Restoring smoke pulse effect

[strmnd54]

Wow I didn't know they were selling the proportional hardware units equipped with the non-proportional boards ...
Anyway ; my offer still stands if you want to go to a proportional unit ....I have the parts ...

[MarkofZollo]

Ok cheers, I will pm you next week once I have had a fiddle with it when I get home, I will see if I can get it working better.
My tank has 2008 stamped in a few places, I had about 5 tanks that broke quickly before I got a working one and they all had the same smoke boards.
Thanks,
Dave

[strmnd54]

Hi Dave ....Here's a pic to show you where to weld those 4 diodes on the rx-18 board ...

[Wizzard033]

My proportional smoker stopped working and upon inspection I found the element had burntafter only a few moments of use. I then proceeded to use a peice of nichrome wire I had on hand and the end result was the pump stopped working as did the led for the machine gun. after reading this thread I thing that I have possibly trashed the trasistor the supplies the power. I thought i would try the mod you have posted here so I found a 15ohm 1W wire wound res which is as close as I could get but I was unable to identify which diodes those are in the pics so I could find something suitable for mine. Can I get those specs?

[strmnd54]

Those are 1N4007 ...They have a forward current of 1 Amp. and most important the Peak Repetitive Reverse Voltage is 1000 Volts ...
You can check the data sheet here : http://www.fairchildsemi.com/ds/1N/1N4007.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; ...
I use them because I don't trust the ones used by H.L. which have a lower Reverse Voltage ...
Also ; by welding the diodes on the RX-18 board ; You only have to send 1 wire to the smoke unit board instead of 4 ....

[MarkofZollo]

I can vouch for strmnd54, his set up works brilliantly!
I was just wondering what battery you use Norm? Also what is your smoke oil mixture?
I am running low on the stock stuff that was with tank but I keep having to empty the tubes of residue
Cheers,
Dave

[strmnd54]

Liquid residue clogging the pipes is a major problem with the smoke units ...I am now using a mixture of Isopropyl Alcohol 99 % and vegetable Glycerin in a 2:1 ratio ( 500 ml alcohol in 250 ml glycerin ) ....I still have residue ; but only half of that produced with water based smoke fluid ....
As for the battery pack ; I'm using 2 Matorro Nimh 2000 mAH monted in serial ....
The main pack is powering the Rx-18 board and the motors in a standard manner ; and the second pack is powering the 14 Ohms resistor element of the smoke unit ; providing a constant smoke output level for the 1 hour running time of my Panzer IV ...
Putting 2 battery packs in a H.L. Panzer IV requires some serious " dremmel " work ...
I am now experimenting with a battery pack made of 6 AA Nimh 2500 mAH batteries to power the heater element in order to gain some space in my tank ...So far so good ...

[MarkofZollo]

Thanks for the info, looked up the IsoPropyl Alcohol and its less than £5 for a 500ml, but the Vegitable Glycerin is more like £9 for 250ml? How much do you pay/where do you get it from? And how long do you reckon you get out of that?
Thanks bud

[strmnd54]

I got them from the drugstore across the street ...I paid around $10.00 CAD ( 7.04 EUR ) for the glycerin ....I got 700 ml of fluid once mixed ( enough to fill a 710 ml bottle of pop ...
Right now I"m testing a smoke unit ( with 2 levels of smoke output ) so I'm consuming more than normal ....My unit is running an average of 4 hours a day ....
The normal consumption should be similar to the H.L. original smoke fluid ...
I know from experience that the consumption depends of the level of smoke ( similar to fuel consumption in a car engine ) ...The more smoke you have ; the more fluid you consume ....
In any case ; that mix is a lot more expensive than the commercially sold fog fluid ...
For example I paid $35.00 CAD for 4 litres of commercial fog juice ; which breaks down to $35.00/4 L = $8.75 per litres ...Compare to $17.00/0.700 L = $24.28 per litres for the alcohol based mix ....So my cocktail is roughly 3 times more expensive than the commercial fog juice ...
So It might be worthed for me to develop some king of drain system for my smoke units ....

[strmnd54]

OOPS Made a mistake with my numbers ...Got 750 ml of fluid instead of 700ml ( don't know how to add ) which bring the price to $22.66 per L. : Still expensive