my god.. lady biodiesel why ...

Thanks again everyone or your kind thoughts.
The investigators were here yesterday
and i answered all thier questions honestly.
I can only hope for the best.

I, for one, was heartsick to hear about this.

I recently had a cousin that went through the same thing. Their entire apartment complex caught fire and burned. I also grew up in an area where an arsonist burned several homes to the ground, two he even burned twice.

It's extremely heart-wrenching to watch a home burn, especially when it's your own or those you know.

You guy's, it's the most sickening feeling in the world to watch a house burn that wasn't supposed to be burning. When I was 14 I watched it over and over as the arsonist burned homes. I once saw a fireball shoot 500 feet into the air when a house exploded. It will alway's stay with me. I feel for you OB1 and wish you the best.

In that interest, I contacted OB1 and with his permission, I've put together a page where people can donate to help him out.

I made a PayPal Donate button that links directly to his PayPal account so I'm not involved in any way.

If you'd like, you can now donate to his recovery efforts by visiting the link below.
http://www.utahbiodieselsupply.com/fredshouse.php

I don't have any affiliation with OB1 other than here at the forum. I also will receive nothing of these donations, as they're going right to his account. I simply can feel for him and wanted to help him out. I've already donated to him and would encourage others to donate if they're able and feel so moved upon.

May God be with you Fred and here's to a speedy recovery!

-Graydon

Fred,
I sent some money your way. I hope it will help out in your time of need. If you need anything else PM or email me.

Ian

thank you all for your generosity and
especially your moral support..
This is a great community!!

OB1,

I'm a little late into the topic, but glad to hear you still have a roof over your head. I lost my home to fire during the great blackout of 2003- candle (which I had blown out somehow the embers started up again).

Having gone through this, I know it's a really emotional time and hopefully your family, friends, and community are supporting you. I'm glad to see you hired a claims adjuster- that's very important. Take lots of pictures of the damage, and yes- cooking accident.

Look on the bright side, in a year you could have a new second building which you may custom design for you projects!

Best of luck.

Ryan

John ,
I find it amazing that even in times like these you find it possible to look at the feelings of others . Sometimes a little compassion can go a long way to making lasting friendships . But the opposite is also true . I would hope that if there is nothing nice to be said that one would just not post to a thread such as this one . As for it being the equal to a shed or out building , I have alot of very expensive items in my out buildings that would render me unable to do a variety of tasks that help support my family . This may also be the case in question here , but you just want to act as if the man has just lost a little tin shack . No one here knows for sure what his situation might be , but in any case it is a horrible tragedy that was caused by a mistake . The exact same mistake has been repeated over and over by others in normal kitchens all over the world . Not many people I know wear a firesuit and carry a fire extinguisher to cook french fries , and that is truely the most equal task to what was being done when the accitdent happened . Please do not take this response as an oppourtunity to turn this thread into another sensless argument . This is an important topic that needs to be left as it is for others to be able to learn from this tragic experience .
Shannon

Shannon

I too was in the compassion mode when I first heard about this through Greydon and his help page. It is indeed tragic when one looses a home.
However my compassion was tempered when I read that is was not the principal residence and to a lesser extend when I saw how it happened.
I spent way too much of my time in New Orleans and South Florida last fall and I guess my compassion index does not cover this kind of event anymore.
I feel for OB1, and I hope for the best outcome with the insurance adjusters.

Hi John and Kent

Have a look here.

This was OB1's 'outbuilding'. I'd be pretty cut up about losing a place like that.

I know it would be worse if it was your only home, but hey, this is still pretty heavy bad news.

More upsetting for him and his family is the realisation how easily it could have been a lot worse. Only a few minutes ago, I heard on the local news about a guy not far from me who just died in a chip-pan fire.

The good thing is OB1 is OK and we are all more aware about what can happen if you drop your guard.

Here's some advice about chip pan fires

OB1,

Terribly sorry to hear about this. I just finished setting up a new heating, settling & filtration system and thought about how dangerous all this oil could be. Hopefully this will help others, including myslef, be more careful. Glad you and your family are OK, and I hope the insurance situation works out OK>

quote:

Originally posted by john galt:
...This is not much different from someone loosing an outbuilding or shed. Bothersome yes, but hardly tragic as some would like to believe. Besides the 'accident' was entirely do to inattention to safety, not forces beyond someone's control.

John, you're a prick.

Hello jake
You seem to have impeccable judgment of human character.

John Galt, you never cease to amaze me in you ability to be a total jackazz.

God as my witness, if you and I were toe to toe right now, I'd punch you squarly in the nose.

If ever there was an example of "if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all" this would be one of those times.

