Brand new 2019 Hyundai Tucson catches fire - local news story.

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I remember Fiero's doing similar. The nutty thing is in my life I have only seen three cars on fire:

Hyundai Sonata
2 Pontiac Fiero's
 
Originally Posted by NoNameJoe
I remember a while back BMW had a huge rash of fires in South Korea, so much that BMWs were forbidden from parking in underground, under building parking or parking garages in general. Traced to a bad design for the EGR cooler.

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/12/24/south-korea-fines-bmw-10-million-over-several-engine-fires.html

One incident is noise. It could have been anything, a defect, damage from road debris, sabotage. Corroboration through multiple independent incidents though (like the BMW thing) is another thing though...

Local news stations will rerun weather stories from several years back if there was major flooding etc. just to scare people. Fear is what sells.
Like you said, this might be just a fluke. Todays cars are extremely complex, and some small glitch in assembly can cause this. It is completely different from known issue like BMW had with coolers, or when they had issue with ground wiring on battery on E61 model's.
 
Big problem with Hyundai and Kia is the serious reluctance to confront the problems and acknowledge them.
Kind of reminds me of the attitude they have when it comes time to use their long warranty...you WILL fight them tooth and nail to get that coverage acted upon.
 
I used to see much more frequent car-b-ques in the '80s. BMW, VW, and the domestics all had their poster children for Smokey the Bear. Materials like hoses and fittings and plastics just weren't as durable back then. I saw VW cloth-wrapped fuel lines spraying fuel in dad's rabbit at 7 years old, and not long after that he had to pretty much replace all of it. Watched a tired GM taxi struggle up a hill, still in pretty decent shape, and there it was. Ducked and rolled out of my '73 VW bus when it's engine caught and burned to the ground. The materials back then weren't as good, and the hoods were filled with miles of disorganized wire, vacuum tubing, ductwork, and comparatively large devices like York A/C compressors, mounting brackets and old Chrysler alternators 10" wide. Things rubbed on each other, looms weren't so neatly wrapped, and you couldn't visually see as much.

While I am definitely interested in BEV tech and have pet dream of a BEV volvo in my future, battery tech is going to have a wave of occurences and then following safety development, I think. Even a cel phone battery, if mistreated, can get pretty ugly. I'm envisioning something like a built-in battery neutralizer such as a network of capillaries with a neutralizer such as salt water in Li-ion applications, or something similar, to chemically inert the battery if a high temp is detected. I'm not sure if our first BEV (if it should ever come to be) will live in the garage or not...
 
With any garage attached to a house always disconnect the battery when parking inside, yeah not fun but the car won't burn then. Now with Li ion in electric cars always park them 30 or more feet from a structure. I have never known of a lead acid battery that has been removed from a car start a fire.
And the item to really worry about are the new all plastic electric meters that are being installed on your house.
 
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