Roberts Fogger: The original DIY Fog Chiller without ice
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- Опубликовано: 26 сен 2019
- A demonstration of generating low lying fog from a standard fog machine and ordinary tap water. And a little something extra.
I hope this inspires everyone to build something awesome!
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Oh, man. I'm an engineer. Studied fluid mechanics for 7 years and spent 15 years in the business. I'm a Halloween haunter for at least the past decade, and I'm embarrassed to say I didn't consider this. But intuitively I know you are right on, before I even build the thing. This is great. Thanks so much for sharing. Like you said, we're all better for more info. I was looking for a new project for next year, and now I'm onto it.
If I can recommend a serious, but low budget fogger, I'm more than happy with my Chauvet Hurricane 1100. I've had mine for 6 or 7 years with no issues. Run it a few minutes in April or MAy to keep everything loose and you're good to go. At 700W you don't need to dedicate an entire circuit to your fogger, and it produces a ton of CFM with little juice used. Most importantly, though, you said it: quality fog juice is critical.
And I love that you gave it your name. When the ToTers' parents ask how I do it, I'll be sure to mention it's a "simple Robert's fogger setup," like the entire haunting industry knows what that is. Awesome work. Thanks for the vid.
Well thank you! So much... what a compliment.!
My background is electronics - This project was just another in my neverending need to tinker and iterate. It was born out of a "what if" line of thinking. Truly, I thought it would condense the fog so quickly that it would just end up in the tank with the rest of the water. I had only a small bit of knowledge of how fog machines worked. I knew it wasn't smoke and that the point of the heater was to convert the water in the fluid to steam, causing the glycerin to atomize.... or something like that. I never expected the fog to be so much more dense nor did I expect it to fall and stay low lying as effectively as it does.
Dude, I was kinda shaking with excitement the first time it worked!
My next thought was to package it and make a ton of money off of it. LOL. Maybe I should've. But its been a blast seeing how other approach this project!
Please share your build, if you wouldn't mind.
Thank you for watching!
This will be forever know as the Roberts Fogger system
That would be kinda cool. 💀🎃
My husband and I already call it like that! And "Roberts fogger" sounds very much pirate to us! :) ;)
This is an INCREIBLE idea / discovery. One thing that can make this even simpler is buying an ultrasonic mister that comes with a float ring. That keeps it at the right level in the water, eliminating the need for the internal bucket and pump. Just fill up your main tank and drop it in.
I can't wait to build one of these. Such a game changer.
I love this idea! Less parts = more reliable.
I'm going to look for this!
If you want to have the Venturi effect without the gap, start with a 45 degree “Y” joint.
Love the process you used to invent an awesome practical scene prop. The Robert's fog machine is a winner. WHOAAH
Thank you very much! It's been a fun project to tinker with.
This is brilliant, and exactly one of the reasons the internet was created. I am building two of these: one for a home tiki bar, and another for Halloween. You, sir, are brilliant. Also: "Alas, Poor Yorick." 😂 Thank you for contributing the the greater bandwidth of fx knowledge.
All hail the Roberts Fogger!!!
Yay! Somebody mentions the Yorik reference. Lol
Thank you so much for the kind words!
This is kind of my way of 'paying it back' so to speak. I can't remember if I mentioned in the video, but so many of my early Halloween projects were based off of others sharing their own projects on the internet before the days of RUclips.
I am intrigued how you will be using this with a tiki bar. I'd love to see a video of it in action if that's okay.
Thank you again, you made my day.
@@intocoasters I will definitely keep you posted. I need to start sharing some of my FX hacks and I like how you are paying it forward. That's how the global knowledge community works. Thanks again. I was approached recently about low-lying fog and I had recommended the old 55 gallon barrel with hot water muffin fan and dry ice, but this is a game changer.
This is similar to when using ground fog on wet grass. There were times I would wet down the grass on Halloween so the fog that came out of my chillers would glue to the grass for a long time, even in stronger winds. In a no-wind situation, using Froggy's Fog juice, the chilled fog would stay in the grass for quite a while. The effect is really cool when you walk through it.
I have never wet the grass - I did not know that was a thing.... I can't wait to try that! I have relentless wind in my neighborhood.
