Who has a home fire extinguisher?

I have a couple of old ones taken from a friend's work who were going to have to get rid of them due to their age, they are stored in the garage though rather than in the house.

We have a fire blanket in the kitchen just in case.

I'm big on fire safety but to be honest extinguishers are very limited in their use. They are there to help you escape if your escape route is compromised, many people are surprised how quickly they run out (seconds). You won't be able to put out a lithium battery with a fire extinguisher. A CO2 extinguisher lasts about 6 seconds and a 9L water one lasts about 13 seconds.

The number one thing is to have a good fire detector and alarm system and test it regularly.

Yes we have one in the kitchen cupboard under the sink. Every time I see it I think "oh yeah, we've got that". Would I remember it in a fire scenario??

Nope, but a fire blanket in the kitchen. Also interlinked smoke alarm which drive me crazy if they go off accidentally, the combined racket seems to literally freeze my brain whist I'm trying to get the bloody things to shut up.

I have 3.  One at the top of the communal stair and two in my kitchen.  Really old tho so even tho they are showing OK I wouldn't want to rely on them

No

After almost 30yrs in fire service, never felt the need.

Smoke and heat detection everywhere in the house though

Good info there airvent, thanks.
We've already got interlinked smoke alarms.

I've got a dry powder extinguisher in the garage, 2 or 2.5KG I think?  Mainly because I'm occasionally using a blow torch or welding in there. The garage is detached and 15 or so yards from the house, so not exactly handy if needed in the house.  I do occasionally think I could do with one in the house.  I've thought about a fire blanket for the kitchen, but aren't they predominantly meant for chip pan fires?  We haven't used a chip pan for about 30 years - does anyone still use an old fashioned chip pan with a basket?

Got interlinked smoke and CO alarms which test themselves monthy (Nest jobbies that were here when I bought the house). A fire extinguisher seems like the kind of thing I'd forget to make sure was still within its service life until I came to use it.

It's not a question asked on home insurance quotes so I'm taking it that they see their benefit as negligible at best.

So no.

I've done the wet tea towel trick at a friends house on a pan fire once though.

Got heat and smoke alarms, I'd like to be alerted to a fire at least so I can get me and the family out.

Me - I bought one, and a fire blanket, when I rented out a property for a few years. And if I am being honest the lack of fire exits/escapes in UK houses freaks me out a bit, only having one door to a property seems to be acceptable which is just nuts. It was not a requirement as a landlord but seemed a cheap measure that could help with a chip pan fire or the like. Now I keep them in my own home in a cupboard near the wood burner.

3 in the house; kitchen, cupboard housing with consumer unit and 1 upstairs. Further 1 in a garden room that has a leccy supply / consumer unit. Fire blanket in kitchen too, although the last time it was needed I used a damp dish towel instead as I didn't want to ruin the nice fire blanket....

I have 3. One at the top of the communal stair and two in my kitchen. Really old tho so even tho they are showing OK I wouldn’t want to rely on them

If it's got a hose, replace the oring where it screws into the valve and check the hose isn't cracked.

If it's dry powder, give it a good shake up and down every six months.

If Co2, weigh it. Make sure you can move the horn up and down but the nut is tight.

Those that have dry powder, have you ever discharged one in a confined area?

I certainly would not want to be in the confines of a house room when you do without a BA set on and you can almost certainly throw out any electrical items in that room due to powder corroding the solder. You'll also be spending the rest of your life clearing up powder.

Nope.
Interestingly, our family home had a serious fire, ooh late 70s... Best thing my mum did was close the door to the bedroom (my little bro's) where the fire was*. If she'd had an extinguisher and opened the door to try to put it out.. dunno, could've been nasty.

* the local newspaper featured it under the title, which I still remember exactly: "Well done Mum say firemen"

We have 2 - A CO2 once and a smaller powder one. The powder once is almost certainly useless as we've had it for 10 years.

I have to have them as a stipulation of insurance for a thatched cottage. One downstairs and one upstairs, along with numerous smoke detectors and wiring certification!.

Yes, although it's in the garage. And a blanket in the kitchen as we use the deep fat fryer a lot.

Have actually used one in anger when a tumble dryer went up in flames a couple of years ago (the little electrical interference suppressor was the cause).

Did have one in the car too, although the plastic handle got snapped off so had to bin it and haven't gotten around to replacing it.

