Thought I would give an update. My garage is back together. My insurance company was the saving grace thru this whole thing. I use Amica for everything except my businesses and classic cars (they don’t write policies for them). The one corvette in the garage was heavily smoke damage, but no heat or fire damage. JC Taylor was ok to deal with on the classic car. My only complaint is they sub the coverage to farmers which was a little difficult to deal with. In the end the vette was completely gone thru and returned to better condition.
My insurance company hired an inventory company to inventory every item in my garage. Tools alone came out to 90k. If I inventoried my tools regularly that number would be a lot higher. I think a lot of models were recorded wrong or just guessed on. I didn’t push the issue with the insurance company. Although they deemed everything in the garage a loss, I was allowed to keep what I wanted. I held on to the sentimental stuff, but everything else had to go.
I estimate the fire to have been going for 8-10mins or under. Basically my garage was being fishbowled. All the caustic smoke was entering my tool boxes, cabinets, and eventually my house. The chemicals in the smoke caused everything metal to instantly rust and start pitting. Snap On rusted just as quick and bad as Husky and Craftsman. The only chrome that didn’t pit or rust was SK.
All my electronic stuff was toast. All the wiring and circuit boards corroded instantly. I couldn’t save anything with a cord or battery. My welder, battery chargers, and diagnostic equipment was all destroyed. Worst of all, I am a contractor and all my tools were in the garage. I lost about a month of work because my stuff was destroyed. Amica gave me money the day after the fire to replace my work stuff, but I had to order a lot which took time.
The garage was a total gut and rebuild. Oddly I still catch a whiff of smoke on humid days. I am thankful to have this mostly behind me. The fire happened last July 31 so this July was 1 year. My claim and payments were handled very fast. Again, Amica made this whole thing bearable. Besides my families wellbeing, Amica’s only concern was returning my property and possessions back to pre fire condition.
The hardest part was the days following the fire. I was not allowed in my garage. I couldn’t touch anything, clean anything, or look at anything for almost 2 weeks. The fire was caused by a brand new piece of equipment I had in the garage. The company that sold it to me installed some options incorrectly. Basically an unfused wire sat arcing against the battery post eventually causing the fire. Yeah I hired a forensic fire examiner....2 of them.
