Lesson Learned, Dont Make my Mistakes

[5.4MarkVIII]

Lots of guys here have shops Figured I would pass along a very important PSA.

STORE OLD RAGS PROPERLY

We have a wood shop that I do some hobby work out of and have been painstakingly building a table in my free time for the inlaws, Yesterday my Wife and sister put on a coat of stain, and when we cleaned up we threw the rags in the garbage box. something I have done a million times before, in my wood shop, my garage and even in the home.

I don't store thinners or varsole in there and all my paint and stain is in a metal cabinet, any way this was about 1 in the afternoon when they finished up and we headed out of town. we got back around 9 and I was walking down to the shop to check on the stain see how it looked when the town fire alarm went off and shortly after I saw a guy kicking in the door to my wood shop.


turns out the stain reacted with either the rags or possible some Styrofoam that was in the garbage box and started a fire. we were very lucky that the tenants in behind heard the smoke detector and acted quickly to hit it with a fire extinguisher, didn't get it out but slowed it down enough that the fire department wasn't far behind. nothing but smoke damage and everyone in the attached apartment is fine.


very lucky. so just remember


Any chemical garbage no matter what should be in a metal fire rated container, smoke alarms and fire extinguishers save lives and in this case probably saved the building. don't take for granted something you have always done. you could have just been lucky up until now

[MUSTANGWOP]

WOW, glad no one was injured. This could've ended up so much worse.
Excellent PSA announcement to everyone though.

[Blackmare]

Excellent reminder. Thank you for posting and glad to hear it wasn't worse.

[Black Sheep]

Glad everything , for the most part, is okay.
We make it a practice to place any solvent/ chemical rags outside after use that day. The fear is exactly what happened at your place.

[ZR]

Steel garbage can here and never without the lid.

[Laffs]

Glad it didnt turn out much worse for ya, but good lesson to preach. Perhaps one of these is in your future

https://www.uline.ca/BL_6777/Oily-Waste-Cans?keywords=Oily+Waste+Cans

[Snaketamer]

Same thing happened to a co-worker a few years back. He was reno'ing his house. Installed a hardwood floor and stained it. Left the rags in a pile and they ignited causing smoke and fire damage. Luckily, he was home when it happened. He had to restart the reno...

[92redragtop]

Good reminder. Did this happen to you or a PSA pass-through?

[5.4MarkVIII]

it was me. talking with the father in law (hes the fire chief here) we think it was some sort of reaction with between the Stain and some Styrofoam that was in the box, I'm normally pretty good at letting everything dry up before disposing. I know we had laid the rags out flat on the top (not just balled up) so that they would dry out.

either way very lucky. and yes picked up a metal fire rated garbage pail today.

no one hurt and looks like minor smoke in the apartments worst of it is the wood shop itself. but didn't actually catch onto anything else, just the box I used for garbage. now I've got a whole lot more work ahead of me to try and salvage the Christmas presents I had sitting in there waiting for wrapping. some will defiantly need to be stripped down and re sealed

[92redragtop]

Wow, close call - glad it didn't turn out to be something bigger. One of those things I wouldn't have really thought about at the time.

[RedSN]

Curious as to what kind of stain it was?



....and pics of the table? :shrug:

[5.4MarkVIII]

Stain was a pentreant from Benjamin Moore. Different than what I normally use.

Pics later. Can’t post from my phone for some reason.

[5.4MarkVIII]

still thrashing, running out of time to get it done

15606

15607

need to make the leafs, finish sanding re stain the base and seal everything. lot of work to do in less than two weeks

[RedSN]

Looking good!
Love the table top. Walnut?


...don't have to tell me the number of hours involved in a project like this, LOL.
stupid amount of work, but worth it.

[5.4MarkVIII]

Yes top is walnut.

Base is old barn Beams. Pretty sure it’s Hemlock.
Spend hours squaring them only to have the in-laws say they wanted it painted white.
After a frustrated conversation with my lovely wife about how much time and work I could have saved by just using over the counter wood had I known they wanted it painted white.

We did some samples and they decided to go with a light white stain instead so the grain still shows threw.

Will finish out at 4 x 8. With two 2 foot leaves so the whole family can sit at Christmas.

If I get it done. Lol

[5.4MarkVIII]

so the good news is I was able to get the table done. went into the dining room the day before they had Christmas brunch with a bunch of friends and was big enough that they only needed one of the two extensions to fil all 14 people around it for Christmas diner.

