Check out these pictures of the inside of my 05 coupe when it caught on fire while I was at a gas station going to Myrtle Beach, SC. As you can see the electric seat was the cause. Lets see what Infiniti will do. Has anyone else had this problem?

 

Was the seat heater turned on at the time? Might sound like a stupid question since you're in SC in July, but I gotta ask.

 

That's disgusting.

I think you'll get a fair settlement. Afterall, seeing the location where the fire started is pretty disturbing. If you had been sitting in the seat, seatbelt on, would you have been able to release the seatbelt button without injury? You are extremely lucky you were not in the car at the time. Yet, having this happen at a gas station would have been it's own trauma as well.

Those remaining few with the ever-rare cloth upholstery are secretly rejoicing right now. Whatever makes them feel better.

And the seat-heater question is entirely valid, IMO, as the buttons are so poorly located/designed that they're easy to accidentally turn on.

 

ouch

 

Umm. That's not cloth. That's ash. 05+ never had a cloth option.

 

What did insurance company say? Whoe do you have it insured with?

 

Oh ****! Missed that it was an '05... ...and just noticed fuzzy seats. Disgusting, indeed!

What's funny is that I have Stone and didn't even recognize it.

 

Odds are this is going to be an extremely rare thing, but as asked above, was the heater on at the time?

 

Not if it's related but the 03's and possibly later models had a TSB for the heated seat buttons. I wonder if this is related. I would hope not (They had a couple years to fix), but what if Nissan kept using the faulty switches because it was cheaper then fixing it at the factory? LAW SUIT city! Damn glad you're ok man!

 

Sorry to see that damage, NCSU.....g/l with the repair/replacement.

Welcome to G35Driver, btw.....
C.

 

"As you can see the electric seat was the cause."

Ummm....No, I can't really see that. For all I know you dropped a cigarette down the side.

But anyway, what ever caused it......that sucks!

Sorry.

 

Wow, thats awful. I can't really tell what started it, but man, what a mess

 

No, I didnt have the heated seats on and no I never let anyone smoke in my car...Ive had the car for 8 months and still smells brand new, but not anymore. A guy at the gas station was from an insurance company and was looking at it for awhile. He told me that he has seen this before and that electric seats are a hot spot for electrical fires. You could smell the fire was caused by a electrical malfunction. Currently my car got towed back to the Infiniti dealership in Raleigh, NC and Allstate is not letting Infiniti touch it until they send an agent this week. Ill keep you updated.

 

Hmmm couple questions / comments ...

1) That's not cloth, it's leather. And that's not ash, it's the chemicals from the fire extinguisher ...

2) Looks like this was put out pretty quickly, as the heat damage did not spread to the passenger side (notice there is no damage to the sun visor where yours is cooked), in fact your hand-break isn't even damaged.

3) The fire was burning pretty hot (but not excessively so) in a very centralized spot ... and didn't have a chance to spread. The fact that it is not a high temp fire comes from the fact that the plastics covering the courtesy lights melted in a long string ... and didn't shatter or burn. Thermoset plastics would have burnt if the temp was high enough.

4) I'm just guessing, but I would suspect a short in the wires BELOW your seat, near the heating duct to the passenger side. If you look, the heat started to come up from there, as the side of your seat is burnt. And then spread along the path of the car carpeting/rug torwards the front of the car (as there is carpeting that runs vertically up the transmission "hump" and meets the center console). That short could have been caused by many things, but most likely, the wires got crushed by the seat when moving it back/forth.

I suspect you probably had 2 drivers using the car - one woman and one man. The action of moving the seat back and forth crimped a wire that shorted and caused a fire in your car.

Just another reason why you shouldn't let your women DRIVE YOUR G!!!

 

holy crap. glad youre okay tho. hope everything works out for yah