Hey guys, is there any place other than ebay to find original lionel smoke pellets??? They seem to be getting pretty rare and pricey on ebay these days. Heck, right now, i dont even own any postwar locos, but i will someday soon. And i may be only 25 years old, and have missed the postwar glorry, but i grew up with dads old postwar trains durring the holiday season, and nothing, and I mean NOTHING smells like Christmas to me more than the scent of original lionel smoke. Try as others might, nothing else even comes close!
And I know the original stuff is toxic, but hell, were all still alive right??? So it cant be too bad :)
Hello 92!
Perhaps a Train Show in your area might have some?? I saw some bottles of original Pellets at the Expo Mart Train Show in Pittsburgh last month. Be prepared to pay some $$$$$$ if you find any. Take Care.
Last summer I bought a full bottle of vintage smoke pellets at an antique store for $3.00.
Smoke pellets are being made once again by a company in Texas, I believe. Here's a link:
Modern SP Smoke Pellets
Jim
Modeling the Baltimore waterfront in HO scale
i am aware of the new smoke pellets... so, in that case another question would be has anyone here used these new pellets, and done a side by side sniffer test to the originals??? how do they stack up???
In all honesty, i am a sucker, LOL, and will probaslly end up shelling out some big bucks for the originals.
jimtrumpie wrote:I have used the repro pellets that Jim mentioned, and they are identical to the the originals in smell and output.
Intresting... i guess thats a really really good thing though. ive got to get me some PW trains and try it out. I simply miss the smell far too much.
I think they work fine broken up.
$15 for 50 pellets...no idea if that's considered expensive.
I have one bottle of original pellets, for which I paid $15 for about 20 pellets and some powder. This was before the reproductions were available.
I'm fortunate to have a local shop which deals primarily in Postwar. That's where I bought my one bottle. That same shop gets anywhere from $5 for an empty or nearly empty bottle, and as much as $50 for a full bottle.
As for the comment that they don't have the same smell as the original, I have my doubts. The smoke original smoke pellets are primarily m-terphenyl. Considering that the synthesis procedure was originally carried out in Mario Mazzone's kitchen, there could also be some side products present, which would primarily be o-terphenyl and p-terphenyl. I don't know the exact synthesis used, however the production o-terphenyl would not be favored, and likely some other group which was later removed would prevent the formation of p-terphenyl at all. So, in a properly designed synthesis, the yield of m-terphenyl, the desired product, verses other possible isomers should be 99% or greater.
So, all that rambling aside, there shouldn't be more than a trace amount of anything other than m-terphenyl in the original pellets. I can confirm that 99.99% pure m-terphenyl purchased from a chemical supplier, when vaporized, smells exactly like the original smoke pellets. I suspect that this is probably the source that Toy Trains Unlimited uses for their pellets. If that's the case, the smell should be exactly the same.
If I ever get around to ordering some reproduction pellets, I'll run some analysis on them vs. the original and see what I get. I highly doubt, though, that there will be any difference.
I wonder if the person commenting that the reproductions smell different could be suffering from the placebo effect.
Repro toy train pellets are made by Toy tRains Unlimited in Dallas and they smell just like the original. This is pretty much confirmed by me and a ton of other operators out there.
Mike s.
ben10ben wrote: I wonder if the person commenting that the reproductions smell different could be suffering from the placebo effect.
Speaking of placebos, I read an article in CTT by Arthur Zurel (sp?) where he stated that smoke pellets didn't creat enough smoke to show up on camera in the early days of TV. So he popped an aspirin down the stack and it smoked like crazy. This was in the 1950's, when Lionel was seen on TV talk shows and in advertising.
Ben, I've often wondered if he was kidding or not. Would an aspirin smoke when heated by a post war smoke unit?
Hello Jim!
I bet that cured Art of Excedrin Headache #103! Take Care.
Hello Keith! I'm thinking if it's true, that guy in the other thread who get headaches from the smoke may be in luck! How fortuitous!
Jumijo wrote: ben10ben wrote: I wonder if the person commenting that the reproductions smell different could be suffering from the placebo effect. Speaking of placebos, I read an article in CTT by Arthur Zurel (sp?) where he stated that smoke pellets didn't creat enough smoke to show up on camera in the early days of TV. So he popped an asprin down the stack and it smoked like crazy. This was in the 1950's, when Lionel was seen on TV talk shows and in advertising.Ben, I've often wondered if he was kidding or not. Would an asprin smoke when heated by a post war smoke unit? Jim
Speaking of placebos, I read an article in CTT by Arthur Zurel (sp?) where he stated that smoke pellets didn't creat enough smoke to show up on camera in the early days of TV. So he popped an asprin down the stack and it smoked like crazy. This was in the 1950's, when Lionel was seen on TV talk shows and in advertising.
Ben, I've often wondered if he was kidding or not. Would an asprin smoke when heated by a post war smoke unit?
Dangerous so I have been told. Has been tried.
God bless TCA 05-58541 Benefactor Member of the NRA, Member of the American Legion, Retired Boss Hog of Roseyville , KC&D Qualified
Jim,
Aspirin tablets are acetylsalicylic acid bound with starch.
Upon heating to the temperatures present in a smoke unit, the acetylsalicylic acid, which is really just a condensation ester, will break down into acetic acid and salicylic acid.
Both of these should easily vaporize at typical smoke unit temperatures, and would certainly give a smoke-like effect. Salicylic acid, though, is an irritant, and I'd have some serious concerns about breathing it. The acetic acid certainly wouldn't smell very nice, either.
In addition, any acetic acid, which would be liquid at room temperature, would likely cause trouble for the metal components of the smoke unit. It would certainly cause corrosion of any steel parts. It could also potentially react with the zinc parts to produce hydrogen gas, which would not be a good thing to have in your smoke unit.
I would definitely not reccomend the use of an aspirin tablet in smoke units.
Thanks for the explanation, Ben. I now have little doubt that Art did indeed put aspirins in the steamers to show up better on TV. But I also have no desire to recreate his efforts. The aspirin in the smoke units was just one trick he mentioned to make the trains perform better on live TV.
What I love about the smoke smell is that it quickly overwhelms carpet deoderizers, Fabreze, and the dozen or so holiday scented candles my better half tries to overwhelm me with. Now she's determined to go out and buy some of the scented smoke drops (for me?!) as a stocking stuffer.
Jack
IF IT WON'T COME LOOSE BY TAPPING ON IT, DON'T TRY TO FORCE IT. USE A BIGGER HAMMER.
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