To Smoke Or Not To Smoke?

come on paul..a train that dont smoke to me is LAMO!!..we wanted them to be closed to realistic as possible,,sounds and smoke..

Diesels that smoke heavily indicate a serious mechanical malfunction. In general, for the Diesels it's smoke "off". Steamers run coal scented smoke fluid, and I have no qualms turning loose the smoke units on the steamers.

 

Gilly

Very rarely do I ever run smoke in my diesels.  Steam locomotives get smoke fluid though.   To me, it's just not that exciting coming out of a diesel.

For me it is always smoke OFF. Too many engines to fill and maintain. Then there's the matter of where does the smoke go? Finally there's the simple matter of breathing.

I like seeing steamers smoke but even using Nada it doesn't take long for smoke to fill the room. Then I shut them off.

I like having the smoke feature as it adds "life" to the visual. Not critical for diesels but almost a must for steamers.

However, the issue I have is with the fragility of the current smoke units. I can only speak of the Lionel units, but I'm always expecting one to quit which reduces the enjoyment factor.

 

My steam smokes, fortunately with DCS I can adjust as I run. Diesels are set to light smoke then adjust to more when starting or climbing a grade. Steam is set to medium and then heavy when working hard.

 

Clem 

The smoke switch is off on all mine.....I turn them on for some visitors for display....but I can't take the smoke in the basement.

Ours are off... But not because we want them off.  The smoke gives my wife a migrane.  We have tried all sorts of brands and all sorts of pleasant scents including no scent, which my wife says she can smell.

 

So for the sake of her well being... off.

I've heard that most railroads didn't appreciate photos. of their diesel locomotives smoking.

Who knows?!

Ralph

Same here.

 

I don't own any smoking diesels, but if I did, they'd be smoke on like my steamers.  But most of my steamers are off for now because the units need some work.  Most are louder than the engine sounds.

All of my engines smoke. I love this feature and so do visitors to the layout. I have a good exhaust system, so even though eight smoking engines are running at the same time, there is never a problem with smoke accumulation.

I have the opposite problem, my wife usually gives me the migrane

I have mostly diesels and I turned them all off because it looks like white steam is coming out, not black diesel exhaust!

 

Don't steam engines make both smoke (from the coal) and steam at the same time?

 

I always run my allegheny with the smoke unit on, though I think it is making steam (????)

If it can, I let it.
Only have one diesel that smokes.
My TMCC k-line RS-3 hammerhead.
Smokes just enough. Running left overs from the Christmas layout.
Hot Chocolate.

I smoke 'em if I got 'em.  That being said, all of my steamers and all of my diesels all of the time if they have smoke units. 

USSR diesels smoke bigtime..

here a new term for us train smoke and fire..

 

Yup, agreed

I have both types of locomotives.  With the one's that smoke they re Legacy so I can smoke when I feel like it or turn them off.  I believe I have the best of both worlds.

 

Steve, Lady and Tex

Well-fired and well-coaled steamers produced little to nearly no smoke, and if

the weather was mild the steam was sometimes not visible, either. (Not to insult

anybody, but the white stuff was steam, the dark stuff the smoke.)

 

For the above reason I use a smoke unit when it works, but I do not mind a model steamer that does not have smoke for one reason or another. I do not recall ever "repairing" a smoke unit, except adjusting the wick and changing the motor direction on my Lionel Niagara.

 

It's not really "smoke", anyway - its oil vapor. Harmless. There is no combustion going on,

unless you have flame coming out, in which case you should shut it off and fix it. Or

just leave it off. 

At home I usually use the smoke units on steam engines, very seldom on diesels. It's more trouble to keep the diesels primed and operating. Most diesels require a funnel to add smoke fluid, and in many or most operations you have multiple units, and multiple stacks per unit meaning you have to blow down the stacks more often to clear bubbles. And, in a small room multiple smoke units fill up the place faster than the single unit of a steamer. 

 

At the club/museum I sometimes run the smoke units on the diesels, at least for the first half hour to an hour. Then I usually shut them off because it just gets to be too much hassle to keep them running than it's worth. If I get tied up in an operational problem on the layout, or talking to members of the public, I'm running a risk of burning out multiple smoke units if I don't keep them all filled. 

No smoke here also. All my power units are pre- 1934. If anything smokes, something is very wrong.

My steam engines..oh yeah but never on my diesels.

Smoke,smoke,smoke! I think it a important part of the trains.

Fred