Heat lamp caught on fire!

[wildeflowers]

Can't believe this. I check on the babies just a little while ago and while I was looking for our roo, who's apparently decided to roost in the trees tonight, the heat lamp caught on fire! And not from the bulb. It actually started making weird noises and crackling down in the base, and while I was trying to jiggle the bulb to get it to come back on, the plastic part lit up. Gosh, the smell was awful.

I HATE those stupid heat lamps. They are so cheap and obviously dangerous. I wasn't planning on using one through the winter, but was thinking of using if it got super cold. Guess not.

Watch out, guys, if you have the heat lamps or other electric stuff in your coop. If I hadn't gone out to check, we would have had a fire tonight.

 

[speckledhen]

Always use the ones with a ceramic socket, not the plastic ones. I think that will help prevent what happened to you today. Glad it wasn't worse!

 

[Imp]

I'm glad you were there. Caught it before you had a tragedy.

Imp

 

[welasharon]

Our house burned completely when I was a child from a lamp on some biddies. I am paranoid about electrical things now. We got out with our night clothes only.

 

[LindseyM12]

S-C-A-R-Y!!!!!!!!!!!

Stupid lamps!

 

[silkiechicken]

Quote:
Yeah, that.

The shop lights with plastic heads found at home improvement stores are not meant to be on 24/7 and are usually not rated for more than a 100W bulb.

You need a ceramic or metal heat lamp made for the purpose. You won't find those for 1.99, but the extra 5-8 bucks can save thousands and even your house in the end. Plus, don't rely on clips, they are for temporary lighting situations like the work bench, you'll want to be sure to use the hanger on the lamp that does not come out.

Glad it wasn't worse.

 

[Kat's Silly Chickens]

Wow that is scary... Good thing you were there when it happened.

 

[emvickrey]

Ya'all make me want to go and turn all mine off. I have 1 outside on the chicks and 2 inside on new babies. It gets cold at night and I don't want the little ones outside to get too cold. They don't have all their feathers yet. Oh, I forgot about the grow pen. It has 2 for the little babies in there too. I should turn off the one on the side with the ones that are almost feathred except for their heads. When they get feathers they come out and go in a wire pen. Till processing day that is. They are plugged into a power strip so if they have a problem they should kick the strip off. They are actually on 2 power strips. We have a heavy duty extension cord plugged into a power strip that is plugged into an outside socket. The other end has a power cord plugged into it and the lights are plugged into that. It seems something would kick the power off to them. I hope so anyway. I'll have to check to see if they are ceramic or not. I know 2 of them that are in the house are plastic. I just bought them last week.

 

[Rozzie]

Shudder! This is why I get heat lamps made for farm use OR reptile lamps from pet stores.

I've seen enough electrical malfunctions over the years to be extremely wary. (One house we lived in had a ceiling fan catch fire before we lived there. We had a box fan catch fire - motor overheated. We had a furnace malfunction and catch fire. I had a flourescent tube lamp cacth fire in my "new to me" house this summer. We've been fortunate so far. I "hate" leaving ANYTHING on all night now.)

 

[buildingmyark]

Those things get HOT QUICK! I was setting up a brooder and plugged my heat lamp in. It was sitting on the carpet for less than 10 seconds and left a perfectly circular burn/melt mark on the carpet. Guess a bought lesson is better than a free one.