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Fog machine revival - fixing foggers with little or no output

121K views 137 replies 51 participants last post by  corey872 
#1 ·
I've had an American DJ Fog Hog for 10 years. It has been perfect in every way, good output + reliable. I have never done any sort of cleaning and it has worked perfect... until last year. A few days before my haunt I brought it out of storage and it worked great for the first few cycles, then the output decreased dramatically. After a more minutes it was putting out almost no fog, I could hear the pump humming though. I called AMDJ asking about buying a replacement motor but they were no help at all. I tried running distilled water and vinegar through it and it just got worse.

Later I found a PDF about disassembling the pumps and cleaning them, so I tried it. I cleaned the piston, spring, and housings with a rag and water - oiled them and put it back together. It began outputting at a higher volume, but the next day it was back to nothing. So, I repeated the process only this time instead of oil I used Vaseline. I brought the fogger out again this year and it worked, however the hose from the tank to the pump was leaking (it was dry rotted).

I went to Home Depot and bought the closest thing that I could find, it is a little larger than the original hose though. WHAM! The output is every bit of what it was when I bought it 10 years ago, possibly ever more.

Overall I spent about $3 and a few hours.

Here is a link to the PDF that I used - essentially I only looked at the pictures to see how the pump would come apart. I used my own cleaning method - http://wolfstone.halloweenhost.com/_LocalMirror/How to Resurrect a Fogger.pdf

charlie
 
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#39 ·
Well...If they built 'em right the first time, i.e. american made, they wouldnt need to 'fix' them so much.

and lets talk about this sealant. your 'hot rodder' guy used it as a header gasket!?!? Wooo-boy. I'm not too sure 'bout that one. Hopefully it was a emergency repair and has replaced it since.?? (I'm also the Director of the Florida LX Club... Chargers, Magnums (mine), 300's, Challengers)
 
#40 ·
Nope he actuallly used the stuff a his gasket for perm, he couldnt get the machine shop to cut him the thickness of copper he wanted in time for some big race so he went to our supply wall and helped himself.
Still works just fine and dandy to this day not one black mark and he runs his stuff rich as can be so you would be able to spot a leak a mile away.

Ive got a 74 Nova - Purple ( The Wife Said So ) - SS Aluminum Craigers - Straight Lake 4in Side Pipes - Hooker Comp FL Headers - 383 Blue Print Stroker Block - SLP Aluminum PandP Heads - Dual Matched 4150 Holleys w/ 671 B&M Intercooled Blower 18 psi - Tubbed 4inch in Rear with Moser rear setup - Turbo 400 Trans Cottman - 12 point cage - Aluminum floor and guts - Wilwood brakes front + rear and a hidden go go juice bottle just in case.
It looks heavy untill you get close then you can see the work.
Ever since I started the business I havent had time to go racing ( wife still drives it ocassionally though ) every time I drive it I get in trouble, LOL!
I still cant get the car to launch straight, once the wheels come up it pulls hard to the left.:eek:
 
#41 ·
Severe thread jack.... sorry guys.

WOW!! :drool:
Until about a year ago there wasn't any tuning abilities for these cars. Diablosport stepped up and the superchargers have been flyin' off the shelves! just wish *I* could afford it! :(
All I've done to my 4200+ pound beast, is throw in a cam, JBA hi-flow cats, SLP catback, AirHammer intake, and tuning of course. (5.7 hemi) Lifting the tires off this thing is only gonna be done with a jack!
 
#43 ·
fogger made it about 2 hours and I suspect the gasket failed. I accidentally ran it dry for about 5 minutes and refilled it, about 30min after that it had quit working and was out of fluid again, emptied it's self out via the inside, took it apart afterward and looks like that's what happened anyway. Still, got through the majority of the haunt and that thing had the WHOLE yard tough to see through, as well as up and down the street a few times.
 
#46 · (Edited)
You wont get decent proformance out of it untill you hack the crap out it, bigger pump, trash the transformer, seal up the gasket properly.
The heaters are good long life heaters with repairable cleanout, you just have to have the right sealant to seal up the block and the pump is doo doo.
Halloween isnt really over yet and the emails are already starting to come in for repairs on foggers on our website, LOL!
 
#49 ·
Sorry...typing with one hand is time consuming...especially when there's cleanup involved! LOL! Next time, I'll just swap out keyboards... :D

I'd be interested in a parts list of your hacked fogger. Most likely can use one of these windshield washer pumps (or goto a fuel pump! LOL!) and dial it back a bit using a flow control like you have done. Actually...to go 'cheap' I wonder if a 'pond pump' would work?? HD and/or Lowes are dumping those type of 'seasonal' things right now!

