I have several post war engines. Can you use fluid in engines that take pellets? Also how can you tell if they have been fitted with fluid or have pellet smoke units? Do you need to disassemble them? Also does it effect the smoke unit by not having pellets or oil in them (running dry)? Thanks for any help.
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I was once told that you could use a few drops of smoke fluid in place of a pellet. I picked up a postwar 6-8-6 about a few weeks ago and have been using fluid in it with success. I add 3-5 drops and it seems ok. I add more when the smoke output drops off.
I don't know if running dry is harmful.
You could disassemble it. I assume the unit is going to look older than a replacement. My 6-8-6 slows red in the stack at high voltages but my modern steamers don't. So that might be a way to tell but maybe someone more knowledgeable can chime in.
In the post war period, smoke units were run dry by the thousands with no harm.
You can use liquid without any modification or harm.
It's the modern smoke units that put out lots of smoke that are potentially harmed by running them dry.
Thanks, guys.
Look down the stack.
A pellet element is nichrome wire wrapped on a ceramic disc. You'll often see the wraps and some white of the disc amongst wick fluff..
Fluid elements are resistor shaped. The wraps/cylinder can be seen sometimes. Sometimes it's just a resistor. They also occasionally use a sleeve cover over the resistor, a wick.
The ceramic helps, but ni-chrome is very heat proof.
A restor may not burn up in minutes dry, but heat takes a big long term toll on the resistor type elements.
The wells capacity for fluid and wick speed is often limited by old pellet residues clogging the wick. Mixing them forms a funky sludge if a ton of old pellet residue is packed into the wick. Later mixing of fluid & pellets with newer wick, it isn't forming sludge for me.(mind you a few hadn't had smoke serviced since the 50s-60s-70s.)
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