Originally Posted by gunrunnerjohn:
1.5 watts wouldn't vaporize much, are you sure? FWIW, all the caboose smoke units I've taken apart have had some wick material around the vertical resistor. I've never gotten much smoke from any of them, which is why I do the fan driven smoke mod if I want smoke.
I went back to 18 vrms without the diode...so that is around 5 watts and packed the smoke cylinder about half way up and around the resistor. Now I get a wisp of smoke out which is nicely visible. And the side of the caboose did not get as hot as before. I think vaporizing the fluid takes quite a few calories and keeps the assembly cooler on it's outside edge.