What *I* found, while crackin' open all the 400W's and the 1000's ...is that they all use the same little pump in there. same EXACT numbers, etc labeled on them. So I repaired my 1000w pretty easy. Sure woulda figured they would put a slightly larger capacity pump in there - but nope! :rolleyes:

this year I had 20knot winds to deal with - yippie. Although for the Party we had on Saturday, I just cranked all the fog machines up!! LOL! It went with the dragon/gargoyl/rennaissance theme... Was pretty cool with all the yard torches lit-up, and the obvious lighting that happened. Wasn't quite the expected turn-out, but the hundred or so that *did* show up, certainly appreciated the efforts. - i.e. 5am Sunday :googly:
 
#50 ·
We havent found a pond pump yet that would work, short of the bigger ones where you have to submerge it into the fog soulition container, which at some point you have to be practical, but then again look at what madness were doing.
The fuel pump will work to a certian extent you want to use the older electric low psi ones for carb injected engines not the electronic fuel injection ones off your wifes car they usually put out over 60psi and at that rate youll be shooting fog juice from one end of the house to the other ( Tried it, LOL!) , you have two options knock it down with resistors, or even a dimmer switch but then you will loose the pressure needed to keep the hot juice from comming back at the pump.
The parts list is as follows for the Evil Fogger.
1 - Section of 1/4 OD copper tube aluminum would be better we just use what we have in stock to repair the higher end ones.
1 - 1/4 OD compression 2 way adjust valve ( water supply adjuster I think )
1 - Constant heater Block.
1 - Pump prefrence is 1/4 outlet to insure you have the flow capability to cool your line.
2 - 90 Deg. 1/4 2 way compression elbows.
1 - 1/4 2 way connector
1 - section of high temp gasket sealant, copper seal wil not work but for a few hours, you need something like deacon 3300 or if you really wanted to take a few hours and cut and trace a gasket from a sheet of HT silicone then you have more patience and time than me.
1 - storage tank
1 - Tube bender for 1/4 tubeing
1 - PINK TEFLON TAPE - The white stuff get broke down pretty easy by fog juice the pink holds up a lot better.
1 - Fiber glass wrapping ( local Hardware stores carry this in winter by the truck loads BUT YOU MUST USE THE YELLOW NOT THE PINK PANTHER, the yellow is the old itchy real deal fiberglass insulation.
1 - Board to mount all this madness to.
1 - Pump the pump in the pic is our replacment pump for the $2k ROSCO foggers.
 
#56 ·
Im in, let me know what I owe ya, I can send ya a paypal.
Remeber the ones were looking for are the .030 .035 .040 ( Memory serves me correct i think that is the lowest NOS or ELdebrock Makes ) with those three we will be able to do what ever we want, here at the shop we actually have a dec. drill bit set that starts at .020 and goes all the way up to 2.0 so we can take those jets and make what ever the heck we want, not to metion if you need a pill milled out it can be put in a letter and mailed for change.
AHHHH! SImplicity at it's finest!
Im pretty sure the three jet sizes should be real close to what were needing and worse case if theyre too small we can percision increase them as we see fit.
This will be rather nice cause now we can get rid of the adjustable valve on the evil fogger, dont get me wrong it's nice to be able to adjust on the fly, but IT IS TOUCHY, IF you go one hair over you could be dumping out too much juice, the jets are surely the way to go.
Espically since most of the big names are doing similar stuff but they just hide the stuff so it's not very visible
Now that I think about it, even the stock brass inlet on the constant lite fx has a step down inside of it, I dont remember if it is built into the fitting or not but I do remember it is not adjustable and it was way to hard to try to drill out from two different angles and get them right so we canned the stock intake inlet fitting all together.

Let me know what you find from the guys as far as to what they have.
Make sure you check with JEGS SUMMIT ELEDBROCK or NOS Price guide to make sure they arnt screwin ya over.
 
#64 ·
Very seldom do we see snow machines, most theaters and venues use the big foam stuff, every now and then you get the people who have unlimited money and stick a few snow machines on theyre house so the guest inside during the holidays look out and see snow.
Other than that we never have much call for big end snow machines.
Hell last time we worked on one was like 2 or 3yrs ago.
 
#69 · (Edited)
HEY MONTY, FOUND SOMETHING FOR YA!