@@intocoasters I'd never known anyone else to use that trick before. I noticed the effect, by accident, after an evening rainstorm. Fog is terrible in active rain, but wet grass is a fog magnet. Thanks for your chiller idea, by-the-way! I'm going to have to play around with it; see how compact I can make it and still be effective.
I was a lighting and SFX designer for live theater for a decade (until covid decimated that industry overnight) but I put a lot of fog and haze on many stages, and there is really no good manual for this. I second Froggy's Fog juice and won't use anything else. They have mixes for everything you need and you can't get most effects you need using just 1 type of fog machine. Half the battle is using juice with right amount propylene glycol, glycerin and water, from thick low lying fog to "steam" jets to thin light beam catching haze. the other half of the fight is the right application. which basically boils down to time after heating to hit a fan, volume of juice from the element to the dispersal fan, and direction of flow/Elevation of the outlet. Robert makes a very point about not shoving the nozzle in the tube but leave a few inches of space. This because is because after coming out of the heating element is ridiculously hot and a concentrated mass of atomized moisture that needs to immediately cool down to expand. If you've ever vaped before its the equivalent of opening up the airflow for bigger clouds. when you shove the nozzle in the tube it doesn't get that immediate cooling effect and barely expands.
The water mist idea is great, but a big no no on a stage where 20-30 people might be doing a huge dance number. But the key point is forcing the fog to compress in a large volume area (large is relative) and being forced to take the longest reasonable pathway before being pull out of the box via fan. the way I alway did this for a low lying effect was to have the fogger on top of the box(I always liked using a cooler to control the temp) piping it in from the top, as Robert is doing, but the inlet pipe went almost to the bottom. I would use regular water ice (As opposed to carbon or dry-Ice which is the pain in the ass thing ultimately I think robert is trying to avoid) that sat in the upper half of the cooler on a grate. Essentially this made three cooling point. The first inside the inlet pipe which is chilled by the ice, then inside the cooler unit, where it compresses the volume as its forced through the bulk of the ice and cooled down, and the through the outlet which starts near the top of the cooler and does a 90 turn at the bottom prior to exiting near the bottom. It takes a few seconds to get going but once the cooler is at max capacity. Yadda Yadda Yadda, end result is thick, cold fog that fills up ground to knee level on a dry flat stage. In wet grass it would stick to the ground for maximum creep effect. This design would work pretty well without the ice too.
Roberts design is working like a bong, pulling the smoke though the vapor which cools it, making it less harsh, but also producing A LOT more clouds. Chilled fog is kinda misleading. Chilled fog doesn't mean it gets as cold as the ice or water or whatnot. In fact if it got even close to that cold it would liquefy again. But the temperature of the fog directly affects where it will lie in the atmosphere as hotter things want to go up above the colder things. Of course at the same time, hotter things expand more. So there's definitely a balance. There's much more to the art of fog, including fan size. speed and direction theory, barometric pressure, venue venting if indoors, weather if outdoors, persistence of the particulate curtain, fog waterfalls, flameless pyrotechnic effects (using lighting and fog together) beam capture (using lighting and fog in a different way), Moving lights and textured lights, CO2 instant fog chillers, CO2 fire extinguishers as an effect, and that doesn't even include magician acts, music concerts or events on water. And as someone who was a lighting and SFX professor, there is almost no good material or shared information on any of this stuff, outside of the DIYers sharing their info for their home haunts..
so I say thank you Robert for sharing what you've learned. I think everyone has a lightbulb moment when they finally learn about leaving space between the machine out and the cooler inlet. And you don't always have to understand how something works to know it works. Lots of innovation has been stifled by the innovator wasting time figuring out how something works, and much other innovation has happened in the absence of understanding. Hell that probably includes 90% of all medical advances.
Makes sense. Sounds to me like the particles of vaporized glycerin from the fogger pick up extra moisture from the water the misting unit has suspended in the chamber, become larger and therefore slightly heavier, which makes it sink instead of float. Awesome invention!
Thanks man!
That's my guess from observation and what little I have found to read online.
Whatever is happening, it's a pretty cool effect.
I agree. I use this exact setup with just a few Ice cube to get the water to about 40 Degrees F and it works great. And it is at least half the size.
@@jeffallen3382 thank you! This project has been several years of tinkering. I don't remember sequence of events that got me here exactly, but it started with the observation that water misting units always stayed low to the ground regardless of the temperature of the water or the air.
