SaferProducts incident

Failure type

Fire / ignition

Incident narrative

SaferProducts.gov consumer incident report 20240607-1747B-2147338751. Severity: Incident, No Injury. Product: John Deee S170 (John Deere S170 Lawn tractor). Incident: We purchased a S170 John Deere Lawn tractor from Lowes on 9-1-23. We mowed a few times before winter. Come this spring, 2024, we mowed 2 more times. The second time we mowed the tractor went up in flames, while mowing, about 20 minutes into it. It had 7 hours on it. It caught the lawn on fire as well as across the streets empty lot on fire so we had to call the fire dept to put it out. My husband was lucky to have been able to get off of it before his clothing caught fire. We paid 3,199.00 for it and still paying on it for another 18 months. Lowes said to call John Deere. Called John Deere, sent them the pics, described what happed and we just received a letter back from them (dated May 13, 2024) stating they didnt find any part to be defective on material or workmanship based on the extensive damage of the lawn tractor! Based on the reviews on this specific mower, we are the 5th consumer that purchased this mower and it has caught fire and all is lost- these reviews are just from the last 2 years. Those reviews are only from Lowes reviews so Im sure there are more. This is insane to spend this kind of money, it only have 7 hours on it and it burst into flames. SOMETHING is DEFINITELY DEFECTIVE! If my husband caught on fire, he could have died! John Deere will not reimburse us! Our other mower we had over 10 years never did this! (But it wasnt a John Deere). John Deere told us to report it to our insurance carrier! This mower should not even be on the market to sell anymore with all the bad reviews describing the same exact thing! Someone is going to die from this one day.