So My SRT Caught Fire Today...

[1FastSRT-4]

So, I was heading to my parents house, when I decided to make a WOT pull. I just installed my 50 trim, and I was taking my roommate for a spin. After I went through 3rd and 4th gear, everything was fine. about 5 seconds later i started to smell something burning, and could see smoke coming from the back of the car. now I thought that it was oil coming from the turbo after the pull, but when it kept smoking after about 3 seconds I knew something was wrong. I pulled off the road, and smoke started to come from from under the hood, I thought I blew my headgasket. My roommate then said maybe its on fire! I popped the hood and sure enough it was. :eeeek: there was a good size flame coming from the fuel feed line, so i blew on it and the flame got bigger! Knowing that fire needs oxygen to live,I closed the hood fast! Luckily I was only about 100 yards from my parents house when this happened. I called my dad immediately, and he was there in 2 min with a fire extinguisher to put it out. Here's the carnage. :crying:


Before:
http://i1190.photobucket.com/albums/z442/Kenny_Armstrong/IMG_0069.jpg
http://i1190.photobucket.com/albums/z442/Kenny_Armstrong/IMG_0062.jpg
http://i1190.photobucket.com/albums/z442/Kenny_Armstrong/IMG_0056-1.jpg

After:
http://i1190.photobucket.com/albums/z442/Kenny_Armstrong/fire3.jpg
http://i1190.photobucket.com/albums/z442/Kenny_Armstrong/fire2-1.jpg
http://i1190.photobucket.com/albums/z442/Kenny_Armstrong/fire1.jpg
http://i1190.photobucket.com/albums/z442/Kenny_Armstrong/fire4.jpg

[85XR7Project]

Wow, sorry to hear it man. Insurance company total it out then?

[1FastSRT-4]

Idk I just filed the claim, they should call me tomorrow. But im sure its gonna be totaled..

[AutoMods]

sucks man. did a line melt? bad oring? bolts come loose? I always carry a fire extinguisher on a modded car.

[1FastSRT-4]

im not sure what happened, a fuel line might have melted, or it was an electrical fire.

[96-eclipse-gst]

sucks man. did a line melt? bad oring? bolts come loose? I always carry a fire extinguisher on a modded car.

I'm thinking I will do this from now on....

[bizzle]

i had my mustang catch fire last October. it wasn't near that bad but i have decided to carry an extinguisher from now on. hopefully you come out well on the car. best of luck

[1FastSRT-4]

Yeah i have one in my RX7 but I never thought to put one in my Daily. Lesson learned, I will have on in my car from now on!

[1FastSRT-4]

Thanks man, I hope I come out good also.

[sparkles]

Did you tell the insurance company that the car is modified?

[Deimos]

Did you tell the insurance company that the car is modified?

When I did mine I had to give them a crap ton of photos and a list of modifications. Talk about a pain in the arse. They asked when I replaced the brake lines even.

[LT1Dan]

That sucks man, I really like the SRT4. Good luck with your insurance company.

Not to keep beating a dead horse, but I'm with Ryan on carrying a fire extinguisher. I've got one in the Camaro and in my dd.

[1FastSRT-4]

Did you tell the insurance company that the car is modified?

I wont, ill tell them this is how I bought it.

[sparkles]

They never asked me if I bought it that way. They just asked if it is. I'd walk carefully. They may use that as a reason to stiff you.

[Sleepy]

If it is a total loss for the love of goodness buy it back and part it out.
Was the fuel feed line still stock? If so I would bet it was one of the push lock connections, I have had one break on my old car and another on my current dd.
Sorry to hear that it happened.

[90blkbrd]

I'm really sorry this happened to your car and I'm sorry if you don't like what I'm about to say.


They may use that as a reason to stiff you.

HUH? He didn't inform them it was anything but a plain ole SRT-4, so they have been insuring a SRT-4, he has been paying premium on a SRT-4. The best he can hope for is retail value of a stock SRT-4 of comparable quality and mileage.