I also noticed when trying different methods of chilling fog that the better results occurred when the fog could physically touch the ice rather than stay isolated from the ice, like through a piece of duct surrounded by ice.
I had tried using three or four single misting units and fog, it never really sank but was noticeably thicker. Just not thick enough apparently.
I saw a pond fogger unit at a hardware store on display and was blown away by the output of that unit. That got me excited to revisit the project you see here.
You don't even know how much this video helps me thank you so much for this! I just finally got my own house and I can finally make my home haunt and THIS is what I needed for advice
This is amazing! Thank you for sharing! I was looking for a way to make a fog screen for my live show! This is perfect. I appreciate the time you’ve put in to this!!
Awesome! Thank you! I'd love to see your project when it's done.
We do props for plays at our church and this is beyond helpful!!! Thank you♥️
Excellent! I hope it helps! Thank you for watching.
WOW thank you so much for showing how it's made, very clever indeed.
Thank you so much!
You, sir, are a true genius!! Thank you so much for sharing!!
Thank you! You are too kind... I just like to experiment a LOT. the trick is to only share the ones that work! LOL
This is brilliant! What a smart and clever way to achieve this without all the frustration of having to constantly refill / replace ice. Well conceived, and well executed! Agreed - this will always be called the Roberts Fogger system for sure!
Thank you so much! Used this for more than 3 hours on Halloween night. I needed to refill the fog machine, but not the water. Lasted the whole night.
The water got warm, but did not seem to affect the cooling ability of the fog.
Thank you!
Genius man! Get that patent ASAP. I believe the moisture is the ticket for sure making it so dense. Thanks for sharing man this is awesome.
Thank you so much!
I have wondered if I can patent this. But then sharing the method kinda defeats the patent.
I have toyed with the idea of selling kits. The misting unit, pump, tray, power supplies, and dimensions to build.
you NEED to get a patton ASAP!!!!
very impressive
This a a great design. Very effective. This is the best fog chiller I have seen so far
Thank you so much! It's been a fun project and I've been tweaking it ever since.
Whoa, this looks so incredibly cool! I've been messing around with fog chillers that use ice, but they don't work very well and use lots and lots of ice, this is a much better solution!
Thank you so much! I hope it does a good job for you if you build it. I'd love to see or hear your results if you do!
Your awesome. I can't wait to try this with my hurricane 1600 fog machine. Thank you
I wouldn't have thought about the Venturi effect. That's a cool application of a physics law!
Very interesting - thanks a ton for the research, testing and posting the video!
One thing you might consider is using a float for the ultrasonic mister. You can typically buy them at stores that sell the misters, or make your own from a piece of foam and a tray to hold the mister. Either way, it would allow the ultrasonic mister to float at the ideal depth - even as the water gets used up. This would eliminate the need/complexity of the pump, second container, second power source, etc.
Thank you! I love this idea! I will certainly explore that. One less power outlet, the better!
Amazing!This is so smart. The 10 head mister might be overkill for some builds so maybe a single one might be enough just to humidify a small tank. This video needs more likes.
Thank you so much!
I was afraid of not having enough mist on demand so I may have over estimated. LoL
You basically made a mini cooling tower for the fog, nice work. Latent heat.
Nice work, buddy! Thank you for sharing your knowledge!
Thank you! I enjoy giving back to the community that has taught me a lot of what I use for Halloween.
Great video with a good explanation about the works!
Thank you!
Sooooooo you made your OWN Chauvet Cumulus... BRIIIILLANT!!!
Similar effect for sure. I'm not sure if it's built quite the same way.
Thank you very much!
I just found this type by Oak Lane Cemetery. Just ordered my parts and plan on the build this weekend. Thanks!
Thank you! I hope it works well for you! I have such a problem with wind, I can only use this indoors. I like the way Oak Lane has it set up - I'm a little envious actually. LOL
Thanks for watching!
Thank you for sharing this ....so Awesome!
You're very welcome and thank you!
Fantastic!!! This is genius!!
So fantastic!!!! Thank you for sharing!!!
You're very welcome! And thank you!
Genius! Great job.
Thank you very much! It's been a fun project.
