Fire extinguisher

[david nelson]

I am planning on doing a hill climb in France next year and it requires a fire extinguisher larger than 2KG. I have a 4L FIA approved Spa plumbed in system I can put in the car. The date of manufacturer of the bottle was 2000. The bottle should weigh 5.2kg mine weighs 5.3kg and the gauge is fully in the green. I have looked at the MSA blue book and can only find this: There is no MSA requirement for servicing, though we recommend you follow the manufacturer's advice. The fia on maintenance : 5. MAINTENANCE The manufacturer must provide specific recommendations with the system for its installation and maintenance. The competitor is responsible for complying with the maintenance of his system. The recommended servicing schedule is as follows: Extinguishers should be serviced every 2 years, either by the manufacturer or his agent as follows: • Bottles should be examined for signs of corrosion, abrasion and paint finish. Should the service engineer decide that the bottle has been subject to corrosion or exhibits abrasions that may affect performance, the bottle should be discarded. • The bottle should be pressure tested to at least one and a half times its working pressure. Extinguishers with poor paint finish should be refurbished. The interior of the bottle must also be inspected for signs of damage or corrosion. • All seals should be replaced. • The operating head should be cleaned and tested. If found to be faulty it should be either repaired or replaced. • Nozzles should be checked for damage/possible blockage. They should be tested to ensure that they are in good working order. • Extinguisher contents should be replaced. • Service records including the bottle label should be updated, indicating the date on which the service was undertaken, the work carried out and the date on which the next service is due. It is recommended that an approval label from the ASN of the country concerned be fitted at the point of manufacture or service in order to help the competitors to select approved products and the scrutineers to identify them. Has anyone got any exprance with fire extinguishers and scrutineering? do you think the bottle needs servicing or not? thanks David

[Drumster]

David,

 

I can't help on the scrutineering front but I have just been in discussion with Lifeline about getting my 2008 hand-held AFFF extinguisher serviced and was advised that it would probably be OK (as weight and pressure was fine like yours) and probably be a bit 'smelly' when let off. However, they would not service it as it was way past their 2 year limit (although they seemed prepared to extend this considerably and I was outside of this too), their main concern was that the insides start to corrode and potentially run the risk of blocking the nozzle.

 

Therefore I'll be buying a new one and make sure I get it serviced regularly.

[jchasey]

From my experience scrutineers will only check that the extinguisher is in the green, plus possibly that the cable is not stuck, there is no check of dates.

 

This is based on 4 years of circuit racing...I also seem to remember a thread on this subject on another forum, but can't remember where I'm afraid.

 

John

[Matthew Willoughby]

As Chris says, to race in Europe your extinguisher has to be in date i.e. serviced less than 2 years ago. Mine had to be done before going to Spa. I don't know if this is the same for hillclimbs but it may well be. At Spa the only two things that were checked by the scrutineer were rain lights and extinguisher dates.