I went back and forth with my agent on my 1990 SC trying to get proper coverage on it. He claimed it would all be OK if something happened. I tried to get specialty insurance elsewhere on it but was denied as it wasn't old enough. (A lot of the specialty insurance companies put a mileage limit and or no driving it to work clause.) I really needed to spend more time trying to find better insurance but I ended up hoping I could trust my agent. In my case the insurance company had been given documentation on the upgrades prior to something happening and I'm willing to bet I would have had to go to court to get more than $2500 out of a $10-15K car.

[Sleepy]

To concur with Blkbrd when I started my insurance on my car I had asked the agent. He told me I would need to get an appraisal written and submitted to him. Then the insurer would determine the monthly premium they would charge for the car and modifications. I said F it. Granted the mods are worth way more than the car, however not enough to be paying a higher premium than my 08 van.

[1FastSRT-4]

Yeah guys, I called my insurance company. And there gonna take a look, It really dosn't matter if I get my Money back for the mods, everything can be replaced. I wanna keep the car if I can... The only damage is to the engine bay and the hood. I can prolly pull the motor and replace the fuel lines and the engine harness clean it up and call it good.. But we'll see.

As far as the fuel lines go sleepy, yes they were the stock push lock lines.

[Sleepy]

I'm surprised you still had the stock lines and had already moved up to a 50t. Well I hope everything works out fine with the insurance. Glad you want to keep it and fix it back up.

[1FastSRT-4]

The stock fuel feed line is sufficient enough to feed the 50t, after 450hp it's reccomended to add a fuel return line.

[1FastSRT-4]

As far as insurance I told them that they could replace the motor, and paint the engine bay and hood and call it good.

[Chase]

Call me stupid but:

You keep saying fuel feed line, like its going to your turbo...?

I am confused.

[Deimos]

Call me stupid but:

You keep saying fuel feed line, like its going to your turbo...?

I am confused.

that would deinfatelt cause a fire lol

[1FastSRT-4]

Call me stupid but:

You keep saying fuel feed line, like its going to your turbo...?

I am confused.

lol no.. fuel feed line, is going from my fuel tank to my fuel rail to the fuel injectors.

oil feed line, is going to the top of the turbo.

[Batwood]

that would deinfatelt cause a fire lol

That would be awesome to see though!

[1FastSRT-4]

So get this.. There's been garage break ins on my side of town ( Edgewood rd, H ave) and between midnight and 4 am someone broke into my garage and stole all my tools, and a subwoofer box and subs.. This is not my week.. Guys lock your garages! were the 7th house since sunday.

[JustinS]

Saw the story on kcrg about the break-ins, sorry to hear you were one of them. Did you have renters/homeowners insurance?

[1FastSRT-4]

Yeah the house has renters insurance on it, so hopefully I get my money back for the tools, the sub box I don't really care about, the amp was blown, the box was free and the subs were cheap pioneer subs. I am just mad about my tools.

[Sleepy]

I can tell you it can't be anyone looking at this website for "research". Whoever it is would be crazy. I think just about everyone on this website is a fan of firearms lol.

Not your week at all. Hopefully the claims process with both insurance companies goes well.

[1FastSRT-4]

Oh yeah, whoever did it dosn't know anything about cars, because they could have made off with the thousands of dollars in car parts. But yeah it's definately not my week.. and this house will be protected by a firearm from now on!

[1FastSRT-4]

State farm came and assessed the damage... and they are gonna TOTAL it :crying: and since I have a loan on it there will be no way to save it.. this day just got 100 times worse.

[mcvay98]

hey man, if there is anything off the car you dont want, let me know and ill buy them off you, that sucks that they are gunna total it out, sorry for your bad fortune lately. seems to be happening to alot of people lately

[1FastSRT-4]

I will kaleb, depending on how much I get I might get another SRT, But if I dont, Ill have the stock turbo,o2 housing and the lines, vac lines, surge valve, and my DSP for sale, It should be the end of the week that they let me know how much im getting for it.

[mcvay98]

you wouldnt want to sell the 50 trim? ;P how much for the diablosport cause i was going to buy a new one this weekend

[1FastSRT-4]

this is IF I dont get another srt. but id sell it for $225, I've only used it a couple times.

