Adam LZ is a popular automotive Youtube channel. It has over 2.8 million subscribers. In the channel, Adam chronicles the development of different vehicle projects. Recently, he took his 2017 Ford Mustang GT350 to the track and had a friend drive it around. Sadly, the Mustang caught fire. Of course, being a Youtube channel, there was a camera recording the whole time.

Footage of the on-track incident

In a video posted on May 13th, Adam opens by saying he and a friend named Collette took his Mustang to the track. Then he points to a vehicle behind him that has a cover over it as he explains that an incident happened at the track. Then he plays the footage of what happened. The video is below.

No one was injured

Whenever there is a word that somebody had an incident at a racetrack, the inclination is to think that a vehicle made contact with another one, or maybe a vehicle lost control and hit a barrier somewhere. In this case, none of that actually happened. The Mustang was going through the paces when a fire broke out. Regardless of how the Mustang met its ultimate demise at the track, thankfully, no one was injured.

The cause of the fire

The Mustang was brought back to Adam’s shop. Video shows it being brought under the lights and put up on a rack. When the car is on the rack the camera clearly shows an oil filter gasket that had slid out from its position under the oil filter. The suspicion is that the oil sprayed out from the area the gasket failed and onto hot parts under the hood, like the exhaust of the vehicle. This would have led to the fire’s ignition.

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The track staff was pretty quick to arrive at the smoking Mustang. They used every extinguisher they had available. This gave them enough time to keep the fire contained within the engine bay until the fire department showed up and finally put the blaze completely out. 

Adam claims to have a pretty good working relationship with people at Ford and the dealer that had recently serviced the vehicle. So, he says that he has reached a good resolution with the parties involved. Understandably, he agreed not to discuss the resolution. But, he says he was able to keep the charred Mustang.

The video then changes to a video call with Collette to review the incident. She explains that she found it to be a traumatic memory. Additionally, she felt some responsibility because she happened to be the one driving the Mustang when it caught fire. So, Adam took a moment to emphasize that there was no driver error involved. 

Resurrecting the Mustang

Adam is trying to figure out what he wants to do with his Mustang’s remains. He suggests converting it into a drift car or parting it out. He acknowledges that he first has to determine if the fire compromised the core structure of the vehicle before proceeding with any plans. He finishes the video by encouraging all Mustang GT350 owners to check their oil filters.