This morning at 8.10am police arrive at my door to report my car, parked round the corner, on fire and asking me to attend the scene.

 

Arrived to see our trusty beloved Roomster 1.6 TDI with flames engulfing the engine bay.

 

Police, fire services and insurance company are completely baffled, but I found on the Audi users forum and exact same occurrence with a diesel Audi A6, also unexplained.

 

The car was last driven Saturday 11/1/2015 evening with sub-zero temperatures here in London, after a long drive down from the North. No problems, no fault alerts, not problems with the drive or the car, all working super smoothly.

 

The fire broke out spontaneously in the engine bay at around 7.30am when passers by called the fire service and police.

Passenger cabin and fuel did not catch fire (was even able to recover belongings from the glove compartment, but the engine is entirely burned out and the front of the car is on the ground. Tires suspension all gone.

 

Police asked for CC-TV footage and said that at around 7.15am the alarm goes off, and then shortly after there are flames and smoke.

Waiting for recovery and removal now, after speaking to the insurance.

 

Thinking that before the alarm went off, even a short-circuit would have not been possible if the electrics were off. Could the alarm have made the electrics come on and then there was a short-circuit or would the alarm go off because there was a fire?

I am wondering if some animal might have eaten through wires or some water had got in somewhere and frozen and then with the thawing today triggered some electrical fault.

 

Old car with plenty of millage (160k), so fear there will be very little from the insurance for it. Very sad to see it go....

Edited 13 January, 20251 yr by ReneR

More likely sequence of events is the alarm activating after some sort of electrical fault dropping the battery voltage. The alarm has its own self-contained battery that will operate the sounder if battery voltage is removed while alarm is set. 

Sorry to hear this.

 

In 13 years on here i think i have read of 4 cars that went up and they were Octavias. 

Edited 13 January, 20251 yr by Ootohere

1 hour ago, Warrior193 said:

More likely sequence of events is the alarm activating after some sort of electrical fault dropping the battery voltage. The alarm has its own self-contained battery that will operate the sounder if battery voltage is removed while alarm is set. 

Makes sense, but still wondering why in-car fuses would not have blown if there was a short-circuit. Even the battery had fuses on it.

Any suggestions for a similar type/spec car would obviously be very welcome too, if anyone has any ideas. Only cars that come to mind are Citoen Berlingo or C3 Picasso. Caddy is too pricey 

4 minutes ago, ReneR said:

Makes sense, but still wondering why in-car fuses would not have blown if there was a short-circuit. Even the battery had fuses on it.

There is usually just one wire in the whole car that is completely unfused; the one that connects battery positive to the starter motor. A short to chassis/earth on that could be responsible, but obviously the cable run and insulation is designed with this in mind, so that seems rather unlikely to me.

 

3 hours ago, Breezy_Pete said:

There is usually just one wire in the whole car that is completely unfused; the one that connects battery positive to the starter motor. A short to chassis/earth on that could be responsible, but obviously the cable run and insulation is designed with this in mind, so that seems rather unlikely to me.

 

Thanks for the reply. That helps me understand the situation a little more. Could some kind of rodent chew through the insulation? Or any other parts rub on it and chafe it?

Father-in-law had to have his BMW rewired after rodents chewed through cables in his engine bay a couple of years ago.

I got an interesting reply from the owner of the Audi A6 that had a very similar fire to my Roomster. I am posting it here in case it rings any bells with anyone regarding a similar recall or to act as an alert about a possible issue lurking in VAG engines and cars for others:

 

Quote

In my case I was able to trace back through the cars history and find that UK recall number R/2020/265 applied to my vehicle, from there we worked on this theory that the likely cause of the fire was an electrical short circuit due to water ingress.  This was based on the information we obtained about the specifics of recall R/2020/265, there were more readily available details in other countries where the same Audi recall triggered a response.

    

You mentioned in your post that all the electrics were off, remember that the starter/alternator (and other ancillary circuits) are permanently connected to the battery.  This is what the Audi recall was all about, the fact that moisture in the starter/alternator was able to create a short circuit even when the vehicle was parked and locked. In the US for example owners were told not to park their vehicles in underground carparks until the recall work had been completed.

 

I recommend doing a bit of research, you might perhaps find something that will give a little peace of mind if nothing else.

 

 

To wrap up the story, insurance offered me £2000 for the 2011 TDI 1.6 Roomster SE. Think it is probably fair as I have seen online prices ranging for similar spec Roomsters from £1200 to £4500, but the latter with much lower mileage and, it seems from the photos, well looked after exteriors and interiors.  Considering I bought it reduced from £13.5k to £11k as it was ex-demo, I think I got good usage out of it. RIP little/big Roomy, you'll be missed....

I presume that you make a mistake typing

 

On 13/01/2025 at 13:50, ReneR said:

The car was last driven Saturday 11/1/2015 evening

 

and that the car was not left standing for 10 years.

 

How much were you paying for insurance? If its anything like what others have said the UK prices are they will get back their outlay very quickly through your future increased premiums.

 

It has only cost them maybe £1K net after taking into account what they will get for the salvage and your excess.

