover the smoke.The fire itself was to the far left of where they did the recall plate thing,kind of tucked into the wall where the insulation is.The office to the storage place was closed at the time.If the fire extinisher didn`t work I`am sure the whole thing would have burnt to the ground.

i`ll sure let you know what the outcome of this is going to be.Should be interesting to say the least.

[hazmic]

The FIX just seems to be a band-aid but dose not fix the problem. The tube breaking off. I have heard that others have problems after the"FIX". Having to replace the cooling unit and now even a fire. This is Not the first fire that I have heard about. I think Brad has the right answer. Something else needs to be done.

[mcgiver2]

Well iam glad no one was hurt and at lest your rig didn't burn completely ,,,,,i had almost the same problems 3 weeks ago my fridge caught fire after i got home from a 100 mile trip , lucky my wife smelled the burn then i saw the smoke from fridge area and quickly put out the fire............so we put in a new fridge and bought a new rig a 3605..and saleing my old rig outright, after insurance tells me what there gonna do.........Allen

[bsmeaton]

quote:Originally posted by mcgiver2

Well iam glad no one was hurt and at lest your rig didn't burn completely ,,,,,i had almost the same problems 3 weeks ago my fridge caught fire after i got home from a 100 mile trip , lucky my wife smelled the burn then i saw the smoke from fridge area and quickly put out the fire............so we put in a new fridge and bought a new rig a 3605..and saleing my old rig outright, after insurance tells me what there gonna do.........Allen

Allen,
You made me nervous - I thought it was your 2009 10th Anniversary that caught fire!! Then I read more carefully. Our 2007 is not in the recall, so I'm hoping the issue went away as well. However it could just mean than none of the 2007's are old enough to have the problem yet.

[SlickWillie]

I have known of three at least four folks here in our RV Park that have had to replace the fridge in the last few months. Not sure whether Norcold or Dometic. Lowes and Sears both have a particular model fridge that will slide right in the hole. Three of these did such. I'm leaning towards this if ours goes out, even with the service contract we have. I do know one the for sure; I am going to turn the propane off to the unit.

[Fire5er]

bsmeaton, our 2007 was on the recall. However, our best friends that purchased the same day we did, and who received their rig one week before we did, their's was not on the recall. So the recall is not just by the date of the rig. We had the recall work performed last year, and to date have not had a problem.

[mcgiver2]

bsmeaton our new rig has a norcold fridge so i hope we don't have that problem happy camping to everyone out there

[bsmeaton]

Five5er, you're right, I think our 2007s were a mix of what was in stock at the factory. Mine missed out on the recall.

Hope the Norcolds work out for the better. Thats the only other option other than a standard residential type.