15940


now the maybe not bad news but really annoying.

The Land loard and I had talked and since there was no real damage form the fire, just some minor smoke smell in the wood shop, we were not going to call insurance.


the wood shop needed to be brought up to code anyway and we had already discuced me doing that once i got teh table done. this was gonna include proper insulation. and vapor barier as well as actual drywall and tape so everyting was properly sealed from the ajoinng residential units. My dad and I had already added an extar stud wall between teh wood shop and the rear uning with 2 layers of sound proofing insulation and tape and VB. (this will be why they had no smoke at all back there.


the room above... somer history here, before this place was as wood shop it was our storage unit for mattress that we sell. we stopped using it for that because the guy living above smoked constantly, and were were getting mattreses that smelled like smoke.

I was told to things by guys i know on the firedepartment the night of the fire, one, that there was very little smoke that got into the unit above, "ive had more smoke in my house from burning toast" was what one of them said. second that it was one of the dirtiest places they had ever had to go into, mold and grime everywhere, staled old cigaret smoke. just filty and never cleaned.


so the landloard said, since this was teh last unit that he had not renovated yet and that it desperatly needed it anyway, he wasnt gonna bother insurance.


then the next day the tenent that lives in that unit, CALLED HIS INSURANCE company and complained of smoke smell. yes they guy who has smoked in that appartment since he moved in like 20 years ago, was complaining of a smoke smell

so the clean up complany comes out to inspect, and says GUT IT ALL.

they have now thrown out everything, he is getting all new applainces, new furnature the appartment is gutting and getting all new everything and they made me move our everything of min so they could pull the old crappy drywall off the roof

he is even getting a new kitchen table becasue apparently they could not get teh smoke smell out of his table which is hilarious becasue the table in the picture above was litterly 2 feet from teh buring garbage and was not sealed at the time, gave it a quick clean and now it dosnt smell at all.

frustrates me as the ward is they will be going back on my insurance since we were at fault.

[55 HD]

And that's how it works in the Insurance industry. Your property has caused damage to another property. Everyone has OR should have insurance in place to cover loss & damage. So his Insurance will cover him for his loss and then subrogate the loss to your insurance as deemed his loss was caused by your property's claim..........whether you put in a claim or not for your own coverage.......you did have coverage in place.

Which is a good thing or his Insurance would be suing you. THANK GOD YOU HAD INSURANCE IS ALL I CAN SAY

[5.4MarkVIII]

yeah know that's how it works just seems wrong to have to pay for smoke damage in a place that's been smoked in constantly.

and the comany thats on clean up is a prime example of whats wrong in the insurance indusrty, took a crew of 6 guys 3 days to pull down the drywall from the roof. thats all they did, oh and shared a 24 afterword. wonder how much their bill to the insurance co will be. my dad and I could have done in one day whay 6 guys took 3 to do

[RedSN]

There’s a separate living space above? And there was no proper fire separation?
Sounds to me like you’re lucky nobody is getting charged/fined (landlord).

[5.4MarkVIII]

There’s a separate living space above? And there was no proper fire separation?
Sounds to me like you’re lucky nobody is getting charged/fined (landlord).

Honestly not sure there won’t be. Heard the insurance requested the fire report yesterday which I’m sure is standard practice.

I’ve heard differing opinions.

One the building is so old and major work has not been none to my unit so was to “old code”

Two I’m responsible for the unit I rent and the work being done so I should have made sure it was up to all fire code

And three it’s the landlord that responsible and should have ensured it was up to fire code regardless of what it was used for.


I have talked to the land lord a couple times about doing it proper if nothing more just for the dust and noise I was creating but he never really wanted to address it.

Just a waiting game right now.

[55 HD]

Sounds like you are just a tenant. Hope you were using the rented space as per your rental agreement ON PAPER. And if so, zero worries for you I would think. For the Building owner, I hope he was renting all units out to others as per City or Township zoning. And then on top hope he had the building to the standards of the Ontario Building Code when the units were created. Codes do change in the building construction and material types over the years to improve structure and longevity. But when it comes to FIRE CODES building with tenants in living spaces must be changed & improved to meet the new codes as they change for what is called the safety of the tenant.

Does sound like this could get messy, but hope for you your ducks are in line.

ALL THE BEST