[AutoMods]

are you allowed to take parts off of it ??? i thought the insurance company doesn't let you do that? did they take pictures?

[1FastSRT-4]

No im not taking any parts off of it now. All the parts that i have for it, are the stock parts, my 50 trim is gonna stay with the car. Nothing will be taken out of the car.. except for the wideband but I took that out a couple hours after the fire.. there not getting that!

[Sleepy]

It all depends if they have run their CCC report to get a value on the car. Typically they will want to see receipts for anything additional and will take depreciation on the parts.
So lets take stereo parts for an example(since it is usually the common item to be removed). If a guy has an upgraded stereo, they will run the report for a premium stereo system. Then he wants to remove it, they will remove the premium to standard or whatever. Usually the only thing is they will request the factory stereo to be placed back in the car or they remove a stereo all together on the car.

In your case if you took your intake and 50t and threw the factory stuff back in there, it would not make a difference to them unless you tried to get them to pay for the parts already.

This is at least how the insurance company I work for handles it. And no it is not State Farm :lmao:

[sparkles]

I'm really sorry this happened to your car and I'm sorry if you don't like what I'm about to say.



HUH? He didn't inform them it was anything but a plain ole SRT-4, so they have been insuring a SRT-4, he has been paying premium on a SRT-4. The best he can hope for is retail value of a stock SRT-4 of comparable quality and mileage.

I went back and forth with my agent on my 1990 SC trying to get proper coverage on it. He claimed it would all be OK if something happened. I tried to get specialty insurance elsewhere on it but was denied as it wasn't old enough. (A lot of the specialty insurance companies put a mileage limit and or no driving it to work clause.) I really needed to spend more time trying to find better insurance but I ended up hoping I could trust my agent. In my case the insurance company had been given documentation on the upgrades prior to something happening and I'm willing to bet I would have had to go to court to get more than $2500 out of a $10-15K car.

You don't think that if he was to tell them he modified the vehicle, and as a result, the thing caught on fire, they might be a little hesitant to pay out? I'm just saying, the less he says, the better.

[1FastSRT-4]

Yes, the car is at my parents house now, and when statefarm asked if my car was modified, my dad said hell no I told him not to. ;) But I should get book valve, and that will be more then I paid for it, so that makes me a little happier.

[AutoMods]

You don't think that if he was to tell them he modified the vehicle, and as a result, the thing caught on fire, they might be a little hesitant to pay out? I'm just saying, the less he says, the better.

I agree. Its is extremely rare for an unmodified car to catch fire. Either improper installation/wiring, lack of attention to lines rubbing or excessive heat exposure without shielding or heat wrap, or just crappy aftermarket parts that failed. Which was it ?

[1FastSRT-4]

Im thinking my oil feed line got a small hole in it somehow. when I let off from my wot pull with my cutout being open it popped a flame and ignited the oil that was leaking/leaked, That's my only guess..

[JustinS]

It's a good thing this thread isn't publicly available...oh wait. I think you should probably have Ryan trash this since it could be used against you if the ins company wanted to search around for info on your car.

[AutoMods]

Can an insurance company deny you coverage because you modified your car? I wouldn't think they could unless it was gross negligence that they could prove.

[sparkles]

Oil squirting out of a line caused by modifying it would probably fall under that definition Ryan.

[Sleepy]

Possibly depends on the policy language.

[1FastSRT-4]

My mom is in the insurance business and she said that if you modify your car there is a extra policy protecting your custom parts and the car. But that just insures the parts. Not modifying it. And when the statefarm looked at it and they couldn't find any "negligence"

[AutoMods]

Oil squirting out of a line caused by modifying it would probably fall under that definition Ryan.

probably hard to prove negligence over accident

[90blkbrd]

Can an insurance company deny you coverage because you modified your car? I wouldn't think they could unless it was gross negligence that they could prove.

No they can not. What they can do is not pay you the actual value due to the modifications.

[BGjohnson]

Depending on the company, they will drop you then and there if you admit to even having an aftermarket air filter.

It's all in the policy language as stated before, each company and policy is different to say for sure.