Alan, Black smoke is just unburned carbon going up the smokestack, indicating incomplete/insufficient combustion. The white "smoke" is condensed steam. Charles Weston
--- On Mon, 10/22/12, Alan Lambert <[email protected]> wrote: From: Alan Lambert <[email protected]> Subject: Re: {S-Scale List} Re: The "York" Conversation To: "[email protected]" <[email protected]> Date: Monday, October 22, 2012, 2:05 PM From: Alan Lambert Fort Worth, Texas Ed, I always thought that the big black smoke cloud meant the steam engine was aplying more horsepower to move up certain grade conditions but after leveling off the smoke turned white or disapeared as horsepower was met for flat rail and speed conditions. Ant steam engineers out there want to add coments. Alan Lambert From: Ed <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Sent: Monday, October 22, 2012 12:33 PM Subject: {S-Scale List} Re: The "York" Conversation --- In mailto:S-Scale%40yahoogroups.com, "richgajnak" <rustytraque@...> wrote: > > Couple of quick points: > > --- In mailto:S-Scale%40yahoogroups.com, "Ed" <Loizeaux@> wrote: > > You are right -- the prototype has large billows of puffing smoke. Most > > models have wispy wimpy white (not dark) smoke that is a poor > > representation of the real thing. > > Smoke on a steam locomotive indicates poor combustion. Ideally, the fireman > should have a light haze coming out of the stack, fairly close to the white > stuff than spews out of models. > > Of course, in the real world, conditions cange often and visible billows of > dark smoke happened quite frequently. > > I admit, when I fired at a railroad museum, we would "showboat" by making > smoke for the admiring masses, but running out in the boonies away form the > general public, I tried to keep my stack as clean as possible. > > > Yes, I agree -- as long as accurate dimensions and slow smooth operation > > are not sacrificed in the process. We should ask MTH and Lionel for better > > smoking features. Perhaps a volume button and a color button -- black, > > gray or white. Once it becomes realistic, I would agree it is a major > > feature that will be much in demand. Right now, most scale modelers do not > > care that much about smoke. > > > > Cheers....Ed L. > > > Black smoke was covered by the O gaugers several times. Smoke fliud doesn't > lend itself to "tinting." In order to make black or dark gray smoke, you're > going to need to have dark particulate matter coming out of the smoke units. > > It's bad enough cleaning the spew of the smoke fluid up. Do you really want > prototypical soot all over your railroad and train room? > > Rich G(ajnak) >
