The day my air ratchet decided to start a fire on a pinewood derby car

I was out in the shop last Saturday, just helping a neighbor with his kid's pinewood derby car. Nothing crazy, just some light sanding and fitting the weights. I grabbed my trusty old air ratchet to tighten the axle nuts and everything was fine for about ten seconds. Then I smell this weird burning plastic, and I look down to see smoke pouring out of the trigger area. Turns out the internal o-ring had split and all the oil was leaking onto the motor housing, which was hot enough to start smoking. I yanked the air line off so fast I nearly knocked over a can of WD40. The whole thing is fried now, and I'm trying to figure out if I should just buy a new one or try to rebuild it. Has anyone ever actually rebuilt one of those little IR air ratchets, or is it a waste of time?

2 comments

2 Comments

kelly.emma1d ago

Honestly, my first thought was "well, at least you didn't torch the kid's car too," because that would have been a whole different level of awkward for the neighbor. Tbh, I tried to rebuild one of those little IR ratchets once because I'm too cheap to buy a new one, and it ended up looking like a small bomb went off inside. Ngl, I spent two hours picking out little bits of rubber and plastic that were melted into every crevice, and when I finally got it back together, it made a noise like a dying cat and then just quit forever. I think those things are basically disposable from the factory, like they're designed to crap out right after the warranty ends. If you can find a cheap replacement on sale, I'd say just toss the old one and save yourself the headache of trying to fix a fire victim.

rivera.jake1d ago

Got any ideas on what actually starts the fire in these things? Is it a battery thing or just cheap plastic getting too hot from use?