Had a "Train Fire" Tonight...Almost Lost the House

Good lesson--and good advice!

I never had anything like this happen and certainly hope I don't. Something told you to go check. What ever made you go check saved your bacon!  Two thumbs up for having fire extinguishers nearby. The worst that happened to me was I melted some carpeting with a bad connection on a floor layout. Not bad, but if I weren't there, who knows?

Very scary stuff.......Thanks for the reminder....and thankful the damage is limited to things that can be replaced.

Very sorry to hear this Larry.

Sobering reality check for all of us!  Glad you were able to tend to the matter at hand quickly and avoid serious damage to your home.

 

David

Sorry to hear this Larry, but this is something we all fear. I'm happy that the damage was minimal compared to what could of happened if you fell asleep rather then return to the train room.

This is a lesson we should all take to heart, 18Volts can cook things.

 

Keep us posted on how things work out and what you decide to do about keeping this from happening again. I would like to know what caused that switch motor to fry.

 

Good luck buddy.

Thanks for sharing your scary experience with us. The damage to your layout and trains is trivial compared to the possible loss of your house. Good cautionary tale for all of us to keep in mind. Always keep a fire extinguisher handy, and the closer to the layout the better. You don't want to run through the house to the kitchen or elsewhere for an extinguisher when you already have visible flames in the train room. Fire spreads fast.  

Very sorry to hear about this, Larry, but thank God you were able to get things under control.

 

I think the above quote covers most all the recommendations I might give, the first and most important of which is to never leave a layout powered-up and unattended.

 

I have used pink foam (Extruded Polystyrene) on layouts for years, but always have placed it on a plywood or other firm underlayment, and have always covered the top with plaster or a similar scenic material.  In other words, the foam is always fully encased in something more sturdy (and probably more resistant to fire or melting).

 

I don't know what brand/type of switch machine you use, but since you have had two bad experiences with that particular brand, I sure wouldn't use it again in the future.

 

And, of course, having a good fire extinguisher on hand--one rated for electrical fires--is always a good idea.

 

Hopefully your experience, unfortunate as it is, will provide a lesson to others.

Hi Larry,

 

Sorry to hear of your troubles and glad you were able to handle the situation.  Looks like you have your work cut out for you repairing your layout.  There are several good lessons in your story.  Like most disasters, it took a combination of factors to lead to your fire.  Fortunately, you had a good defense ready to avert a much bigger problem.

 

Lesson 1 - Keep good, charged, fire extinguishers in your house.  Preferably more than one with an "ABC" rating stored in different locations.

 

Lesson 2 - Avoid using foam and other easily flammable materials near a potential source of ignition.  Foam is great modeling material that has many good safe uses on a layout.  However, it is much easier to set on fire than wood, plaster or even homasote.

 

Lesson 3 - All twin coil switch machines need to be properly installed with some form of circuit protection.  Without proper protection they are a match waiting to be struck.

 

I'm not going to beat on Atlas in this instance because this mode of failure is not exclusive their switch machines.  All twin coil type machines including Atlas, MTH ScaleTrax, Rix, Thenshodo, etc., have the same potential.  A twin coil machine can only have power applied for a few seconds before it begins to heat up.  A good momentary toggle switch offers some protection, but it is not enough by itself.  Electric non-derailing also complicates the situation because a train parked on a non-derailing section has the same function as holding down a momentary button.

 

The Atlas #6924 non-derailing board offers very good protection for all brands of twin coil switch machines.  My crew and I have installed several hundred of these boards with excellent results.  The Atlas #6924 costs about $18 per board.  Each switch requires its own board (paired crossovers can share one board).  Another excellent form of electrical protection is a capacitive discharge circuit.  Circitron, makers of the Tortoise switch machine, offer a very good quality capacitive discharge power supply called the "SNAPPER."  These sell for about $30 and can supply power to about 8 Atlas or ScaleTrax switch machines.

 

One other piece of advice about the clean-up.  Larry obviously used a dry chemical fire extinguisher.  These do a great job of smothering a fire, starving the combustable material of oxygen.  They're a good choice for a general purpose extinguisher.  However, they do add a complication when cleaning up after the fact.  Dry chemical power is a strong base that will cause rapid corrosion, especially in a high humidity environment like a garage.  Anything you hope to save after the fire needs to be cleaned as soon as possible. A moderate acid such as rubbing alcohol will help to neutralize the dry chem powder and makes an effective cleaner. Liberally lubricate any mechanical components after cleaning.

