[sinanju]

“I have heard of it before— quite a lot, actually. Major cause is dust build up in the fan. Causes the motor to overheat.”

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I mean, it might make sense to have one that runs continuously as many bathrooms seem to stay continuously humid, but isn’t there someway to secure the power to one that is malfunctioning. I recall from basic Damage Control and Firefighting from the Nav that rule number one in an electrical fire is to turn off the power.

[hoosierham]

I had a ceiling mount ac/heater combo short-out from water dripping after it iced up in hot weather;turning off the remote thermostat /mode control didn't shut off the power.The circuit breaker had to be thrown by hand as the short or leakage path wasn't enough to trip the breaker;but it was enough to melt the plastic louvers and cause parts to start dropping!

We narrowly avoided losing the building.

[green pastures]

I know what you mean, but some of these fires did not involve continuously running fans.

I’m a little concerned about one of ours right now— the upstairs one has started to periodically make a bad noise when starting up. And I haven’t had a chance to try to vacuum the durn thing out (not easily accessible, it has a light/fan combination.

The downstairs bathroom one, is easier to get to, but my mother has refused to run it for the last several years because of a story of a bathroom fan starting a fire she’d heard on one of the morning “news” shows.

Actually, I’m surprised she even lets us use the clothes dryer... ;-)