smoke issues on Legacy fef-3

How much fluid did you use.. Good smoke at low speed and nothing at high speed usually means not enough fluid in my experance. 

jojofry posted:

How much fluid did you use.. Good smoke at low speed and nothing at high speed usually means not enough fluid in my experance. 

I only use lionel premium fluid and never exceed 15 drops in the stacks(per Lionels manual). Too afraid to add more than the directions state due to warranty issues.

I probably put in 0.5 ml to start and it smokes very well. I don't know how many drops that is, but more than 15 for sure. In fact is smokes so well my wife complained in less than 30 seconds.

If you never exceed 15 drops, you'll never see the max smoke output she is capable of 

I have found the sweet spot for this engine is somewhere between 60-80 drops. It will smoke nice and thick on high for about 30 mins. If you don't believe me you can watch my YouTube video of it. This engine has a huge smoke unit and you could fill twice what I have suggested and still be safe from overfill. However, if you limit yourself to 15 drops you will never enjoy the smoke output that this engine is capable of. 

My experience with almost every style of fan driven smoke is 15 drops is probably too little, especially for a dry smoke unit.  When I'm rebuilding a smoke unit, it normally takes about 2/3 of a dropper of JT's MegaSteam to properly soak the wick.  When I just "measure" it by dropping it into the bottle, that's around 35 drops.

I like ml or cc for measurement. I wonder if drops vary with the size of the dropper opening at the tip...

Drops do vary in size, that's one of the reasons that drops aren't all that reliable a measurement.

You need more smoke fluid 

I agree that there seems to be a "sweet spot" for the newer Lionel Legacy dual fan units like this engine has. I also note that a bit of experimenting with my FEF3reveals that the EFX setting for the loco is intended to and does increase the smoke output when you ramp the setting up.

The OP's problem sounds a little odd but I'd be inclined to put in at least 25-30 drops fluid to "prime" the unit when new and let it soak in for at least 2 or 3 hours before operating. This ensures that the fluid gets to both chambers. The real solution is to fully saturate the smoke wadding but that's hard to do other than by the process GRJ mentions, which necessitates taking off the body shell and opening up the smoke unit itself.

The other thing that can unexpectedly affect smoke output is of course aircon/room ventilation as it doesn't take much of a cross-draft to disperse the smoke vapor.

Hancock52 posted:

 let it soak in for at least 2 or 3 hours before operating.

The smoke batting isn't that thick, the smoke fluid has a thin viscosity . Id recommend maybe 2 minutes minimum.