The fog fluid is a mixture of glycol and water that relies on the heater block to boil the water and shatter the glycol into tiny droplets. I'd guess the extremely hygroscopic dry glycol vapour is attaching to the airborne water droplets and forming heavier glycol and water droplets that sink.
This makes so much sense. Thank you! I didn't really know what happens in a fog machine other than knowing it's not steam, not smoke, so it was something other than a by product of something burning.
Oh... I had to look up hygroscopic. But that really makes sense as to why it's so much thicker and heavier... even cooler to the touch.
Thank you!
100 percent correct
@@lightwerklabs7449 and one could use str8 water if they were so inclined for a greenhouse 🍄 grow could they not?
Hi Clive, Glad to see you here on this site, do you also make Halloween props where you're at, I haven't seen any on your channel, if you do it would be great to see what you cook up.
@@raymitchell9736 Halloween is less full-on here than in America.
This is amazing. Thank You for sharing, I use a fog chiller and I have to use a lot of Ice. This will be so much easier.
Thank you!! I hope this works well for you! I'd love to see how you use it.
Thank you so much for sharing. I have two 10 head misters that my company was trowing away as they "did not work". - Took them and change the small disk and they work excellent now. - Just to overkill will try it with both misters to see what happens. lol
Awesome! I'd love to hear about the result!
OUTSTANDING! I built a standard "tube though ice" ground fogger, but it needs a LOT of ice. This seems to be a far better solution. Ill be trying this on Halloween.
Best of luck, I hope it works awesome for you!
I can confirm this works 100% as shown. My initial tests were indoors using the container I had made into one of the ice fog chillers. It was too cold for the outdoor test. Fog went in horizontally across the top of the mist then out on the opposite end pulled out by a computer fan. Just as in this video the fog dropped and did not rise. The effect was instant so long as the mister was on. I am debating tweaking my existing container to allow the input to come from the top as in this video but I am not sure that it would make a difference in the final fog volume. There is also some wiggle room in the mister depth where higher or lower doesn't make much difference. The amount of condensation coming out with my horizontal system is insane - Noticeable drop in water level with the fan in use so the pump is a must and likely would need some refills in an evening. The big test will be seeing how it works in the colder outdoor setting, but I have no reason to believe it won't work the same way. I'd say this system is a game changer!
This is AWESOME to hear! Thank you for sharing!!
Well done my friend!
Thank you very very much!
This is a really good idea. I've thought about experimenting with a solution like this, but never gotten around to it. Thanks for showing the results you were able to achieve. In addition to providing more water vapor, I suspect the mist is an efficient way to lower the temperature of the output quickly. Though not as cold as ice, the contact area between the mist and the hot gas is probably huge.
The cheapest fog machines rely on the nozzle output mixing with the surrounding air, which is why you see a difference when you do/don't leave a gap before routing the output into a distribution pipe or chiller. Slightly less cheap machines have a fan to bring in outside air to mix. If the heated juice to air mixture is well tuned, I'd expect the gap after the nozzle would be less important.
Depending on the machine, high wattage can be a disadvantage. The electricity is used to heat a bunch of metal, like a coil of copper tubing. As the juice is pumped in, the heat energy is used to vaporize the fog juice, and excess heat energy may be transferred to the vapor itself. Thus the metal cools rapidly in the process and had to be reheated. The higher the wattage, the faster the machine can be ready to produce more fog. But some of the high wattage machines have a tendency to make the metal hotter than necessary, so your vapor can be overheated, increasing it's tendency to rise. A lower wattage machine might not be able to sustain long bursts or might require more time between bursts, but it's less likely to overheat the vapor. The best machine design would have more metal (thermal mass) in the heat exchanger and consume just enough watts to maintain it at the ideal temperature, but that would increase the cost of the machine.
Wow! This is a comprehensive answer - Thank you! I have considered adding ice to the tank or in the tube to bring the temerature down even further... but then I could no longer call it iceless chilling LOL. But it'll be neat to see if the temperature makes enough of a difference to pursue.
Going to try this Great work
Awesome! I'd love to know how well it works for you
Pure brilliance!!
Thank you very much!
Awesome, Thank you for sharing!
Absolutely! Thank you!
Damn good work! I don’t have time this year but next year I may have to try this!
Thank you!
