Can a car’s fog lights catch fire, as Minister Camila Vallejo said?

A hit “scandal” has generated among certain parliamentarians the renewal of certain government vehicles, among them, a model which belongs to the Ministry General Secretariat of the Government (MSGG).

The subject arose from a note in the La Segunda newspaper where it was indicated that the Minister Camila Vallejo requested a change of car 2024 budget.

This information led parliamentarians such as Andrés Celis (IA) They will show their annoyance at the expenses that will be incurred. Given this, Vallejo herself responded on her Twitter account that it is not a whim, but rather a need for a vehicle that adds a series of problems.

In the tweet, the government spokesperson commented: “Friends of @lasegunda and @Cooperativa, I understand the concern about having “the data” only that they did not mention this. The car has serious defects that have resulted in million dollar repair costs and yet it continues to stop in the middle of the road!! 😬 and even the fog lights catch fire 😒 . For safety reasons, this car must be written off if it has been in service for 10 years and “I have my life ahead of me, it’s him or me.”

The vehicle that can be seen in the video is a Hyundai Azera of the year 2012 graphite gray with a 3.0 liter engine and automatic transmission, a model attributed to the Undersecretary General of the Government, Nicole Cardoch but these days it has served to mobilize Camila Vallejo because her assigned ministerial vehicle (a 2016 Hyundai Azera) is in the workshop.

As the MSGG told us, The Hyundai Azera HG 2012 already has a long journey with almost 350 thousand kilometers it worked in three administrations and repair costs in recent times amount to approximately 30 million pesos to which is added that it spends many days in maintenance, in fact, over the last two years, it has passed through the workshop a dozen times.

It is for this reason that it was decided to renew the vehicle, which may be a common theme among a large part of motorists. National Automobile Association of Chile (ANAC) They commented that replacement “in passenger vehicles and SUVs is on average 3 years and in commercial vehicles 4 years. “A lot of it depends on the financing conditions. »

What is striking in the video shared by Minister Vallejo is the fire that can be seen in the headlight area, he specifically commented, in the fog lights.

To find out if this is a common theme, Cristina Catalán, founder of the AMC Performance mechanical workshop , clarified that “this can happen for several reasons. There are times when cars arrive without fog lights and people install them with poor quality cables which generates an electrical fault which over time melts the connectors until they catch fire. “It’s a common failure.”

“Another cause that can cause this is the humidity generated by the water that the wheel sends to this lower part and over time electrical problems are generated . This is why every time you check the bulbs, you should check for moisture. This is something that happens, sometimes taillights catch fire, so you should always be careful of any electrical issues. and in this specific case it could be due to humidity issues, which caused a short circuit and ultimately caught fire,” he concluded.