Lionel #1967 Smoke unit

From the 6-18079 NEW YORK CENTRAL 2-8-2 MIKADO #1967 product page.

• Fan-driven smoke generator that produces clean, safe and realistic smoke

My guess is it's either very quiet or broken.

Its a mechanical puffer unit. Heres the last page of the parts breakdown showing the smoke unit: Lionel  6-18079 parts

Having said that, ( amazingly) theres quite a few parts still available for this loco.

False advertising on Lionel's part, at least on the website.

I had one of these, albeit in the Rio Grande scheme, and it too had the heater element puffer unit.

Thanks; I had it apart, but I didn't understand what I saw. Mine looks like the one on the parts list, but it has quit giving smoke. How does a mechanical puffer work? I didn't notice any moving parts, but I didn't know what to look for.

The mechanical puffer has a piston at the bottom that is activated by a cam on the axle and a pushrod to move up and down as the locomotive moves.  Some of the smaller locomotives have a lever that is pushed by one of the driver rods to pump the piston.

Thanks everyone; I learned a lot from your responses. I started this thread because I thought something was wrong with the fan unit. Now I know that there is no fan in this locomotive, so that cannot be the problem. It still doesn't smoke, so it must be something electrical. I will take it in for repair to Charles Ro.

In disassembling the smoke unit, I noticed something interesting: it looks as if Lionel was thinking of running steam down in the direction of the steam chest. In the casting there is an open channel which would lead some of the steam downward. The channel is in a position marked by the black line leading to a hole in the attached picture of the gasket. In the gasket shown, the hole is open, but it is blocked in the gasket in my engine. I suppose the plan of having steam in the steam chest and pistons didn't work very well, so they just blocked the channel.