Edited 16 January, 20251 yr by J.R.

17 hours ago, J.R. said:

I presume that you make a mistake typing

 

 

and that the car was not left standing for 10 years.

 

How much were you paying for insurance? If its anything like what others have said the UK prices are they will get back their outlay very quickly through your future increased premiums.

 

It has only cost them maybe £1K net after taking into account what they will get for the salvage and your excess.

Sorry, that was a typo! 2025!

You are right. They will get it with interest. My +9 years no claims has come down to 4 and looking at replacement cars, I am looking at a doubling of the £350 I was paying for the Roomster. There was a car with apparently cosmetic damage parked next to it they will also have to pay the other insurance to fix.

 

Replacement cars I am considering at the moment are a new 2.0 TDI Golf Estate and an ex-demonstrator 2023 2.0 TDI Tiguan, both around £25k.

Interesting development with my insurance claim. Seems that my insurance company is looking to claim costs from the manufacturer and have initiated an official dispute. Wonder if their salvage contractor was able to identify the cause. Would be good to know, also in terms of warning other users of cars with potentially similar issues. If they are successful, I would also get the excess back from the insurance. Not a big deal, but would help with the unexpected expenditure resulting from the incident.   

Someone is winding you up I reckon.

9 minutes ago, J.R. said:

Someone is winding you up I reckon.

I called about the excess and whether I was entitled to it and that is what they told me.

Having a bit of fun with you making up a story rather than saying the true "No!"

10 minutes ago, J.R. said:

Having a bit of fun with you making up a story rather than saying the true "No!"

OK, they said they had launched a dispute with a 3rd party and if it was successful I would also get the excess, but as there was no 3rd party involved, I can only assume it was the manufacturer. Unless there was more in the CCTV than the police were able to see at the time of the incident and I have not heard about it. 

On 17/01/2025 at 10:38, ReneR said:

Sorry, that was a typo! 2025!

You are right. They will get it with interest. My +9 years no claims has come down to 4 and looking at replacement cars, I am looking at a doubling of the £350 I was paying for the Roomster. There was a car with apparently cosmetic damage parked next to it they will also have to pay the other insurance to fix.

 

Replacement cars I am considering at the moment are a new 2.0 TDI Golf Estate and an ex-demonstrator 2023 2.0 TDI Tiguan, both around £25k.

Although my Roomster is 2013 and only done 65k I am rather attracted to the Caddy Life. They are either 5 or seven seater. It would have been a good Roomster model replacement.

Third party usually refers to the other person(s) involved in the accident, I have never pondered why, perhaps its "insured" "insurer" and "3rd party"?

 

So did the insurer say that they had initiated a dispute against the manufacturer?

19 minutes ago, J.R. said:

Third party usually refers to the other person(s) involved in the accident, I have never pondered why, perhaps its "insured" "insurer" and "3rd party"?

 

So did the insurer say that they had initiated a dispute against the manufacturer?

No not the manufacturer, but a 3rd party. But there was no other party involved in the incident as far as I am aware. The car had been parked up for a couple of days and then spontaneously combusted at 7.30am where it had been parked.

 

I can see it would hardly be worth their while for such a small settlement, but maybe they have some idea of a specific problem from their data or something. I have no idea. I was surprised when they told me this today.

Edited 20 January, 20251 yr by ReneR

3 hours ago, edbostan said:

Although my Roomster is 2013 and only done 65k I am rather attracted to the Caddy Life. They are either 5 or seven seater. It would have been a good Roomster model replacement.

I was quite into it, also the Citroen Berlingo, but the rest of the family (wife and children) objected because they thought both looked too much like a van. 

Yes I understood there was not a 3rd party, people on the end of a phone probably working from home can spout no end of falsehoods and will usually backtrack when challenged, why dont you ask them who the 3rd party is and whether they have responded, what the deadline is for a decision regarding your excess being refunded?

Edited 20 January, 20251 yr by J.R.

3 minutes ago, J.R. said:

Yes I understood there was not a 3rd party, people on the end of a phone probably working from home can spout no end of falsehoods and will usually backtrack when challenged, why dont you ask them who the 3rd party is and whether they have responded, what the deadline is for a decision regarding your excess being refunded?

Could be, but the initial claim handler put me through to the disputes team about it. They said it may take some time but if the dispute was successful I would get the excess back.

Its implausible that an insurance company would take on a motor manufacturer to make them responsable for a random fire on a 14 year old vehicle bearing their name.

 

You should ask the question and see how they react.

1 minute ago, J.R. said:

Its implausible that an insurance company would take on a motor manufacturer to make them responsable for a random fire on a 14 year old vehicle bearing their name.

 

You should ask the question and see how they react.

The only other thing I can think of is if it has something to do with the other car parked in-front and that suffered some apparently cosmetic damage. Maybe when the CCTV was looked at beyond the actual start of the incident the other car had parked around that time and bumped into mine and triggered the events that unfolded somehow, but cannot really see how. 

I was wondering whether someone had some evidence or information suggesting arson or vandalism.

 

Ask the question!