Does anyone make black smoke?

You only get black smoke if your engine catches fire Lol 

 

All kidding aside I have never seen any smoke fluid that comes out black. There are some that smells like diesel fuel though. It smells awful, I would not use it. 

Rich can make black smoke!  Especially if he sees or hears "LASH-UP."

Black smoke has been discussed here many times, particularly befor the forum switched to Hoop-la.

 

The short answer is no.

 

The long answer is it ain't gonna happen.

 

Rusty

I do not thing the smoke most of us are familiar with is really smoke.  It is oil vapor, sort of like steam.  Real smoke would probably leave a mess that would be difficult to clean up. Most smoke is also toxic.

i agree with  your first statement, but should qualify the rest.  true there is likely some unburned oil vapor in oil burner exhaust and from the minute amount of cylinder oil mixed in with the steam, but it is mostly water vapor you are seeing.  as someone who sees steam locomotives run quite often, it was hard to locate more than a handful of pictures i've taken that show anything coming from the stack at all when running.  the only time i have seen any off-white exhaust were people using a high sulfur content coal.

 

as far as being toxic... i sure hope not.  we have live steam club members pushing their 90's and i don't believe more than the average number eventually pass from lung related complications.

 

 

 

"Black smoke is waste"

 

Try chopping up a rubber band and putting it in the smoke unit, I bet you get black smoke then!

 

Jerry

Black smoke is fine carbon particles.

 

Find some O scale fine carbon particles to put in your smoke unit.

 

Andrew

All you need is stoker coal from Southern Illinois:

 

 

It burns dirty, but steams great... at least until the flues plug up! 

That is the point. White smoke is actually condensed steam. Smoke units vaporize smoke fluid. We see it after it condenses, like steam.

 

Black smoke contains impurities - "fine carbon particles," as falconservice posted. They are tiny solid particles of coal or wood OR tiny droplets of oil. Also called "cinders" or "soot." Unlike steam or smoke fluid, they don't evaporate. They fall down and coat everything near them. Hot cinders (sparks) can also cause trackside fires. That is why UP excursion steamers burn oil. Big Boy No. 4014 will burn oil, too.

 

To produce black smoke, a smoke unit would have to spew black particles. They wouldn't evaporate, either. Like oil smoke particles, they would stain everything.

 

Black smoke sounds good, and threads about it keep coming up. But there is no practical way to do that in "O" Gauge locomotives. Even if it could be done, no one would put up with the mess.

Good info, guys.  This is kinda like the "why can't I find a printer that makes white decals".  Just not gonna happen.

 

I'm best off just leaving off my smoke units entirely on my diesels.  The white looks unprototypical, and its making a mess.

For what it's worth, I have seen diesels making white smoke. But it varies from thick to thin to invisible, and from dirty to so-so. A steady stream of white smoke from diesels just doesn't look right - to me, anyway.

 

Yep, turn 'em off. You can always turn them back on.

Diesels only belch black smoke?  Nah, don't think so! 

 

 

Here's some black smoke.

Found these articles that might shed some light on the subject:

http://www.looksolutionsusa.co...to-make-colored-fog/

http://www.theatrefx.com/funfacts19.html

 

Jerry

Why would anyone want 'black oily (carbon) smoke' settling all over one's layout, train room, lungs & ...

Much you have learned, young Jedi.  A greater mess black smoke will create.

 

Channeling Yoda...

 

Rusty

Martin H.,

 

You are serious right? Why would you want black smoke?

 

Do you know what kind of toxic pollutants are in that stuff? I assume you are running  O gauge scale indoors and not outdoors. To suggest adding anything to your smoke unit that could cause an indoor fire hazard is insane and ridiculous.

 

I think that on the units that are larger scale ride on units it would be safe (precisely because they are outdoors) but it is definitely unsafe to burn toxic materials in close quarters and breathe it in!

 

Fellas, chime in here!

 

 

(****, when I was a kid) I used to set my plastic airplane models (never trains) on fire but I ALWAYS did it outdoors. And yes it was black smoke! But it was plastic! That was 45 years ago!

 

Dangerous!

 

Mike Maurice

 

 

Hi Martin, Good analogy but no longer true. RGB plus White printers have been around for a couple of years. And they are often used when printing direct to substrate. A layer of white on unpainted aluminum gives better color rendition. Also, you do not need "particles" to make "colored" smoke.. Just a solvent based dye that is compatible with mineral oil. Vaporizes in the same temperature range. Since all "smoke" condenses back onto your layout anyway, it will also "weather" your layout just like a real steam loco. "Never happen". I think they said that about the Wright Brothers.