You are a jerk and I wish they'd kick your sorry azz off this forum. I for one would not miss you a bit.

Wayne

quote:

Originally posted by john galt:
Wayne Thomas the dude who brews biodiesel in his basement. Another accident waiting for an opportunity to happen. Your 'credibility' speaks for itself. Are you vying for this years Darwin Award?

Once again you manage to take a very meaningful and tragic topic and turn it into a "flamefest". Why is it you take someone's misery and make a mockery of it. Are you so hard up for attention that you have to use these forums to play ME ME ME. I hope you NEVER have to go through anything similar and that you are accident free in your biodiesel endeavors. As for credibility, YOU need to take a long hard look in the mirror Sir.

Ian

Back to your original inquiry OBI. The devil or angel will be in one of 2 places only, perhaps a bit of both.

Firstly the insurance contract itself "the fine print" yes you gotta read it.

Secondly you're a Canook right? You will have a piece of probably Federal Legislation called "The insurance Contracts Act" or some such. And for that you will need a lawyer.... or student doing Commercial Law this semester/term...

This may well turn on the definitions of cooking or fuel making. Forget not that the Insurance company advice on why it does not fit into a compensable situation IS NOT TO BE TRUSTED.

They know that they save money by knocking back any claim they can becaus most people accept it without a fight. Their only purpose is to make money by taking in premiums and paying out the least amount of claims.

Remember the cause of the loss is spilt cooking oil... not necessarily styled as fuel making....

Bushpig
thanks I am in the U.S.
These are my fears.
The original Intent of this post was for me to gather any advise on dealing with big claims
and insurance companies .Not for it to turn into a flamefest(no pun intended)..
.
With that said
.
All. Don't be hard on galt.Everyone has a right to thier own heartless opinions.
John here is a pic of my shed/outbuilding.
Six bedrooms ,full bath ,kitchen, garage.

Anyone want to buy a used processor?

Wow!!!
That's just amazing!! It really did "take the whole building"...

If you look close though, that processor still is fairly intact.

Just goes to show why I like the Water Heater style over the plastic tank ones. In fact, I'm bettin' that thing'll still hold pressure.

OB1, that's just amazing to see the pictures.
I hope everything works out for you.
-Graydon

Hiya ObI

So sorry to hear about all your hard work being burned to the ground, not to mention the building that contained it. As others have mentioned, sometimes good things can come from a loss, and I hope that will be true for you. It was for me.

In my early days of bio-alchemy, I followed Josh Tickell’s method of making mini-batches in a blender. In fact, this is how I used to mix my methanol and lye. I got impatient one day with the slowness of the lye dissolving, and cranked the sucker up to the highest speed. Now, even non-reactive materials get kind of warm when you do this. To be sure of a good blend, I let the mix whiz around for quite awhile. Little did I know that the mixture was warming up furiously. The next thing I knew , the whole thing was on fire.

“Oh ****, oh ****…” thinks I ..my worst nightmares coming true, imagining the 250 gallons of raw fat sitting outside my impromptu lab. As I picked up the, by now, blazing blender, I inadvertently tipped out its contents onto my bench. The flames now leapt to the methoxide mixture which had leaked out of the incendiary mixer during my disastrous blending.

My heart pounding like a steam-hammer, I picked up the remains of the blender, en route to chucking it out the door. Luckily I live in the Great White North, and the outdoors was a step away. I hurled the offending object outside, only to turn around to find that some of the blazing mix had ended up in my bucket of KOH, which I had been experimenting with. It now had an interesting dark blue flame, quickly eating through the plastic bucket that contained it. So out that went into the awaiting snowbanks. That left the blazing bench, which I mercifully smothered by a blanked that I had used as insulation on one of my earlier experiments.

What probably only took seconds, seemed like an eternity, all the while conjuring up a vivid picture of the news headlines in screaming 60 point print proclaiming my utter stupidity. Not to mention the rest of our quaint village of heritage wooden houses, located next to each other cheek-by jowl, going up in smoke.

So did I learn anything from this horrifying experience? I would like to think so. No more blender mini-batches…in fact no more blender, period. Safety, safety, safety. Developing a system of mixing that keeps me away from these nasty chemicals as much as possible. And ‘slow’ being the operative word. A close call, and a wake-up call, too.

Richard

Thanks Graydon.
and again thanks for all your help.
I would imagine the tank is still fine
But i would think the insulation is gone.

But the electricity is still connected

It sure looks a lovely setting. Except for the snow!.
The main geographical feature of Paradise as far as the eye can see is Flat. The highest and lowest spot in Paradise (Both Man made) have a difference in elevation of around 10 metres.
A 1 speed Pushbike works fine here in Paradise.