Tata Nano On Fire!! Edit: Now Many More!

The Nano, the world's cheapest car, appears to have developed a technical snag. Three cases have been reported of the car developing short circuit near the combination switch in the car's steering column, igniting small fires. The company has called two of them back for repairs.

The company has now decided to carry out pre-delivery audit of the car's electrical circuits and also check out cars that are already with customers. It is not, however, calling these check-ups a "recall". Recalls are done by companies when they detect a snag in a batch of vehicles that could lead to a compromise in safety norms.

"We do not believe that this is generic and we are not considering any recall. However, a pre-emptive check may be carried out on cars that are to be handed over or those that are with customers, purely as a precautionary measure," a spokesman for Tata Motors told TOI from Mumbai.


The problems, that are similar in nature, have been noticed in three cars - one each in Ahmedabad, Lucknow and Delhi. The cars have seen smoke emanate from near the steering column area, even when parked with ignition switched off, following which some of the area around it has melted due to heat.

Source - Zigwheel

This may be caused because of the low quality of wire.
It might mave been high current flowing through a highly resistive wire.

P.S I had a similar experience when i used low quality wires for the LED Lights i had put under the car.It gave a burning smell and almost melted.

Mods kindly change the Topic name to Electrical glitch in Nano's or Electrical problems in nano.
the Current name suggests a nano burned because of a a problem with the car

+ 1

Just three cars out of so many.The reason must be the poor quality wires,parts used without proper inspection in some cars.

Real shades of 2500$ car comes to the light!

+1. Yes, Its due to cheap quality wires & electricals.

am sure its just a start!!!

this was how ever expected, every one was expecting some or the other problem to showup as the car was praised a lot before its launch. and what can we expect from a 1lakh car anyways

Cheap stuff. Has problems. End of story. Vibhor, having second thoughts about those airbags you were talking about? [lol!]

well this seems the starting for Nanos for deliver the real car to come in near future, as cheap pricing isnt always necessary for a good car, cheap quality issues are coming up and hopefully tata rectifies this and we may see better nano like Europa in future.

No recall, Tatas plans checks on 7,500 Nanos

Tata Motors said it may undertake a pre-emptive check on the 7,500-odd Nanos that have been delivered till date, after a faulty
combination switch in the world’s cheapest car resulted in fires in at least three cases across the country.

Three cases of fire in the car had been reported in the past few days in Delhi, Lucknow and Ahmedabad. There were no reports of injury or loss of life in any of the incidents.

The country’s largest manufacturer of cars and trucks by sales, however, said it was not considering a recall of the car for the time being. It said its experts will check all the cars with customers, purely as a precautionary measure. Unlike in the US and European car markets, recall of cars is not mandatory in India, even in cases of technical faults.

“There seems to be some minor problem in the combination switch area. Of the two cars that we have had access to, this caused smoke and localised melting of plastic parts,” said Tata Motors spokesman Debashish Ray, who chose to play down the incidents.

The company, which started delivering the Nano in July, said it was not considering any re-engineering in the car despite the fact that the fires were caused by a common problem in all the cases. The cars were stationary when the fires were reported. Tata Motors has not started to export the car yet. It refused to share the number of Nanos parked at its Pantnagar factory in Uttrakhand and those with dealers.

Sunil Kumar, the owner of the car that caught fire in Delhi, has sought compensation from Tata Motors. Another Nano owner, RH Rizvi in Lucknow, said, “I had parked my car at the parking lot of a shopping complex near my residence. Within moments I was informed by the parking attendant that the car was on fire. There was thick smoke in the cabin and I failed to douse the fire.”

In a similar incident, another Tata Nano caught fire in Ahmedabad last month due to some technical fault in the battery.

Technical experts blame the position of the battery for such incidents. “It’s quite a serious issue as the fuse and the main circuit breaker should have had gone off before the fire. There could be over-rated electrical parts in the car, which led to the fire,” said a former official with the Automotive Research Association of India.

The Nano, which is priced in the range of Rs 1.2 lakh to Rs 1.7 lakh in Delhi (ex showroom), is the cheapest car in the world by a large margin.

Source - Economictimes

Well if one saw the pics of mine during my Nano Test, quite a few things were leading to something of this sort happening, what with the cheapness of the components used. Electrics are still the biggest Bug Bear of Tata's, right from the day they started with the 1st 206 pick-up leading to sierra, estate, sumo, safari, indica & so on...... Have faced atleast 1 electrical problem with all of my Tata Vehicles at some point of time of their ownership.

With that low price tag, this is all can be expected. Especially bearing in mind Tata's reliability, which is yet to see improvement.

The space in nano is so good. Its spacious for for , i mean in the leg room section.

Nano reported loads od electrical failure, Almost all the 20 nanos sold in pondicherry has a electrical problem , majority of it with fuse blown.- A report from a friendly mechy at ASS when i went to leave the vista for service.

Yes Ilango!

Reliability of Nano is really worse.

Its time for TATA to call for a free checkup camp to rectify all the problems in NANO.

I suspect a very "national" recall may be in the offing.
Article in the Rushlane (with a photo)


Safety aspect – Tata Nano catches fire

As rumors on the safety aspects of the new small car Nano from Tata Motors are increasing, a new shocking incident took place at the Eastern Express Highway were a brand new Tata Nano was engulfed in flames as its engine caught fire due to reasons unknown when the owner was taking it home from the showroom.

The car was taken by Mr. Satish Sawant who is an insurance agent for 2.4 Lakhs from a showroom in Prabhadevi. On his way home he was alerted by a bike rider about the fire on the back of the car. He quickly escaped from the car, which in a few minutes was in flames.

Oh my god. Brand new car got fire. How it could happen?