SaferProducts incident

Failure type

Overheating

Incident narrative

SaferProducts.gov consumer incident report 20260505-E60A6-2147319748. Severity: Incident, No Injury. Product: Ecowell ETH150 (Ecowell model EHT150 fan heater, white with black trim, globe-shaped upper section on a pedestal, 15 inches tall, 10 inches diameter. Date code 202208, made by Aton Industry Ltd.). Incident: My Ecowell model EHT150 space heater has at least twice spontaneously turned its heating element on with no user input, without showing any 'on' indication, and without activating its fan, leading to it overheating and announcing itself by smell alone. I should have retired the unit after it happened the first time but I thought it was just a fluke. It should be noted that this unit is a replacement sent to me by Ecowell after the first one suffered a melted tip-over switch, for which I filed a separate report at the time. In that case, the heater was being used on concrete and was bumped slightly, leading to it rocking and causing arcing in the tip-over switch. That unit was retired. The new unit was being used on short-pile office carpet under a desk. It has not been turned on in at least a day. It doesn't have any kind of timer function or thermostat. I smelled something burning and started immediately shutting off equipment, starting with the soldering iron on my bench, and as I was hunting for the source of the smell, the heater made a buzzing noise and the display flickered. I unplugged it and used a handheld blower to get airflow through the heater to cool it down to a safe temperature. There were no injuries.