ENGINE FIRE!

Well, back in the days of real metal hub caps, you could pry one off, then gather enough dirt to throw on the fire to get rid of it. But, you have to do this very quickly before it spreads.... But, a fire extinguisher is allot better! The above advice is if you don't already have one!

I'm still puzzled as to why it caught fire, it only ran for 30 seconds tops, so the engine wasn't hot, it wasn't a carb fire, the air cleaner was on it also & the fuel line is steel except for a short rubber piece connected to the fuel filter,which appears to be intact after the fire. The fire appeared to be around the distributor,something ignited years of old crud build up on the engine, it burned all the spark plug wires,distrubutor cap, coil wires,etc. If I'd been out on the road it most likely would have burned to the ground!

Possibly a leaking plug wire or coil wire.

Yep. I had a bad coil wire catch the hood insulation on fire on my car. Good thing I forgot something and had to walk back out to the car to see the smoke coming out from under the hood.

MadDAWG

Once several years ago I was driving through a small town. As I made a very slow curve through a business district I saw a man jump back from his truck. The hood was up and smoke started billowing from under the hood. I hit the brakes and grabbed the dry chemical extinguisher from behind the seat in my truck and ran over and doused the flame for him

All the guy said was... "Thanks.... I guess. Is that going to hurt my engine?" and gave me a funny look. Seems he had been working on the carb and the air filter was off when it burst into flames.

Him. :-)

Whole truck could've burned to the ground had you not stopped the flame. It probably didn't hurt the engine, but even so, one engine is cheaper than the whole truck... well, unless the truck's ready to be retired anyway.

Ya done a good public service. :-)

JS

I've got it running again, it apperars the 3 wires coming from the distributor shorted out & ignighted some oil around it. I replaced the pickup in the distributor,plug wires, coil wires & the fuel line. It started right up afterwards.