If you do a build, I'd love to see how it turned out!
I have been looking for what chiller design to use. And I think the Roberts Fogger system is a winner.
Very excellent, thank you!
I hope it works well for you, would love to see a video
👍 great job
Awesome! I plan on building one. I learned from reading manuals that this is exactly how the $4,000 professional ground foggers work. This 10 head misters are just incredibly expensive 😕
Thank you. If you do build one, I'd love to see your take on the project.
Really great work. I was never able to get a homemade fog chiller to do what I needed and commercial ones were too expensive. I plan on testing this with a high power Chauvet fogger so I’ll report back how it went. I think the fish tank is going to be the best route here but I have been looking around to see if a large plastic bin would work too. I think it could. I didn’t see any leakage from your glass tank top so it might be worth testing with a large plastic bin.
I would love to hear your results!
I used duct tape on the top for this video - otherwise, there is a lot of fog leaking around the lid.
thats really cool man, thx. i want to try getting this to work in a room with wind so I'll let you know if I find a way to shield air from outside windflow
I look forward to hearing about it! I'm working on a laminar flow box for my fog screen. I'll post a video when it gets finished to see it if was worth the effort.
this makes sense. the hot smoke coming out of the fog machine just amplifies it, not just adding to it.
Good job
Thank you!!
The water tank is the replacement of ice it's still a refrigerant you run the fog through. Ice is standard water just colder. Becomes water after a few hours of running the machine. Now you have the tank to deal with instead of a cooler. Same as a cooler
Great system indeed. I live in Dubai, United Arab Emirates and in October it is still very warm even at night, so I have been using my fog machine with a homemade fog chiller with dry ice in it to get the ground covering effect. But it is not cheap to buy the dry ice and with the heat of the machine in the warm weather I feel like all is turning very hot. Last year we bought the same ultrasonic mist maker that you use in your video. But we received it just before Halloween and were not able to find a satisfying way of getting the thick and covering fog effect. The fog was stuck in the box. I am going to try your now famous "Robert's fog system" although I didn't get the water pump system installation very well. 😆👍🙌
I checked the water pump system, it is very clever Roberts! Now I will run some tests with ultrasonic mist makers only and no fog liquid to compare. I am thinking 3 blocks of 10 heads in a big box with the fans on the top. I want to cover some ground and would like it to stay low. I tried this morning with a block of 10 head in a medium plastic box and it was very nice but it got even better when I added ice pads in the water. It was crawling and staying a long time on the ground. The temperature outside was 86°F at 9.30am. Right now it is the hottest season of the year in UAE, with a whopping 107.6 °F at 3.45pm right now... In October it will be cooler but still hot, not like back to France where I come from. Cheers.
@@bruhnette that's awesome! Wow, I bet with 3 of these mist units it would be killer thick and low! I'd love to see a video when you do that!
@@intocoasters So, we have tried with 3 units of 10 heads, in a big styrofoam box. We have plugged 2 computer fans on the lid. The fog was coming out through a pipe that goes high and makes an angle then we have another pipe with holes all along. We want to make a fog curtain. It will be in our carport and we want to create the entrance of a cave with the fog coming above our heads. The result was not satisfying. The mist alone produced by the ultrasonic heads is thick inside the box but when going through the pipes even it comes out nice, doesn't go down enough. It dissipates very quickly. So we don't have the fog curtain effect.
On top of that, the water temperature was super high. Even for a bath I wouldn't like this level of temperature!
Based on this, we added ice and then the effect was much nicer, with a durable and crawling effect. The thing is, as it is very hot in Dubai, we don't want to be forced to add ice many times during the Halloween night. The ice doesn't last long enough here, the water produced with the transducer is almost burning hot and buying dry ice isn't cheap either.
SO, we decided then to add a regular smoke machine that we already had, in order to complete and boost the system. It worked much much better. The fog from the machine is blown into the box, get charged in humidity produced by the ultrasonic heads. We obtained a thick, dense and regular fog curtain. We canceled the computer fans because the blow from the fog machine is enough to make the smoke run through the whole pipe.
We decided, after all that experimentation, to keep only one unit of 10 heads but in a smaller box. Place the box high above our head in our carport and connect the pierced pipe directly to the box, no angled pipe.
