It's true... Here's what happened....

A buddy and I were changing the brake lines on my Civic... some brake fluid spilled in different places--mostly the floor, but also the inner fender liner (side closest to the motor), and the back of the LF caliper. I didn't think much of it, seeing that the fluid didn't contact the pads or the rotors at all...

... well...

it did...

I went for a spin, everything checked out OK. I went on the freeway, got off the freeway, and the left-front part of the car started smoking and was soon enveloped by a huge cloud of smoke. A block later, I stopped to see what was going on... lo and behold...

FIRE! 5" flames lickin' out from both sides of the wheel!

Well that sucked. I blew it out, it came back. Sparkletts to the rescue, and that solved the fire issue... it still smoked for the next 5 minutes... but the damage had already been done!

The pads are now charred, blackened if you will. Similarly, the rotors are spotted, and the plating (these were the Brembo/PowerStop slotted rotors) was flaking off. The car pulled heavily to the right now under heavy braking that day, but now, 2 days later, it seems to be somewhat OK. Do I still need to replace the pads/rotors? Maybe even the caliper??

 

Well, I can't say that I've ever had that happen to me, but damn that must've looked cool

 

I doubt the fluid caught on fire. I would take a good hard look at the pads to make sure they aren't dragging. Jack up the frontend and try turning the wheels (out of gear of course). It should be relatively easy.

Warren

 

I had a leak where the brake line attaches to the caliper and got fluid all over the pads an rotor. I raced someone with it like that (I was unaware of the leak) and all that happened when I tried to slow fast was the effects of brakes over heating but no fire.

A friend of mine pushed his brakes to the max. Stopping hard he set his pads on fire and his rotors were glowing, red hot. Fire went out fairly quick and things were ok.