As stated,keeping a fire extinguisher nearby is a good thing. I have one right @ my control panel.

All I can say is, the lord was looking down on you. Being a FF for 45+ years I have seen a lot that people would not believe. That being said I have seen things like that even happen in the fire stations.

 

One volunteer fire station that I have helped with a Christmas train display has has a few close calls. One time a box car derailed in a mountain which did not trip the breaker and started burning in the mountain. Then when smoke was noticed coming out of the tunnel portals they were able to keep the power and got to the derailment and get things under control.

   

The worst one was in a room about 8' x 12' in size that was built just to store and and to work on the trains. This room was built in a area that it also housed some of our fire equipment and was remote to the area where the train display was. Well someone went in there and worked on some trains and forgot to turn off the power supply to the transformer used for testing. And something shorted out while no one was in there and it started started burning. We were lucky that the room along with the equipment bays had a sprinkler system which put out the fire.

 

The Fire station that originally started the Christmas Train Garden was hit by a major fire almost 3 years ago. And that fire was believed to have started by a electrical short in a medic unit. That little electrical short totally destroyed 1 medic unit, 1 brand new fire engine, 1 brush unit and 1 humvee plus damage to another fire engine & medic unit not counting the damage to the building itself.

 

http://statter911.com/2010/02/...t-dundalk-firehouse/

 

So yes, you had someone looking over you. 

 

Remember, just because something is just plugged in, does not always mean that it can't start a fire. And also have interconnected smoke detectors in all parts of your home.

 

Glad to read that you caught the problem in time.

I also make it a practice to never leave my layout unattended when powered up.

I think I'd better get a fire extingusher for my basement (already have one in the garage and by our fireplace)

 

I also put postwar Lionel #91 electromagnetic circuit breakers in each of my main feeders.
Properly adjusted, it is likely that one of these breakers would have tripped before your switch machine overheaded.

I adjust mine so they trip under the expected load, and then raise the setting just a bit higher.

I agree with Paul - make sure you have a smoke detector! You were very lucky and you had the common sense to have fire extinguishers nearby. As a fire firefighter also, I would have called the fire department just to check for extension of fire in the ceiling - it looked like the layout was close to the ceiling from the photos. 

I'm very glad you were so lucky.  Obvioously it could have b een much worse.

 

Myself, I do worry about fire and my train layout. First, because there is no avoiding the use of flameable materials, and second because there is only one exit (that doesn't involve jumping at least two stories) from the room - concievably the  fire could be between me and the exit. 

 

So I have three fire extinguishers - two rather large, located in my train room (28 x 16).  

 

I also use a lot of "electrical protection" - probably more than is warranted or needed - no doubt due the fact that I was a power system protection engineer in an earlier life.  I have a breaker box just for the train room and use only power supplies with breakers orfault  interrupters: Z400, CW80, etc.  

 

And the only strange thing I do is use very big wire throughout in the feeds to my layout and accessories (#8 or in a few cases just #10 copper).  I do this partly because it limits voltage drop, but also for short circuit protection, bizarre as that might sound.  Small wire and its high impedance limits short circuit current - feed a fault through #22 wire that runs across my layout and it will likely may not blow a fuse: feed the same burned out motor through #8 wire and the fuse will blow instantly. 

Wow! Certainly a wakeup call. I'm glad the fire didn't spread, and that you returned when you did. Thanks for letting us know, and for the pictures.

Wow.....Glad you caught it in time very lucky. As I read down I was thinking of Lee and his all night train runs. Stuff happens no matter how well you prepare. 

Next time call 911 before attempting to control the fire yourself.  It could have gotten completely out of control in very short order.  Glad it wasn't worse.

Very Glad you and your family are safe. I do try to shut down the power when done operating the trains, However I have forgot on several occasions. Wake Up Call.

Wow that's really terrible. Looks like you lost some equipment in the fire also. That's a real shame. I hope all is ok with the house, and most importantly that no one was hurt. Obviously, that is most important. Everything else can be replaced or repaired.

On the up side, I really enjoyed your video looks like its a fun layout. Hope to here you get it rebuilt and are back in operation soon.

