Fire

March 2nd my new house that had been under construction for almost a year burned down. I was cleared by the insurance company on Monday to begin clean up. I believe their investigation points to stain rags the contractor improperly disposed of. I had a 9x14 foot gun vault poured in the basement with 10" walls and a six inch cap. The mistake I made was having duct work in to the vault. When I got the door open I couldn't believe how much smoke damage there was. Thankfully we hadn't moved in yet so no firearms were damaged. If you are considering building a vault ,have no penetration's! My next one will only have a floor drain and electrical conduit through floor.

Thanks for posting this may help someone in the future.

I work a lot of fires and flood claims and vault rooms are tough. You do need to be able to dry it out but yes smoke in the duct work goes everywhere (especially if the HVAC is circulating during the event. I had a good friend down at Rockport that lost around 100 long guns to sea water. He had the nicest fire safes he could afford but of course they weren't flood proof. In hindsight, duct tape would have probably saved them.

Ive only had one of the spontaneous combustion claims from staining rags but the engineers all promise me it is a real thing. Mine was at a big Catholic School that they hadn't moved into yet thank goodness.

man that is a heart breaker BUT........I have to ask why it has taken a year at this point. I have built more than a few houses in my day but NONE has taken more than 6 months from start to finish. I sure hope you can begin again from the original foundation

You need to add a smoke damper to your duct work.
Closes when the smoke alarm triggers.
Seals the majority of the duct up.

White. I couldn't agree more! I had to spend most of last year working in Puerto Rico so I only made it back about every six weeks. And I most definitely picked the wrong contractor! I have spent the last two days hoe ramming the poured walls down. Not even the concrete was salvageable. The tops of the walls spalled off. I will rebuild but it may be awhile.

That is terrible cablejohn. I am glad no one was hurt. Was the rags your error or the contractors?

Contractor which should help me.

Yup. Hopefully the contractor mans up and builds it right

I never would have considered this. I'm in facilities/construction for commercial buildings. I don't do design but I see a lot of designs. duct mounted smoke detectors that trip shunt-trip breakers to kill exhaust and supply fans in the event of a fire is real common. And, ductwork that passes through a fire rated wall always has a spring loaded fire damper with a fusable link that melts when the temp reaches a certain point, often 165º.

If smoke is the issue, the fusable link won't ever melt, you'd need heat for that. But shutting down the fan when smoke was detected might help.

Once the floors fell in the duct work went with them leaving the openings. There were pvc conduits that ignited from the flames coming through. This was definitely a lesson on vault building. I had a Smith's vault door. I will say that I was impressed with how it held up. It was no longer usable but I needed a torch to get in.

I've heard that same tale many times !

I sure hope you find a better contractor for the next attempt.

Hey, I think Lugnut is in your neck of the woods.........oh but you need someone reputable !

I am sorry to hear about your loss. I can understand a house taking over 1 year to build. My dad was a contractor so that part totally makes sense.

That's bad when you can't reuse the concrete.

Thanks for the replies! It is a major set back but I will get through it. My wife is taking it hard so I'm trying to stay positive for her. There were a lot of lessons learned on this one! No one got hurt and we don't have the plague yet so all is good!