bath fan fires

[charles2]

I understand bath fans have been responsible for fires occasionally. How long is safe for them to run continuously?

 

[mcclary's electrical]

I understand bath fans have been responsible for fires occasionally. How long is safe for them to run continuously?

Everyone I install I put on a 4 button timer 5, 10, 15, 30. That's all you need to evacuate steam or other pollution

 

[Buck Parrish]

I understand bath fans have been responsible for fires occasionally. How long is safe for them to run continuously?

I've saw an attic fan burn up. But not a bath fan, yet.

 

[mcclary's electrical]

I've saw an attic fan burn up. But not a bath fan, yet.

I did two burn jobs last year both caused by bathfans

 

[Buck Parrish]

I recently did a job where I offered to get panasonic whisper.
But the owner wanted the loudest bath fans he could get.
This is a college rental.
He says the bath fans are just to drown out any bodily function noises that may be over heard.

 

[ctmike]

I did two burn jobs last year both caused by bathfans

was it caused by the fan or the build up of lint inside the fan

 

[mcclary's electrical]

was i caused by the fan or the build up of lint inside the fan

The build up of lint, powders, dust and sprays is flammable. After 20 years or so there's enough to do damage. If someone leaves the fan on overnight, like in a guest bath, the bearings can fail. If they "spark" when they fail, or just get hot enough, they'll catch that dust on fire, which falls onto the flammable plastic grill, which melts on falls onto the flammable linoleum floor.

 

[crazyboy]

I agree, the problem is that no one ever cleans them, they get full of dust and lint.

 

[kwired]

I understand bath fans have been responsible for fires occasionally. How long is safe for them to run continuously?

​

until it fails

I think most of these motors are marked "impedance protected" but they will still get pretty hot if they get stuck.

I saw a fan in a plastic housing that the motor got hot enough that it just about melted enough plastic to fall out of the housing. Only one I ever seen that was plastic don't know what brand it was or how old it was.

I think its a good idea to install metal housing as well as metal duct. If a lint fire were to start it may contain it long enough for it to burn itself out.

 

[ctmike]

so should we we blame the fan or the homeowner/landlord for lack of housekeeping ...yet another "electrical fire" goes on the books

 

[76teach]

Bathfans, turn tables, rotating window displays, and so on so forth requiring low torque motors utilize an inexpensive motor design usually 1/10 hp or less which incorporates a shaded pole priciple in the motor magnetic laminates to produce a rotating field or magnetic pull on the motor armature. Locked rotor current on these motors is only slightly higher than normal running current due to thier inherent poor efficiency to begin with.
To me lint collecting in the fan would likely be what causes a fire. As stated also the wear and friction of the motor shaft with sleeve bearings getting hot may be more likely the cause than a winding failure

 

[MF Dagger]

I had one smoking pretty good the other day after just a minute or so, but that was one of them with the heater built into it and i didn't realize it when I flipped it on. It was a foreclosure and had been sitting a long time and within a minute the smoke detector was going off and the smoke was coming out.

 

[rodneee]

unintentional bath fan field test

unintentional bath fan field test

I understand bath fans have been responsible for fires occasionally. How long is safe for them to run continuously?

i can't say how long they will run safely;but my sister left one of those dinky 50 cfm fans running when she left my parents vacation home on the sunday after thanksgiving. the house was vacant until new years eve when i arrived and turned it off. that was about 5 years ago. fan still works but has been on a timer since then.

 

[Sparky555]

I run a Broan S130 to vent my crawl space 24/7/365. I'm on the second one. The first one died safely. I forget when I started venting the crawl space, but a good guess would be over two years ago.