Questions on smoke generators for buildings commercial or scratch built

[AKKevinT]

I am considering adding one or two smoke generators to the buildings on my Christmas layout. Here are my questions.

What kind of devices are there to make smoke for building smoke stacks? How well do they work? Are they easy to operate? What are the wiring requirements?

Does anyone have experience with scratch building your own smoke generating device and would you be willing to share how you did it? What materials seem to work the best and what are some of the important points to keep in mind?

Thanks to anyone out there with ideas and responses. I am swamped with work this week and will not have much time to monitor this thread throughout the day but I will do my best to check back inwhen I time permits.

Thanks! Kevin T.

[Anonymous]

I'll take a quick shot at some of it. Bought a smoke unit from Micro-Mark which worked like a champ off one of my alternating-current transformers at 6 - 12 volts or so. The idea was to send smoke up  and out the chimney of my Lionel Rico Station.

So I lifted off the smokestack that came with the unit and fabricated a piece of foot-long brass tubing of exactly the correct diameter. Got it at my local hobby store.

Turned it on and it acted like a chimney with a prostate problem. Evidently, there is more engineering than meets the eye in the stack that comes with the unit, because it provides the proper draft, and my brass tube, despite several rounds of "clever ideas" it has never worked right.

Put the "factory stack" back on and it works great again.

Perhaps you can design something that will work better. I hope someone will show us the way.

[Tom1947]

My brother in law constructed one using an old smoke unit from an engine.  It worked really great and produced a lot of smoke.   Enough that it would fill a room. 

[Anonymous]

 did the smoke unit have the fan with it ? that may have been the problem .... will need fan unit at least to get it a foot high .

[dougdagrump]

Kevin, Try a search, or contact directly, but if I remember correctly perry1060 did a step by step series here in the forum not to long ago.

[Anonymous]

Just a hobo,

Assuming that your question was directed to me: yes, the unit I got at Micro-Mark has a very good fan. With just the stack that came with it, it will blow smoke well over a foot high. Under reasonable power, when the smoke emerges from the stack it looks almost like three intertwined streams. I think it has a very well-engineered updraft.

I don't know, but I think the unit may be a replacement part for a European train -- LGB maybe?

[Anonymous]

Here's the straight-skinny on my smoke generator. According to the paperwork which I found this evening, it's an:

Aristo-Craft Trains model ART-29311

Works on AC or DC current from 6-24 volts but states that there is nothing to be gained by running it "above 8 volts." It features an automatic cut-off when the fluid gets low.

I gather that the generator and the stack are two separate items (although sold as one by Micro-Mark) so evidently different stacks can be placed on the unit for different purposes. I couldn't find any identifying marks on either the generator or the stack. The generator is a black rectangular box with four tiny feet. It needs the feet because the fan blades are virtually flush with the bottom of the box, and the feet provide enough space so that the fan blades don't rub and air can be sucked in.

It looks like Aristo-Craft makes other models as well.

Their website is http://www.aristocraft.com/

I realize now that "LGB" was in my mind was because I use LGB smoke fluid in it.

....................

Try searching Google using the key-phrase seuthe smoke and click away. I found the  "Tips"  article to be interesting.

Hope this helps.