How To Make A Smoke Generator

[maggot555]

hello.

i was wondering if anyone here knows how to make a small scale smoke generator? or can redirect me to a website.
it`s for my school wind tunnel experiment. the wind tunnel cross-section is about 1m x 20 cm . i googled a little but cannot seem to find any info. we are required to built our own, so i can`t just buy a smoke genarator from ebay or something.

sorry for my bad english.

^__^v

 

[megawatt]

You must have Googled less than a little as I Googled a little and quickly found ... http://wmunderway.8m.com/cont/smoke/smoke.htm

Please try harder

MW

 

[tim west]

As its a school project i'll guess you'll have access to bunsen burners?
normally smoke machines as we use are based on an electric heater and smoke fluid(light vegetable based oil) these are out of your build your own scope so what i suggest is heating in a spoon a small amount of vegetable oil carefully so it smokes but doesnt ignite. of course smoke fluid would be better if your school can supply it.

Smoke Fluid

otherwise there are smoke pellets that can be purchased that are used for proving air flow through ducting amongst other uses though these produce a lot of smoke and are uncontrollable once ignited so it may pay to break them up first if wanting only a small amount of smoke.

Smoke Pellets/Matches

 

[JohnD]

be aware that the smoke will not improve the health of people breathing it, especially asthmatics or those with chest complaints or breathing problems

 

[tim west]

The use of a vegetable based fluid is mandatory as the older fluids were found to be carceogenic.

 

[maggot555]

Many thanks for the replies.

Actually I'm a collage student. The old wind tunnel for my research group is gone/ thrown away(!) , nobody knows what happened to it actually. So, we need a new one, for experiments in fluid mechanics. We were given 3 weeks to build the whole thing, and me plus 2 other partners were assigned to build the smoke generator. So I'm looking for building instructions, drawing etc for the generator.

and for the smoke fluids, i guess i can try to find those, the don't actually supply us with anything, they only gave us money.

http://wmunderway.8m.com/cont/smoke/smoke.htm

nice! seems simple enough. anyway, im spending this week researching on the best design and maybe start building it next week.

i wish they would just let us buy one :<
ah, i think i just started this thread in the wrong section, sorry ^_^v

 

[megawatt]

I wish they would just let us buy one :<

Why don't you just buy your qualification and forget college altogether

 

[tim west]

If you've been given a budget then a commercial product may be the answer?

Cheapest I could find

 

[megawatt]

I think the OP has to build it Tim as part of his college work.

 

[plugwash]

smoke fluid isn't hard to get there was some listed with the smoke machine there and any disco type supply shop should be able to get it.

the tricky bit with building your own will be to control the smoke, the smoke machines like are shown there heat it up in an enclosed space creating smoke under pressure and then release it when the button is pressed (they also sometimes smoke a bit even when it isn't pressed to let off excess pressure).

 

[Adam_151]

Not sure whether anything in this link would be usful?

http://www.emanator.demon.co.uk/bigclive/smoke.htm

 

[masona]

My youngest son Luke have got a smoke machine for theatre work I shall ask him when he wake up

I thought my summerhouse was on fire when he tried it out

 

[Space cat]

Do you have access to liquid air (or liquid nitrogen)? A little of this dropped into water will raise great clouds of harmless water droplets (yes, it's a real water cloud) which might be what you're looking for. I've heard that a lump of dry ice (frozen CO2) will also work but I've never tried it.

 

[tim west]

Do you have access to liquid air (or liquid nitrogen)? A little of this dropped into water will raise great clouds of harmless water droplets (yes, it's a real water cloud) which might be what you're looking for. I've heard that a lump of dry ice (frozen CO2) will also work but I've never tried it.

Dry Ice Machine, We used to use them on TOTP, basically a sealed tank on wheels filled with hot water maintained by four Immersion heaters(12KW total) a tray filled with dry ice would be lowered into the tank and several vent axia fans would blow the resultant fog through plastic ducts onto the set. One great thing was the huge thermal containers outside the studios to store the dry ice were handy for obtaining a chunk or two for experimentation back at the workshop.

 

[EdwardCurrent]

Hi,

I know how to make a generator smoke, if its of any help !

Ed