This is my adaptation of Chuck Rice's Fog Chiller. Some of the pictures and instructions below were taken from Chuck's page since...well... I couldn't have said it any better. I have a letter in to Chuck asking permission to use some of his pictures and descriptions. Let's hope he says yes seeing as I already posted them up here. Thanks in advance Chuck!
THE FOG CHILLER:
All fog machines put out hot fog. Since heat rises, so does the fog. Cold air (or Fog) will hug the ground, so if you want ground hugging fog, you have to chill it after it comes out of your fogger.
Materials Needed: All items can be purchased at the local hardware store. The copper and the pump is the expensive stuff, The rest is cheap.
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READ BEFORE PROCEEDING:
I can make no warranties on the methods and procedures presented here. I have built this device and am happy with the results but your tools and skills are unknown to me. Proceed at your own risk!
If there is a step or procedure here that you do not understand, Email me and I will help you out.
OK, LET"S GO!!
This design uses 2 hand made soft copper coils that get placed inside a stovepipe (black tube in picture). The coils are connected via plastic tubing to a water pump that is placed in an ice chest full of water and ice. The cold water is pumped thru the tubes and returns to the ice chest where the ice chills the water again.
To build the inner coil, I took 25
feet of 1/4 inch soft copper tubing and bent it around a
inch and a half scrap piece of PVC pipe. The soft copper
bends well enough that it is easy to coil it around the
pipe. As you can see I had a little left over.
For the outer coil, I did the same using 50 feet of
3/8 inch copper and a 3 inch scrap piece of PVC. (Your
hands will hurt after coiling this bigger copper!)
Once the coils were made, I pulled the scrap PVC out
of them and spread the apart a bit like a spring till
they were the same length as the stove pipe.
Now slide the smaller coil into the
bigger coil. (see below)
You'll notice how I used the wire ties to hang the inner
coil inside the larger outer coil. This is kind of
a pain at first but this will allow the fog to pass in
and around the coils and cool it even better. Do this
the entire length of the coils. After you have the 2
coils hanging together, you can do the exact same thing
with the coils and the stove pipe. Hand them
inside as close to center of the stove pipe as possible
using the wire ties. This is a step I blew off but am
thinking I should have done it. Look at Chuck's picture
below. I think he is seeing better results with
his suspended inside rather than mine just laying inside
the pipe.
Chuck's Chiller (below 2 pictures)
Now, connect the inner and outer
coil with a short piece of plastic tubing and pipe
clamps.
On the other end, attach longer plastic tubing from the
coils to the pump and ice chest.
You can add a handle
and feet but I stopped here cause I was too anxious to
fire it up!
Now comes the fun.
Put your fog machine into one end of the chiller.
Fill your cooler full of ice and water and allow the
water to get damn cold! I know it sucks to wait
1/2 hour or so when your dying to try it out but it
doesn't work unless the water is ice cold. After it's
cold, fire up your pump and allow a few moments to get
some good cold water circulating through the copper.
Feel the copper and you'll know that the ice water has
flowed through when the copper is good and cold. Of
course, you should also have water flowing back into
your cooler.
FIRE UP THAT SMOKE MACHINE!!!
The beauty of this design is that you can blast hot fog through your new creation all day. The fact that ICE WATER is constantly flowing through, keeps the copper ice cold at all times!
Here is my Chiller in action. Sorry for the so-so pictures. When I took them, I had little intention of using them for anything but showing a friend. I'll take better ones in a few weeks.
Here
you can see that I used a rag or shirt to clog up the
end with the fog machine to make sure ALL the fog goes
through the chiller. (some was sneaking out the same
side un-chilled) Notice also my bucket of ice and the
lines running to it.
Here
you can see my entire setup. You notice the
previous mentioned rag on the fog machine end. I also
added a rag to "slow" the escape of the fog from within
the chiller. My fog machine is so forceful
that some of the fog was coming out un-chilled.
This method (though stupid looking) works very well.
As
you can see, it works pretty well. Big hunks of thick
fog just billow from the stove pipe! COOL!
My only complaint is that even after chilled, eventually
the fog gets warm and rises. Indoors this is
noticeable. If used indoors I get an exaust fan going to
suck out the high stuff.
So, there you have it. The 'Kick The Fog" version of Chuck Rice's Fog Chiller.
Make sure you visit the Halloween Forum to discuss this and other projects!