EBAY Item number: 110306163562

I just asked the guy how he knows that the heater is 1000w, there are no stampings on the block or bracket which makes me think that might be for some of the lite fx 400w or 700w blocks.
So I wouldnt grab them up just yet, but im keeping an eye on them, if he can prove they are 1000w I will take surely take a few.
 
#73 ·
Yeap! and thats why his last reply was ' I have no information I can release '

Well! Isnt that nice!
Lets sell a product, call it what what we think will sell and provide no proof, man im in the wrong business, sounds like the guy worked politics before he was on ebay.
 
#72 ·
On another note.... I've got the jets!!! I've got two .016's and two .022's. Shoot me an addy and I'll send 'em to you!! - I'll keep one of the .022's for myself tho ;)

and lemme tell ya the Wilson Manifold is a SICK shop to go to!! WAY too many toys to play with!! Monster parts to play with.... All I could do is drool everywhere... Clean-up general production area....and R&D dept.... ANd nitrous dept...etc. 5-axis machines carving away at blocks of aluminum like CRAZY! Which starts the mind wandering... :evilgrin: Anyone sliced one of these heaters open??
 
#75 ·
got it!! mail already went ou ttoday...I'll get 'em out Monday. SO get a machine broken down, and get ready... Also, I can get the "plumbing" parts too. I'd be all aluminum, and would have really cool fittings!

Custom heater blocks ???? That's why I asked if you've ever cut one of the heaters open to see what's really going on inside?? I'd DEFINITELY need a pic and details. Maybe create a larger heater block to stay hotter longer..... ;)
 
#76 ·
got it!! mail already went ou ttoday...I'll get 'em out Monday. SO get a machine broken down, and get ready... Also, I can get the "plumbing" parts too. I'd be all aluminum, and would have really cool fittings!

Custom heater blocks ???? That's why I asked if you've ever cut one of the heaters open to see what's really going on inside?? I'd DEFINITELY need a pic and details. Maybe create a larger heater block to stay hotter longer..... ;)
Im probably goin aluminum myself, we have acumilated a lot of that here latly for soem reason.
Plus copper is getting too pricey to be chopping up for goffing off.

Let me see if we have any heaters that have gone kaput usually we tossem cause space is limited to keep too much junk around but im sure we have something.
 
#82 ·
fogger newby

We also have always said we do Halloween much better than we do xmas.
As such we tried to add a fogger to our setup this year. It was a cheapo Crazy Fogger picked up at one of the Halloween stores. (I know you get what you pay for). It worked for a bit then stopped putting out.
It is not clogged as I can force squeeze some juice through the tube and it will spit out fog but the pump wont draw anything through. I have opened it up to examine the pump and kicked it on. I hear it buzzing but it doesnt pump.
I figure the impeller or diaphram in it is frozen.
Any way to fix that?
It is labeled
Micro pump DS8 Type 40DSB 120v 20w
Tried to find such on the web but no luck
Is it worth even chasing?
Is there another pump I can sub or should I trash it and try to step to a more expensive unit
 
#84 ·
I just wanted to add...two years later...that Rosco is a professional fog machine manufacturer (as well as other theatrical things). The F-100 is a staple theatrical fogger. Although I am not as knowledgeable about fog juice as I wish I was, I can only assume that the Rosco fog juice is of the highest quality in existence. That said, I should comment that the more I research foggers and fog juice, especially the cheapo Party City kind, the more I learn that the pump and heater expect certain qualities to the juice, in particular at what temperature it atomizes at.
 
#85 ·
I too am having the same problem. With 2 of the Chauvet 1250's. The pimp just makes a weird buzzing noise with very little (looks like its at idle) smoke coming out. So I took them apart and opened the pump and found really nothing wrong or out of the ordinary and just re-installed. For what ever reason it now makes more noise and has Zero fog coming out of it. Alls I did was clean the pump and re-installed it the same exact way I took them apart. Any help?
 
#86 ·
Manual tests.

I am very familiar with this pump. You should be able to manually test the pump. If you wish you can send me the pump and I will test for you. I also have an extra pump for parts. PM me if you want me to have a look at your pump. One thing to be careful on this pump. Make sure you put the correct spring in its location. If you switch the springs it will not work.
 
#87 ·
Hmmm...Perhaps I may have switched the springs around but I am pretty damn sure I did it the correct way. Cause I had the other one right next to me to make sure i did everything correctly. But i can take pictures of it disassembled in order, or yeah, I could send them to you too. That'd be cool. Thanks.
 
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