Precedent caught on fire while charging

[ImplantLabTech]

WOW! Is this the same cart you were showing the challenges on the brakes and the relay in? If so was that before or after the install?

In any event thank goodness you were home and were Johnnie on the spot with the extinguisher.

[fltekdiver]

Great questions
The light kit is on a 10 AMP fuse
The reducer is on a 20 amp fuse
You can see in the above photo the resducer is still intact it was burnt from the flames below it
The hotspot looks like it was at the charging port somewhere between the charger and the wiring on the cart

[Volt_Ampere]

The charge current is high enough to cause a fire if you have a poor resistive connection at the connector. I've never seen this happen but it's possible. Fuse would not protect you from this either.

[fltekdiver]

Yeh the fire was started at the port
Or wiring behind the charge port
Indicated by the dark black circle in the photos
Also by the batteries
The reducer was intact enough to get damaged by the flames , but was not damaged enough to cause the actual flame
The reducer is ran off an on off marine switch , the cart was in tow mode at the time of the fire, and the on off 48v switch that turns the reducer on and off was off, so the reducer which was only powering the led light kit had no power

[fltekdiver]

This is the switch I used:
Ampper Battery Switch, 12-48 V Battery Power Cut Master Switch Disconnect Isolator for Car, Vehicle, RV and Boat (On/Off) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07413JWLD...RZGD7JR39YCA9R

[ThreeCW]

Did the Battery Switch also burn up ... I was not able to spot it in the photos?

Do you see any heat damage to the cord outlet (rubber cord) of the battery charger? If the fire started at the charge port, I suspect that cord would also show heat damage.

This is a good reminder to the rest of us to occasionally put your hand on the charge port to see if there is any heat being generated when charging

[fltekdiver]

Thanks for your questions
The battery switch was melted along with the whole middle of the cart.
The relay was off the side it looked like the relay caught some of the fire but it's not disencengrated like the whole middle of the cart
The cord to the charger was burnt off
The charger was on and still trying to charge after the fire was put out
I threw the charger out
As I'm not sure if it was a bad charger, poor connection at the charger port, or wires behind the charger port that caused the spark

I can't figure out how it went from over heating or faulty wiring at the port to. Spark to ignite the flames

[Pat911]

Overheating -> melting insulation -> bare copper -> shorting wires -> sparks -> fire -> BOOM.

[scottyb]

You were lucky indeed. Imagine if these were Lithium batteries. The fire extinguisher would have been worthless and you would have been tasked with moving the burning cart out of the building

[SoFLCart]

Wow! Thank God everybody is okay! I cannot imagine this happening to me. I changed my FLA batteries out last week to AGM. I put 7 gallons into my FLA over the last 12 months and got tired of it. I had one of the FLA batteries leak material to the bottom of the battery too! I am going to check on my fire extinguisher now! Thank you for the PSA (Public Service Announcement)!