Late sixties we were deep into VW Bugs which were very cheap used, we made mud buggies and ended up with many blown engines

Then we started racing them in the Midwest, formal mud events, camping at most

Inevitably some fool would light off a magnesium VW engine, which burned like the Sun and impossible to put out

Many fun events were ruined, poisonous fume, thick smoke, water or mud would not put it out, extinguishers were useless.

All went somewhere far away asap

I see on YT that some never learn

Magnesium fire vw block burning





Quote Originally Posted by John Layton View Post
One warm summer night when I was 12 me and my best buddy wrapped a 10ft. length of magnesium ribbon around the big maple tree in the center of the local elementary school yard and lit one end...shined like the sun and boy did it ever attract attention!