Just venting here so pardon me…I’ve put away my bottles of smoke fluid and my eye dropper. I don’t give a flying fart if its LGB, Aristo, USATrains or whatever. One day the F’n units smoke and the next day they don’t and then they do again. I give up. Screw smoke. I’ve run with out it before and will continue to do so now.
Rather annoying, eh?
I use one of my Aristo’s fairly heavily. Some days, it works a champ, going 40, 45, 50 minutes on a load of fluid and turning itself off. Other days, it insists on turning itself off every couple minutes no matter what you do. For a while I thought it was related to humidity, but then it was sunny, clear and warm Sunday and I wound up with fluid dripping from the bottom of the loco 'cause I didn’t realize it had only been 10 minutes since last time I filled it. Grrr…
Rudolf Jager said:awwwwwwww just set on fire like in your avatar pic! :) they'll smoke for sure!
Just venting here so pardon me.......................I've put away my bottles of smoke fluid and my eye dropper. I don't give a flying fart if its LGB, Aristo, USATrains or whatever. One day the F'n units smoke and the next day they don't and then they do again. I give up. Screw smoke. I've run with out it before and will continue to do so now.
C. Nelson said:Same problem---the fire eats up the plastic so fast that the smoke don't last long at all :)Rudolf Jager said:awwwwwwww just set on fire like in your avatar pic! :) they'll smoke for sure!
Just venting here so pardon me.......................I've put away my bottles of smoke fluid and my eye dropper. I don't give a flying fart if its LGB, Aristo, USATrains or whatever. One day the F'n units smoke and the next day they don't and then they do again. I give up. Screw smoke. I've run with out it before and will continue to do so now.
The Aristo units work fine, but like Tom said, they come and go. I keep burning them up also.
Working on an improvement to that.
I don’t have a circuit diagram of it, but it seems to detect overtemperature by measuring the resistance of the heater. But the resistance of a heater changes very little, needing a pretty precise measurement.
I’m hiding a diode inside the heater to measure the temperature directly and building a temperature regulator to hold a constant temperature instead of turning it off. This way, when it runs out of fluid, or something blocks the intake, the circuit just throttles back the power to keep the temperature the same. When you add fluid, it adds power to keep the element hot. If, for some reason, it mistakes the temperature, it will get itself sorted instead of turning off and waiting for you. I think Aristo’s runs at a temperature of about 325F and turns it off at 330.
Does it work? I’ll let you know.
Tom Ruby said:
Working on an improvement to that.I don’t have a circuit diagram of it, but it seems to detect overtemperature by measuring the resistance of the heater. But the resistance of a heater changes very little, needing a pretty precise measurement.
I’m hiding a diode inside the heater to measure the temperature directly and building a temperature regulator to hold a constant temperature instead of turning it off. This way, when it runs out of fluid, or something blocks the intake, the circuit just throttles back the power to keep the temperature the same. When you add fluid, it adds power to keep the element hot. If, for some reason, it mistakes the temperature, it will get itself sorted instead of turning off and waiting for you. I think Aristo’s runs at a temperature of about 325F and turns it off at 330.
Does it work? I’ll let you know.
Thats interesting Tom! Do keep us updated please.
Tom, are you going to attach the diode to the wirewound resistor/heating element? In direct contact? If you don’t I have a hard time understanding how you monitor the temp since there is a fan blowing all the time. I know you cannot put a diode “inside” the heater, since it is a ceramic/fiberglas core with nichrome wire wound around it.
Just wondering… and I agree, sensing actual temperature would help… the temp does change quite a bit when it runs out of fluid though, and the current draw does change measurably.
It would be nice to have a “calibration” button or procedure on these… with a microprocessor, if you said “you are cold right now” then maybe it could calibrate for the specific characteristics of it’s own heating element, and also you could accommodate changes in the heater over it’s lifespan.
Regards, Greg