With all due respect anything that dissolves in the smoke oil will not vaporize along with the oil. The same reason that salt won't evaporate along with the water as it boils away. The solvent will evaporate leaving the solute behind regardless if it is water, oil, alchohol, etc.. Toy train "smoke" is actually a fog and all fogs are white since they diffuse the light passing thru it, the same reason snow is white but water is clear. Anything that dissolves in the oil will come out of solution as the oil is evaporated away and coat the inside of the smoke chamber like boiler scale. There are a number of gases that are colored but most of them a pretty nasty:

 

Fluorine - brownish yellow
Chlorine - yellowish green
Bromine (vapor) - brownish red
Iodine (vapor) - purple
Nitrogen dioxide - brownish red
Chromyl chloride (vapor) - reddish
Ozone - pale blue
Chlorine dioxide - yellowish
Chlorine trifluoride - yellowish
Bromine monochloride - reddish brown
Iodine monochloride (vapor) - brown

 

Here's a link to a theatrical supply house about colored fog/smoke:

http://www.smokemachines.net/faqs.shtml#26

 

Jerry

I would hardly equate the importance of flight with the importance of black smoke for a toy/model train.

 

Rusty

Black smoke... hmm well if you wanted to weather the layout a bit, a few passes could really make things dirty and soot laden like the real thing!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Put a miniature live Diesel engine in your model. 

Then you will get black smoke. 

The OGR paparazzi has caught Rich playing in his back yard.

 

Hi Rusty, Who said anything about importance. Or why that is even relevant to the discussion. Even the Wright Brothers were doing it for the money. They were making bicycles before that. And with the rapid advances in technology, what seemed impossible a decade ago is common now.

Hi Baltimore, You are correct and I was wrong. Using current smoke making technology. Density of the vapor/ fog is the only thing that can be changed to make the smoke whiter. It is interesting how most theater now use a glycol based fog instead of oil.

Actually, an Austrian named Wilhelm Kress would have probably beat the Wright Brothers by two years if Daimler hadn't screwed up and sent him an engine that was twice as heavy with half the power as was specified.  His plane crashed into the lake when it snagged on some debris during an attempted water take-off.  The Wrights would have just been the "me too" guys then.

 

You guys may eventually get your black smoke, more power to you.  But, I once got a snoot full of the real black smoke when the wind shifted while putting the stack cover on 1630 after the fire was banked for the night.  I have no desire to have simulated stuff cluttering up the air in my basement, no matter how it's perfumed.

 

Rusty

No problem Ffffredd, someone may actually make a liquid that when you vaporize it creates a colored mist one day or such a liquid may already exist but my betting side says that it's probably going to A: stink to high heaven and B: be toxic or a major irritant! One of the articles I read did say if the heating elements on a glycol unit over heat and burn the glycol you will get a foul smelling brown cloud but I'm guessing that is probably real smoke at that point!

 

Jerry

Two examples from Jerry's list above:

 

Anybody for purple?

 

 

 

...or maybe:

 

 

Please don't try at home!

 

Jim

 

ok, folks, thanks so much for all the replies!!!

 

I guess I wanted a black smoke, with diesel scent, that wouldn't ruin my health, dirty my layout, or involuntarily "weather" my layout.  Not gonna happen apparently.

 

I'll just keep all my smoke units in the "off" position from here on out.

 

Thanks again,

 

Martin

Iron and chlorine (1:04) would probably be closest to smoke color:

 

 

As Jim said above, do not try this at home!!! 

You know , this could become the next Holy Grail of model railroading, black, non-toxic smoke!

 

Jerry

 

 

ALPS printers make white decals.  They are no longer made but they are still out there, and you still can find the cartridges.  I have one, a MD-1000, and I make white (and gold, and silver) decals for myself and my friends.

As a longtime fireman once told me. In the 40's there weren't that many photographers taking pictures of steam engine like they do now. We would always give them a good shot of black smoke because that's what they wanted. That's why so many people think that's what a steam engine should look like. Lots of black smoke coming from the stack. When we were filming a DVD for the SP 2472 I asked many times for the stuff but he would seldom give it to me. Said it cost them too much money. He's a great guy still firing the engine he worked on tell the end of steam on the SP. Don