I thought the wisdom was to go in through the license plate door, so as not
to admit all the extra air to the fire, and expose the interior to the fire?

I would also propose using short bursts of the extinguisher to keep as much
in reserve as possible.  I had a 71 bus catch fire due to fuel line coming
off carb.  I was driving down a mtn when the engine stalled.  I was trying
to restart it while coasting, thus pumping more fuel out, when a passing
driver alerted us to the fire.  'Course the 71 has the big easy to open
door in the back and is sealed to prevent much air from coming in from
below.  Gave it a quick burst with the extinguisher, sweeping across the
engine bay.  When the powder and smoke cleared, saw where the fire was
burning, gave that a burst, it was out.  It flared back up, gave that a
squirt.  I was then left with a few smouldering wires/tubes which I patted
out with a rag.  I was using a typical 1A 10BC extinguisher as was widely
available in the 80's for $15.  It was not empty when it was over.  As
someone else noted the pressure slowly leaked out over the next weeks.  I
found that on that extinguisher you could actually unscrew the valve off of
it and shake out the rest of the powder on the nearest burning item, if you
wanted to.

After we calmed down and fixed the fuel leak, we tried to start it.  A
quick sputter then no spark.  The powder had gotten into the distributor
and insulated the points.  As it was rated for electrical fires, that was
what it was supposed to do.  A quick filing/cleaning of the points, and we
were on our way.  Keep that in mind for your after the fire recovery
scenario.  I bet that powder would cause havoc if it got in your AFM or ISV!

Edward

At 02:38 AM 12/21/2003, you wrote:
>I'm thinking the best drill would be: 1) Grab the extinguisher 2)pull the
>rear pad and lid out of there 3) foam the engine down till you can see the
>leak  4)concentrate the foam on the hot parts it's dripping on and 5) hope
>your extinguisher is big enough to do the job.