No, JP4 is much more volatile. My ex was a fuel systems specialist in the Air Force. His main qualification for the job was his size. He was small enough to crawl inside the fuel tanks of B-52s. They had to wear cotton coveralls with bone buttons, rubber booties, caps that covered his hair and NO respirator?!
They couldn’t stay inside the tank for more than 15 minutes at a time, so for big leaks, they ran relays. The reason was longer would cause disorientation.
Actually if gas fumes get under the hood those copper strips are way more dangerous than the exhaust manifold IMHO.
If gas vapor gets between the copper strips and cylinder head it reduces the insulating properties of the air.
The gas vapor will then arc causing a fire.*
The exhaust manifold at idle probably isn’t hot enough to ignite gasoline. Note I said probably. Again IMHO
Either way there is no way in hell I would fuel a running Model A.
*Water vapor will do the same thing. An A must have a pain to keep running in a rain storm.
your car can explode if you don’t.
Cite?
His join date is his cite!
This happened locally just the other day:
Caused about $1 million damage – $100K to the gas station, the rest to the car. That being because the car was a Porsche 918 Spyder hybrid, only a month old and worth about $900K, and was completely totaled in the fire.
Not clear if the engine was actually running, but the gas overflowed and came into contact with hot engine components at the rear of the car.
Video not working for me. Is it just me?
Video won’t play for me either.
Video still works for me – it might be one of those xenophobic/copyright-paranoid sites that limit accessibility outside the country. Anyway, if you Google “Porsche 918 fire” there are lots of hits, some of them with video, though the particular one I linked had some good news coverage in addition to someone’s iPhone video.
Bottom line, one of the local TV celebrities had just bought himself a brand new Porsche 918 Spyder hybrid about a month ago at a cost of around $900,000, and while gassing it up the tank overflowed. It appeared he was trying to squeegee the excess off the car body when some of it apparently got into engine section toward the rear of the car and ignited.
The fool was squeegeeing the overflow towards the rear (where the engine is) and right into the engine cooling intake. :smack:
I was just going to say almost the same thing…I’ve been driving since 1974 and can’t recall ever, ever seeing anyone leave their car running with pumping gas. And I’ve lived in Ohio, Georgia and Colorado, and traveled to many other states…except New Jersey.
So…by that logic you are leaving your car running when you stop at the grocery store and run in to The Home Depot and probably all day long while you are at work…?
I have pumped fuel with the engine running many times. Even with an airplane or three and helicopters. Watch for props & over head blades.
I admit I would not do it on a machine where any overflow would run into an engine compartment with a glowing hot turbo pipe or exhaust manifold.
The trick is to not spill any. Just like hand starting a reciprocating aircraft engine. Do not leave your head or any body parts within the propeller arc.
You do not make that mistake but once. So don’t spill any.
If you are not paying attention to everything around you, hot fueling can be deadly.
Much safer now because smoker numbers are greatly reduced.
Now there a a lot of people I will not to this day let them fuel an airplane I am using. They are not ignorant, they are just stupid.
Of course I do not hot fuel very often but I have done it more than three times.
My Millage Is Just Fine
At this point, we can add TEN YEARS to the numbers in my post and its still valid.
I don’t think it’s a fire risk, but I remove the key and lock the car before walking over to pay the cashier. There a plenty of cases where cars are driven off, or property stolen, while left unattended with the keys in.
When traveling or driving alone you do not carry an extra key on your person which makes locking you car while it is running so you can slip in for a latte??? Boyscout, Boyscout… 
According to the National Fire Protection Association, in the period from 2004 to 2008 there were about 100 vehicle fires caused by backfire from an internal combustion engine, which constituted about 3% of all vehicle fires at gas or service stations. The statistics do not discriminate between fires caused by fueling a vehicle that was running and fires caused by vehicles that were not currently being fueled. Most of the fires were minor: there were only two resulting injuries, and the total property damage for all 100 fires was about $0.1 million (so about $1,000 per fire, roughly). See Table 10 (numbered page 25 and PDF page 36) of the report at Page Not Found.
So, in answer to the original question from 2004, there is a risk of fire when you fuel a vehicle that is left running, although the risk is small and the fires tend to be small and manageable. The NFPA’s first recommendation for vehicle safety at a service station is “Turn off your vehicle’s engine when refueling,” http://www.nfpa.org/safety-information/for-consumers/vehicles/service-station-safety, although the report shows that the biggest risk is electrical arcing. (You should discharge yourself by touching your metal car before refueling.)