I’m big on fire safety but to be honest extinguishers are very limited in their use. They are there to help you escape if your escape route is compromised, many people are surprised how quickly they run out (seconds). You won’t be able to put out a lithium battery with a fire extinguisher. A CO2 extinguisher lasts about 6 seconds and a 9L water one lasts about 13 seconds.

The advice I was given on an induction once was unless you actually see the fire start, and it's still smaller than the extinguisher when you get back to it, don't bother.

Surely the STW forum solution would be a halon drench system?

I do, fire blanket in the kitchen and extinguisher upstairs. For the cost it seems daft not to?

no, going to order up a fire blanket though as I was actually thinking about this the other day! We have mains, linked smoke & fire alarms and will probably get some more (smart) ones so as to have one in every room.

Surely the STW forum solution would be a halon drench system?

Fire blanket in the kitchen, and a dry powder extinguisher or two in all the cars. Had to use them early on when I started driving and wouldn't ever not have one in the car now. But that's probably another thread.

8 I think. They’re all above sinks/baths or showers. High volume but not particularly mobile though.

Well over 100 years service in the fire brigade in my family. No fire extinguishers owned by any of them. I think I still have a halon one from my dad's last fire brigade car, he's been retired over 30 years so probably only useful for throwing through a window to execute an escape 😂

I only have them as I have aquired them for free over many years.  One medium sized dry powder.  20 years old.  One small dry powder - even older.  One halon - gauge still reads good ( yes I know I know!)

I think I might buy a new one for the top of the stairs

Smoke/heat detectors everywhere

Fire blanket in the kitchen, was used once by my wife previously. Minor oven pan thing I think?

Fire blanket and fire extinguisher in the garage/workshop

I had an electrical fire in the middle of the night just before christmas. Absolutely filled the house with thick black electrical/plastic smoke and popped the breaker in the mere seconds it took for me to leap out of bed and put it out (thanks to the smoke alarms).
The house was extremely difficult to navigate, i could not find my keys or torch despite knowing exactly where they were. I also fell over some baby toys (a walker and a baby bouncer) that had been left out the evening before that I *knew* were there. It was so disorientating. Normally you can see enough to navigate your house with the lights out (from moonlight, street lamps etc) but i could see *nothing*.

It terrified me that if it had spread to my staircase, it would have been impossible for my family to escape. My house is a semi-detached on a hill, therefore it's about an extra meter up as my neighbour's place is at ground level and the ground drops away as it goes under our house. I think you'd kill or seriously injure yourself trying to escape via an upstairs window, let alone trying to drop a baby out.

I reckon having a couple of powder extinguishers that could buy you a few seconds to get down the stairs would be well worth having.

I am also going to get a torch and extra set of keys cut and am looking into emergency lighting that comes on when the power goes off (not really to see with but so you can orient yourself).

Yes, one in the kitchen and one in the car. I think they're powder as that covers the most scenarios

None in the house but two in the van

I've got a powder in the back of the camper and a fire blanket in there. You may say it's pointless but if you come across a crash and the occupants are stuck, it's a comforting thing to have ready.

Fire blanket in the house

In the attached garage, I have a larger powder and a bucket of fire suppression stuff that looks like wood pellets, easy to throw on a flammable liquid or to soak up a leak such as oil. STW took the piss when I got them and said I shouldn't be doing anything that risked fire (what's a garage for if you can't use a soldering iron, charge a battery, use the grinder out front or change a fuel filter?!)

What I would like is a smoke detector in my campervan that links into a house smoke detector for early warning. Last time I looked the wireless ones weren't designed for something battery powered that goes out of range and then back again.

PS I did a fire extinguisher course with the fire brigade and it took about 10 of us to put out a wastepaper basket fire with water extinguishers! Probably more effective to beat the fire out with the base of the extinguisher 🤣

I have a few around, but this thread has prompted me to go and test/check our smoke detectors, plus maybe pick up a couple more.

3 and a fire blanket.

1 is a larger Kiddie make, powder and two are a foam type.

I feel I need them because of my workshop where i sometimes use heat/fire or a blowlamp in making stripping stuff.

I got them after I set fire to the workshop floor paint stripping. A burning bit fell and ignited all the bits lying on the floor and the whole lot caught pretty quick(old oil bases, shellac type of finishes)

I keep one extinguisher in the bottom drawer of the bedside unit as well as a smoke hood.

