SaferProducts incident

Failure type

Fire / ignition

Incident narrative

SaferProducts.gov consumer incident report 20211210-2BCC4-3519963. Severity: Incident, No Injury. Product: John Deere S160 (John Deere 48", riding lawn mower (with bag catcher) Model S160 Date manufactured: 2021). Incident: A few months ago, the emergency brake broke on the mower and one of the drive belts underneath also broke, but on a different date. The manufactured covered the cost of both repairs. However, they charged the consumer for a pick-up and a delivery fee, to do one of the repairs. 11/7/2021: The mower caught fire during use. The consumer was using the mower�s bagger and had just attached a brand new manufacturer�s bagger to pick up leaves. The way the engine is designed is unsafe, because the muffler and the hot engine are approximately 6� off the ground. This can cause leaves to back up in the front of the mower. Smoke began emitting from the front of the mower�s tire, while the consumer was on it. She quickly tried to remove the leaves to extinguish the fire. However, within that time, the mower�s tires and it�s plastic frame, went up in flames. The consumer said that this occurred within 60 seconds of the smoke starting. The consumer called the fire department and started getting buckets of water to throw on the fire. She used 2 fire extinguishers and threw baking soda on the flames, until the fire department arrived. When they came, they extinguished the fire with cannisters. A ground area of approximately 10� � 15� around the mower was burned. The consumer said that the flames rose to approximately 5� in height. She was extra concerned, because she had just put 2 gallons of gas in the mower. 11/2021: The consumer contacted her insurance company and they reimbursed her for the cost of the mower and bagger, minus the consumer�s deductible. The insurance company rep. told her