I was thinking, has anyone installed an LED light inside a smoke unit? Could put a blue/red one in to make it look like fire when starting the engine up.
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Interesting idea, except that there's no fire inside the smokebox of a steam locomotive, nor in the exhaust manifold of a diesel (except under very special circumstances).
Stuart
I meant mainly for diesels. It would also highlight the smoke coming out if you don't get a lot of smoke output
Realistic or not it would look cool especially in a night scene
We have discussed that in the past. Truthfully, it's not that difficult, I've just not gotten around to doing it. One of these days...
Originally Posted by Stuart:
Interesting idea, except that there's no fire inside the smokebox of a steam locomotive, nor in the exhaust manifold of a diesel (except under very special circumstances).
Stuart
Take a look at these, it happens. 
Originally Posted by gunrunnerjohn:
We have discussed that in the past. Truthfully, it's not that difficult, I've just not gotten around to doing it. One of these days...
Originally Posted by Stuart:
Interesting idea, except that there's no fire inside the smokebox of a steam locomotive, nor in the exhaust manifold of a diesel (except under very special circumstances).
Stuart
Take a look at these, it happens.
I think i can replicate exhaust fires with 10 drops of gasoline in my smoke unit..
jk of course...maybe some fuel oil from my house..
I have thought about it myself. Not for realism but what color LED would look good? A white LED to highlight the smoke?
I think it would depend on what "image" you preferred to project.
Blue, purple, yellow, maybe green too- "oily diesel"
Blue, red, yellow- "flame"
White may highlight, but if not dim, Id expect it to look like "light leakage".
I've been thinking of the easiest way to incorporate light into an assembly, but haven't had that many stock electronic fan driven locomotive smoke units in my hands too know the variations or internal placements well, but think if the unit uses a tube between the opening, & the models stack, and is replaced with a glass tube & JB weld, it would provide a heat resistant, but clear tube for the light to pass through. I have done this with brass tube for custom smoke unit "stack extensions"/"exhaust manifolds".
I think you need to project the light up into the smoke stream, lighting the smoke inside the stack probably won't do the trick here.
I'm thinking of perhaps some 2mm post LED's angled right beside the stack and point up into the smoke stream. For the diesels with the wide funnel, sealing the LED into the sides of the funnel with just the lens pointing up would probably give a good effect. A flickering LED or two would be interesting as well. Lots of room for creative thinking here. 
I don't think you need to know much about the fan driven smoke unit, the LED's will be beyond the actual smoke unit in the stack near the exhaust to get the effect we're talking about.