No fire extinguishers, but I did get an escape (rope) ladder for the top floor when we lived in a 3 storey terrace.

No fire extinguishers but do have a sprinkler system linked to separate water tank (new build in Wales)

Have wondered about ladders upstairs

The house was extremely difficult to navigate, i could not find my keys

I was ideally googling residential fire suppression systems the other day, they didn’t really seem to be a thing which surprised me!

Its my job.
In a (Rich) domestic application, you may have a wet chemical fixed system in the kitchen, covering the cooker Hood/appliances, such as Ansul R102 or Nobel.

Some properties may have HSSD, basically a sniffer system piped back to a laser unit giving early warning.

You can get domestic sprinkler systems but not my field.

Any fixed gaseous suppression system would be bad for the occupants, although designed so the concentration levels on discharge are designed to leave enough oxygen to breathe, you really wouldn't want to be in the risk during a discharge. Also to be effective, you really need a sealed enclosure.
It would also be impractical to flood an entire dwelling. Would need a lot of agent.

We have a fire blanket, smoke and CO detectors.
Upstairs escape plan (not a huge plan in a two bed semi) and external doors kept easy to open from the inside.

Garage, I tend to have a 2kg co2 ready to go if I'm doing any welding or similar.

Five Nest smoke alarms, half a dozen fire extinguishers (most from work when we downsized our building) and a couple of fire blankets.

I keep one extinguisher in the bottom drawer of the bedside unit as well as a smoke hood.

I keep meaning to get some smoke hoods...

One in the kitchen plus a fire blanket and another extinguisher in the car. All salvaged from various properties my old company bought.

Was staying with the out-laws over Chrimbo and was perturbed to see him locking the front door and carefully placing the key in a drawer in the kitchen

Scary, I always make a point of leaving keys in each exit door when we have visitors, although with young kids visiting I check with the in-laws incase anyone gets confused and goes walkabout...

We have dry powder in the kitchen as that's where something is more likely to start. Vague plan of how to get out if the stairs are a no go and all downstairs doors get shut at night.

Actually astonished at how many folk are so dismissive of them. Couldn't happen to you eh?

Those that have dry powder, have you ever discharged one in a confined area?

Yes, it put the fire out and although the taste was a bit minging it did the job fine and nobody died.

zilog6128

because you’ve locked yourself in? Madness, surely!

The keys (and torch) were somewhere I thought would be easily found, turns out it wasn't so easy!

ratherbeintobago
Full Member
Surely the STW forum solution would be a halon drench system?

HiFog watermist is more funner , and more environmentally friendly.

No fire extinguishers in our house, I've done firefighting training but the family haven't, so if there's ever a fire we would get out, shut the doors, call the fire brigade.
Fire detectors throughout the house, and all doors kept closed at night.

Another firefighter here. No extinguishers here either as they are useless on all but the smallest fires. Most important thing is to close all doors at night, have an escape route, key in door to get out and once all that is done and you are out.....insurance.
Boggles my mind the amount of fires I've been at with a gutted house and the occupiers standing outside saying they have no insurance.

Did hear a story, possibly urban myth, about a fire in a data storage facility in the US where since it was electrical a dry powder extinguisher did the job of putting it out but in the process wrecked every other computer in the room with the powder particles.

We've 3 in our place... 1 in kitchen and utility, and 1 in garage..

Having seen my OH panic in her house with a grill pan fire that THANKFULLY I was in her place at the time and put out with a wet tea towel, i went and bought a few for her, and moved them across when we moved...
Watching the little pan fire grown and grow, I genuinely think it would have been a full kitchen fire 3 minutes later .....

I appreciate a dry powder device lasts a few seconds, but I think it would have blasted out the pan fire with ease if she had one..

DrP

Got a couple in the shed, powder and a decent size co2 (since that's where i'm most likely to set something on fire, most recently it was my own head but next time it might be something valuable) and a couple of little ones in the house. Also a powder one in each of the cars, though I really don't want to use those.

I don't really subscribe to "not much point", we had a house fire a few years back that I was able to put out using bed blankets to delay it and then water, but it was touch and go, even a small extinguisher would have made that much safer and easier. Especially since there was live electrical around.

In the workplace, sure, it's "use it only if the fire's tiny or if you need it to escape" but in the home, I don't want all my stuff to go on fire