Good luck,

Mike R

You can coat the foam with sculptamold or hydrocal and put the track on top of that.

 

Andrew

Glad you got everything under control. 

 

We must remember that, at least in my house, the biggest fire hazard may just be the train layout. With 18-20 Volts of juice flowing, foam, paint, plastic, and other highly flammable materials, it won't take much! 

 

I had a similar close call, a few years ago on my old 4x12 HO layout in another (now torn down) house. I was running my new Bachmann "Smoking" 2-6-2 steamer, which never smoked despite it having a smoke unit with fluid in it, and noted a lot of smoke coming out of the tunnel. I was happy to see it smoking until it came out of the tunnel NOT smoking and the smoke continued. I looked in the tunnel to see ALL of the wiring glowing cherry red. Not on fire but just about ready to actually produce a flame. That layout, minus the trains, was left in the house when the house was bulldozed to make way for the larger and new home built in its place. It wasn't worth moving, storing, and rebuilding/rewiring and we felt it had done its job and needed to be destroyed. 

So sorry this has happened to you.  You are doing a good service posting this here for us.  Thanks and good luck!

Sorry that you had the fire. I would agree that the local FD should have been called.

 

Thanks for the wake up call on the extinglisher. I am just now building a layout; and although there are extinglishers elsewhere in the house I haven't put one in the new train room. That is now on the top of my shopping list.

WOW! I hope this is a wake-up call for other hobbyists as well! You are definitely lucky.

The Weaver boxcars, Lionel t-motor and track can all easily be replaced. I am glad it didn't get any worse.

 

Larry;

 

Your guardian angel was most certainly sitting on your shoulder.  Glad that no one was hurt.  BTW, don't clean anything up until you contact your insurance company.  I'm not sure, but you may have to contact your local fire dept have an investigation as to the cause of the fire.

During a recent building inspection in SE PA I larned that any exposed foam will not pass muster.

 

We had to cover all sprayed foam and foam panels in the basememnt with 1/2"  drywall as a fire stop.

 

The other big reason we were told was the lethal funes given off by burning foam.

 

My hand throws are now looking even better!

 

 

Is that telephone wire providing power feeds to the switches/ layout? If so, thats possibly culprit as well,there has already been another post previously where telephone wire melted, it simply can't handle the voltage.

 

I'm glad you caught it when you did, advice taken.

Larry, sorry to hear about this damaging fire to your layout. Good thing you checked it out before going on to other things.

As all have said, very fortunate it was not worse. I use foam for scenery but make sure it is covered with plaster etc. We have had prior posts on fire extinguishers. It is always best to have one or more near the layout. I have one at the top of my basement stairs, one at the bottom, smoke and CO2 alarms and a sprinkler over the furnace.

SD60M, sorry for your loss, but glad it was not worse than that!  Thanks for sharing your experience.  My layout is also in my garage and "hanging" (but on a lift to move up and down).  My layout base is ceiling tiles rather than foam, but I almost went with foam.

 

I am going to purchase two fire extinguishers, to be posted at each door to the garage.  Best wishes.  Ken

Glad everyone is ok and it did not spread further.  Switch machines are not the only units that can melt foam. I had a Fastrack uncoupling track short out due to a stuck button.  When I pulled the track up the foam under it was melted.  Makes me think the next layout will not include foam.

Sorry for your loss and thank you for sharing your story.

 

Note to self:  Get more fire extinguishers!  Get rid of telephone wire that you were going to use for accessories.

Glad everything is ok! Id better get a extinguisher IN the train room, upstairs maybe to far. Thanks for sharing.

 Besides that 2 fires on a layout in 5 months? 

 

I hope my home owners isnt reading these.

Glad to hear you caught this in time. It’s also a good inspiration for me to replace my outdated fire extinguishers. I’ve been meaning to do this for weeks.  I’ll be stopping on the way home tonight.

That was indeed a wake up call! But most importantly you and your family are safe!...and you still have have a home. Thank you for posting this to remind us of the importance to never discount the safety issue.

WOW!

 

Glad you caught it before more damage was done, that's pretty scary!

I'm sorry for you loss. I will thank you for this wake up call. It will certainly get me to make some changes quickly.

WOW is right!  Glad you didn't loose it all. I don't leave the layout powered up when I'm not there. I just figure anything could happen.