To dry ice or not to dry ice!

[Lee U]

After 20 yrs of taping/editing I now will get to try my hand at creating mystical "smoke on the floor" for a presentation. The problem is I need to know a good solution that is easy on the budget. Renting a machine maybe the answer, buying one is out of the question, however I believe there is an easier answer waiting to be suggested. I'm all ears..Thanx. Lee

[prospector]

I see these fog/smoke machines for sale about this time of year in WalMart.
Maby a few judisiuosly placed?
Perhaps?....

[Keith Nealy]

Fog & smoke machines are for aerial fog and smoke. For a blanket of fog that hugs the floor just use a block of dry ice and a bucket of warm water.

$20 max. be careful. Dry ice can burn your skin. where gloves. check the yellow pages for "dry ice."

This one is easy.

Happy haunting...

aloha,

Keith

[Mr Rid]

There are very cheap fog machines available and a particular type of juice for them that creates a ground hovering fog.

[wvp]

yeah, dry ice is the way to go. see in done many times. you may need to have several "stations" and people with pitchers of water to get the effect quickly and evenly over a large area.
it won't last too long though - but i imagine you only need it for a few minutes.

[Bobt]

Hi,
Be careful of the wet floors with Dry Ice.

I used to play in a rock band that the mist can make the
floor a bit slipery if the surface is hard.
I like it better than the chemical fog which smells a bit.
The dry ice looks more natural as far as effect goes.
You might consider a small fan running on low to direct the fog.
Now that brought back a memory.
We used 35 gal drums we got for free somewhere with
a vent fan mounted to the lid and dryer hose leading it to the
stage. Drop in Dry I ice use fan and magic fog..
We used 2 of these for a 35 foot stage area.
Turn the fan off and cover the hose and no more fog..

Bob

[bbeanan]

Take a "normal" smoke machine and a ice chest cut a 3" dia hole in both ends of the Ice chest one high and one low. Bolt a fan to both holes so that the high hole sucks into the ice chest and the low blow out. Then attach a 3" dryer hose to both fans (the foil type for the high side). Fill the ice chest with either ice or dry ice which has been broken up. Then fire the smoke machine into the hose that is connected to the high side.
Chilling the smoke will make it lie low and it will work with any smoke machine. There is low lying smoke juice that will make it last a bit longer but it still needs to be chilled....

Now for option #2
Dry Ice
get a metal trash can with a lid (55 gal. barrel works best but can be hard to find) Now buy 2 or 3 or 4 or more hot water heater elements. Pop holes in the bottom and mount those elements around the bottom. Wire them together so that the current draw is no more that 15 amps. (wire in a GFI for protection) per line. Seal each of the elements with high temp. silicone. Now in the lid pop a hole in the dead center which is about 7/8" dia. get a large metal basket that will fit into the can. Using a 3/4" flange and a flat plate mount the flange to the center of the basket, screw in a 5' long 3/4" pipe into the flange insert into hole in lid (drill a few holes in the 3/4" pipe to put a large pin though to hold it up when you do not want fog). next pop a 3" hole in the lid and mount a fan to it blowing out, attach a dryer hose to that. Fill with water heat it up fill basket with dry ice (pellets work really well). Pull the pin and drop into the hot water and you have fog...
Some additional things which help make better fog... make a door in the lid so that you can keep the lid attached to fill the basket with dry ice. use 2 small water pumps mounted to the bottom one will circulate the water so that it keep a uniform temp. the other is connected to some small sprinklers mount to the lid to spray HOT water from the bottom onto the dry ice.

With dry ice remember it will burn your flesh so use gloves. Keep it in a tightly closed ice chest with some burlap around it (the air will make it melt faster) And never ever never place dry ice into a 2 liter soda bottle and add some water screw the top on tight and throw it FAR FAR away... never do this... he he he...

By the way at one time in my life I spent the better part of 5 years designing and building the worlds largest haunted house....

[bbeanan]

Here is a good site...
http://www.dryiceinfo.com/fog.htm

[Lee U]

Thanks very much. I knew I could find solutions here even though it's not Newtek related, yet it is, I will be capturing it on my 4.6. I thought about making a container with a fan, but hadn't consider using the hose. Thanks everybody. Good ideas...Lee

[Thalek]

Just remember to maintain good ventilation.

[Lee U]

Thalek, OK, breathe good air. Thanks
Brett, Good ideas, I'll give them a try. And I won't forget not to use a soda bottle. Just in case I forget, how much time do I have before it becomes a "Pop" bottle? he,he,he.

[bbeanan]

that is the tricky part anywhere from 2 seconds to 2 minutes... um not that I have ever done it ina large empty parking lot...

[D3Cast]

Dry Ice would be a great name for a band.

[Lee U]

Well, I ended up just using a large shallow pan with hot water and a 8 lb chunk of ice dropped in at the proper time. Vapors spilled out out from under a cloth drapped table and down over the side. Not as heavy as I would like to have seen, but it wasn't bad for the first time. I am going to now look at building a device for our needs. I thought about the bottle trick instead of canned thunder, the pastor wouldn't let me do it...something about old people with heart conditions...just kidding. Thanks all..Lee