How to make “fake” smoke for boiler

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Drprez
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Location: Las Vegas

How to make “fake” smoke for boiler

Post by Drprez »

I’m having some trouble figuring out a way to make more “smoke” out of the stack.

I’m working on a project that we are filming and need to have a very dense smoke coming out of the stack.

My normal operations have little to no visible out the stack (partly to do with living in Las Vegas and 110f temp)

Does anyone know of some type of additive or setup I can do or modify to make this dense smoke?

The boiler we are using is Propane fired. The steam goes through a drier so it also decreases the Visible.

What I would like to do is introduce it either at the stack, in the smoke box or in the fire box.

I have tried glycerin but the boiler is to hot to produce smoke without it becoming carcinogenic.

I have tried mineral oil and no luck.

I did run a copper tube in the fire box if needed to heat whatever.

I also have tried the smoke pellets for bee keeping . They sorta work but only last a few min before you have to put another one in the firebox.

I don’t want to add an electric heat coil or anything. Ideally I want it to produce smoke from existing boiler firebox or smokebox heat.

Any ideas what I could do to get this effect? I basically want it to be as dense as possible yet realistic enough coming out the stack.

This is what I want to produce about this dense whole moving.
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Nicholas Kalair
Las Vegas, NV

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Odyknuck
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Re: How to make “fake” smoke for boiler

Post by Odyknuck »

Throw a smoke bomb down the stack while filming.
Andypullen
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Re: How to make “fake” smoke for boiler

Post by Andypullen »

How about.....coal?
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LVRR2095
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Re: How to make “fake” smoke for boiler

Post by LVRR2095 »

A clean stack is the sign of a good fireman!
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Re: How to make “fake” smoke for boiler

Post by Gra2472 »

I suggest you change locations to a colder climate to film the scenes you're looking for. That is probably the safest and most repeatable solution that will not harm the locomotive or the crew. If time is not a critical factor, you could wait until winter. Otherwise, you might want to use the power of CGI.
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Fender
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Re: How to make “fake” smoke for boiler

Post by Fender »

Are you wanting white, black or gray smoke?
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SPSteam2491
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Re: How to make “fake” smoke for boiler

Post by SPSteam2491 »

What if you adapted your previous method for bee keeping and created a basket that hung the pellets halfway down the inside of the smoke stack? Capturing the pellets on top and bottom would prevent the exhaust stack from blowing the pellets right out of the basket.
Thanks
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Bill Shields
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Re: How to make “fake” smoke for boiler

Post by Bill Shields »

EVER TRIED THE SMOKE LIQUID that they use in theatrical fog machines? Propylene glycol

if you mix it with hot air......or steam exhaust...

you need a reservoir and a small pump (like a theatre smoke machine)....to add it to the exhaust blast inside the smokebox...using the small tube you have....you may need to point / put the tube well up into the stack....

know it works...have a fog machine in the closet that my wife uses at the theater

also..if you over fire the propane burners (intentionally put in more propane than you need)...you may well be surprised at the condensation you get out of the stack...

question:

did you mix your glycerin with distilled water BEFORE you pumped it through the little tube into the smokebox to mix with the exhaust? It is a common mistake to pour pure glycerin out the tube...in the theatre, the mix is 3:1 water to glycerine by volume

of course you could always try a LIONEL SMOKE PELLET..... :mrgreen:
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NP317
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Re: How to make “fake” smoke for boiler

Post by NP317 »

Fender wrote: Tue Sep 27, 2022 2:27 pm Are you wanting white, black or gray smoke?
An important question if you are trying to represent reality.
Black smoke implies over-firing with incomplete combustion. Or soot from sanding the flues.
White "smoke" implies steam. It can also represent an extinguished oil fire that is ready to explode! (I've seen that. It blew the fireman back against the tender!)
Gray smoke = mixing of smoke and steam.

And as stated by LVRR2095, a clear stack = optimum firing.
If you watch old(er) films of steam locomotives in the 1950s, the clear stack of the approaching locomotive often suddenly went black as the fireman saw the photographer and decided to give them dramatic oil smoke, thinking that is what they wanted! That was filmed on GN and NP oil-burning locomotives in Washington State.
Just don't let the railroad's bean counters see that. Black smoke meant $$ wasted up the stack.

So: What are you hoping to illustrate in your filming?
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Drprez
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Re: How to make “fake” smoke for boiler

Post by Drprez »

Dan

Ideally white color.

Can’t use coal is propane fired.


I want to find some way to have like a valve or something to turn that will produce the smoke for x min then we can turn it off. Similar to a ecig vape but I don’t know how I could wire or tube or whatever the thing would be to do this.
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Drprez
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Re: How to make “fake” smoke for boiler

Post by Drprez »

SPSteam2491 wrote: Tue Sep 27, 2022 2:32 pm What if you adapted your previous method for bee keeping and created a basket that hung the pellets halfway down the inside of the smoke stack? Capturing the pellets on top and bottom would prevent the exhaust stack from blowing the pellets right out of the basket.
That’s what I was thinking by the stack in a basket the problem I have is the pellets have to be lit on fire to smoke. In a perfect world if I could find a pellet that would smoke because it had a vapor point close to that of the stack temp and produce the smoke.

I just don’t know enough about smoke pellets
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Las Vegas, NV

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Drprez
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Re: How to make “fake” smoke for boiler

Post by Drprez »

Bill Shields wrote: Tue Sep 27, 2022 3:08 pm EVER TRIED THE SMOKE LIQUID that they use in theatrical fog machines? Propylene glycol

if you mix it with hot air......or steam exhaust...

you need a reservoir and a small pump (like a theatre smoke machine)....to add it to the exhaust blast inside the smokebox...using the small tube you have....you may need to point / put the tube well up into the stack....

know it works...have a fog machine in the closet that my wife uses at the theater

also..if you over fire the propane burners (intentionally put in more propane than you need)...you may well be surprised at the condensation you get out of the stack...

question:

did you mix your glycerin with distilled water BEFORE you pumped it through the little tube into the smokebox to mix with the exhaust? It is a common mistake to pour pure glycerin out the tube...in the theatre, the mix is 3:1 water to glycerine by volume

of course you could always try a LIONEL SMOKE PELLET..... :mrgreen:

Yes that is where I started . I have smoke machines and also an ejuice business so I got the mixing down and can get thick plooms of smoke using the heating elements designed for the fog liquid. Problem is that turns to fog at no higher than 350-375f. Any higher and it’s carcinogenic. I can produce exactly what I want on the machine now how to do that.
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So I f there is some way to find the sweet spot on the stack that is below that. Which is why I did the thermal image pictures. But it’s well above that almost to the top of the stack. I mean when I think about it the temp of the water in the boiler at 125psi is 350 so at 100 psi it might be the perfect temp. To somehow use that more stable temp to run a line somehow and produce it. But that’s above my pay grade on how to solve that .
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Nicholas Kalair
Las Vegas, NV

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