Heater Burst Into Flames

[Topfox]

Not my pool, but very early this morning my neighbors UltraTemp electric pool heater burst into flames! Luckily he had his window up and the noise woke him up, and he went to investigate. Also lucky his pool isn’t anywhere near his house.

His unit was probably 4-5 years old. He had a capacitor go bad on it after like the first year of having it, but otherwise no issues. Said yesterday he had switched it from Cooling to Heating mode.

 

[ChrisABS]

Wow! What catastrophic failure!

 

[ajw22]

Said yesterday he had switched it from Cooling to Heating mode.

Heat seems to work. Just needs to be turned down.

 

[swamprat69]

Oil travels throughout the system along with refrigerant under pressure. I have seen compressor winding terminals blow out from a poor/deteriorated connection. The spark from the blowout can ignite the refrigerant oil mixure under the rightt conditions.

 

[JamesW]

That's called Superheat.

 

[Scandela0629]

OMG ... I run my heat pump all the time while I'm not home. VERY scary.

 

[swamprat69]

It's a rare occurrence usually due to a loose compressor winding connection from the factory, defective solderless female connector at the compressor or a combination of those along with high amp draw due to a failing/failed capacitor. That is one of the reasons that I check my AC capacitors, contactors and wiring connections EVERY year for any sign of deterioration, dirt or oxidation.

 

[Topfox]

A couple more photos of the aftermath. Melted everything pretty good.

 

[JoyfulNoise]

Wow. That is scary.

I’m glad my heater is natural gas … it’ll just explode and launch the heat exchanger into low earth orbit …

 

[Mdragger88]

Wow I can smell that picture from my house!
Thank goodness no one was hurt!