Smoke generator?

[PSRusty]

I came across a guy at my model boat club who has taken the working parts of an asthma nebuliser and put it in his tug boat works a treat with glycerine, baby oil mix but i dont know the mix ratio.

[Peter Webster]

Can you get some photos and a sketch of the set up please
Peter Webster

 I came across a guy at my model boat club who has taken the working parts of an asthma
 nebuliser and put it in his tug boat works a treat with glycerine, baby oil mix but i dont know the
 mix ratio.
 
 

[mjt60a]

Here's a picture of the RCBM article, as I don't have a scanner....
*it wasn't asbestos tape he used but a strip of fibreglass mat....

[steamboatmodel]

I remember  something from the old yahoo form :hmmm  about glass tube and nicrome wire, I had printed it out    but can't find the printout   :rant    and did not find it when I did a search on the old messages? :hmmm
Regards,
Gerald  

[steamboatmodel]

Hi Eddy,
I found the printout!    It was on Mon, 23 Jun 2003
Dave Powell was looking for a good cheap(to produce) smoke generator.
You  :music replied describing one made from a boiling tube, glass rod and nichrome wire which you said worked very well. :hmph
Regards,
Gerald

[The Shootist]

The JJC smoke genie is easy to figure out...... It's a cold mist humidifier!

Lake water fed to a ultra-sonic piezo cell and the resulting mist blown out by a fan. There will be no residue except moisture, and you can get one at most any druggist. They run on houshold current so modifications will need to be made.(Gave $20 US Dollars for the one I use at home).

[Barry]

The article on the smoke generator from the old messages, is that still on the forum? If so how do you find it?
Thanks Barry.

[steamboatmodel]

I did a search for Mon, 23 Jun 2003 and found it posted by Eddy copied bellow:

I made one that worked very well about 2 years ago.... It's not easy
to describe purely in text, so bear with me...

Take a boiling tube (that's a heat proof test tube) of a size that is
suitable to fit your funnel. You then need a glass rod and a glass
tube - The glass rod should fit into the glass tube and be a sliding
fit.

Lets imagine the glass rod and tube are about 6" long..... Wind some
nichrome wire around the top 3" of the tube (nichrome wire is used
for foam cutters that the aircraft guys use to cut foam wings, and
should be easily obtainable from most model shops, if not you can use
the wire from an old electric fire element).... The length of wire
you wrap around the tube needs to be experimented with as I'll
explain later, but start with about 12" wound onto the tube - Leave
long ends on the wire as you'll use those later to connect to a power
supply.

Now to assemble the components, put about 1"-1.5" of oil into the
bottom of the boiling tube (I used Johnson's baby oil which worked
quite well). Put the glass rod inside the glass tube with the
nichrome wire at the top, place the end of the rod and tube into the
boiling tube so that the none wired end is immersed into the oil -
The glass tube and rod will allow the oil to rise up to the heating
element by capillary action, Put a bung into the boiling tube so that
the galss tube/rod sticks through the centre, and route the two ends
of the nichrome wire through the bung ready to connect to a power
supply - BEWARE - The nichrome wire gets VERY HOT!!! So use a bung
that won't burn!

Connect the unit to a 12 volt power supply and within a few seconds
you should see the smoke start to flow - Keep experimenting with the
length of the nichrome wire to get the best results.

I hope that little lot makes sense? If you have any questions just
ask and I'll try to explain...

Regards
Eddy

PS I picked a toy train up at the secondhand store with the original bottle of smoke fluid still unopened, for under $10.00 CAN. Remember you can substitute baby oil and varsol 50/50% for the commercial smoke oil.
Regards,
Gerald

[Harold H. Duncan]

the information posted re smoke generators, stirred some memories  of long ago, and having spent the weekend cleaning out my Mum's house and garage, looked for and found a Christmas gift for my first teenage birthday. - TUGGY - . Now whilst this may not be a paddler, it is a 'steam'  tug, albeit electric powered. Anyway, this tug has a smoke generator which puffs smoke up and out of the funnel. The propulsion motor is contained within the gearbox unit which also drives a slide. this slide presses on the end of the bellows, which in turn forces air through the smoke unit and up the funnel. At the base of the funnel is a cotton 'reservoir' which you soak with light oil, ie baby oil, or 3 in 1 oil, etc. sits above a miniature wound nichrome wire heating element ( miniature toaster element) and wa-la we have  our tug steaming the pond issuing smoke aka the real thing. All this on 2 'D' size batteries.
The photos are of the vessel "as-found" so excuse the cob-webbs, dust etc. A full restoration is planned.

[andygh]

Not sure if it's OK to link to another forum  but thought some of you might be interested in this

http://modeltugforum.com/index.php?topic=921.0

I have no connection with the product whatsoever and I personally haven't seen the thing in the flesh but it looks very promising from the video. I believe the guy who makes them has just started up his own business after being made redundant. Hope it helps somebody

[Eddy Matthews]

Thanks Andy,

Just so your clear, there's absolutely no problem in posting a link to another website as long as it's relevant, which obviously it is!

Other forums and websites are out there, and can often be helpful, so to ignore them would just be silly...

Regards
Eddy

[Tug--Kenny]

Not sure if it's OK to link to another forum  but thought some of you might be interested in this

http://modeltugforum.com/index.php?topic=921.0

I have no connection with the product whatsoever and I personally haven't seen the thing in the flesh but it looks very promising from the video. I believe the guy who makes them has just started up his own business after being made redundant. Hope it helps somebody

This is what I have fitted into my Waverley. It's so good, it actually runs two chimney stacks.

It is the water vapour type system and , as such, creates no mess on the decks. I can thoroughly recommend the product.

ken

[andy]

Ok, friends,

all ok these smoke generators.

But they are driven by electric energy. What, if I have a model with live steam? Exhaust is not good in the funnel. Do you have some solutions for that problem?

Andreas

[steamboatmodel]

On most full size boats the exhaust was not put up the funnel, but piped outboard if a non condenser. there was usually a pipe leading from the safety valve up the outside of the funnel. There may have been a blast-pipe in the funnel to assist with the draft. I have run the engine exhaust up inside my stack, but unless conditions are right I don't get that much visible steam vapour. If we switched over to burning coal or oil we would probably have lots of smoke, but would have to spend too much time cleaning.
Regards,
Gerald

[sandystrone]

Eddy,
one of the members of my club has built a model of the old coal fired Shields ferry and has put his own smoke unit in it. 
(Unfortunately it is screw propelled!)
He uses carbon from hand warmers with a few drops of 3 in 1 oil squirted in and a little 3volt fan beneath it to produce billows of realistic smoke which lasts about 10 minutes, so he has gone back to the drawing board to devise an oil dripfeed.
3 in 1 oil is a lot cheaper than Graupner distillate!                  Sandy