Obviously when wind blows, nothing goes down but it still stays theatrical enough for us. Our car port is completely open on 2 sides. So wind is coming a bit from one side and the front. Once we will put the whole decoration, we might achieve to get less wind coming in. My husband still wanted to add some ice in the water to check if the fog would get enhanced. He was right. I am still thinking that adding ice many times in the night isn't great as the system is not easy to reach. We have a remote control for the smoke machine and can manage from the ground.
To conclude, based on the fact that it is our hottest time in the year, we were happy with the nice heavy and dense effect we got. It then should be even better in October nights.
@@bruhnette This sounds like a great bit of testing! I know the water can get hot with one 10-head unit, I can't imagine how hot it would be with more.
I am trying to come up with a way to circulate the warm water through a small radiator with a fan - like the way a car cools the engine fluid. Of course, this would complicate the design but could make it more robust and scalable to a larger capacity. This video was my first design attempt. I'm for4ever learning and tweaking.
Thank you for sharing your results!!!
I was thinking about the draft of both doors being open. Perhaps a kind of warehouse curtain? I know there are clear plastic flexible panels used to keep different air spaces separate in warehouses. That might help reduce the effect of a breeze.
Absolutely amazing to see this! As an effects artist and dealer for Ultratec, Chauvet, and Martin/Jem smoke I’ve used just about every major low-lying fog system over the past 20 years.. (LN2, CO2, Dry Ice, and the all electric Antari DNG-200 seen in my profile pic are a few examples) We repair machines and I can confirm that this is how the Chauvet Cumulus, Cloud 9, and the Froggy’s Fog Poseidon machines work. Your solution however delivers the same effect on a smaller scale and is perfect for haunt scenes or plays and does not cost thousands! Very impressed sir. Thank you so much for sharing this.
This is awesome to learn! (and also a bummer as I thought I stumbled upon the method for the first time - but I guess someone else is always going to be first. LOL)
Since you have worked on those machines, any suggestions how to streamline this design?
Do you know if the mist chamber size has any effect on the fog output?
I am using an aquarium because it was readily available and I wanted to show off what is happening. If I made a smaller chamber, would that reduce the overall effect?
Thank you for writing!
@@intocoasters You’re welcome! In response to the question, the mist chambers on these commercial machines are small. Think about the ice chamber size in something like an American DJ Mister Cool on the small end (Chauvet Cumulus) and the Antari Ice on the larger units (Cloud 9 and Froggy’s).
In order to make everything smaller you could do what they do and place an external water tank with just a gravity (dog water bowl) type regulator to maintain proper water height in the chamber. The more expensive units use a pump and a sensor.
On a side note, all of the commercial units have chamber fans to pressurize the chamber a little. Most look like computer fans. The speed on them is variable so you can control the effect even more and have longer hoses attached. To keep the mist inside you could switch the fan off and back on only when you needed the effect. Hope that helps!
@@way2tall1979 this is awesome info!!
I'm surprised the chamber can be that small. That would help a lot!
And adding small fans seems like a good (and obvious) idea. I really should've thought of that in my build. LoL
@@intocoasters The whole concept blew my mind when I saw it for the first time at a trade show. The machine had been on for a while at that point and the fog was warm to the touch but was on the ground!!! I immediately went into nerd mode and asked all kinds of questions!!
For years I thought it was temperature that did it (ice,CO2, LN2,etc..) but it’s more the density. That’s what the mist does, it adds density to the glycol/glycerine fog which makes it heavier than air. Now a chiller does the same thing, and I think the output is a little thicker/whiter, but for someone needing the basic ground fog effect and not a “dancing on a cloud” type thing, the aqua fog (as they tend to call it in the industry) is perfect without the need for cold stuff.
@@way2tall1979 This starts to answer a question that no one else seems to have a satisfactory answer. What make 'low lying' fog fluid different from regular for fluid? I can get similar results with the cheap stuff. It just seems 'low lying' fog looks thinker. It really doesn't perform better enough to make a difference in most of the scenes I've used it for. I mean, 'low lying' fog still needs to be processed in some way to stay low.
So, is it just a higher concentration of glycol or something?
That's awesome
YOU ARE Amazing!!!
So nice to see someone use the brain God gave them. Excellent job sir. You did a great job figuring this out.
Great idea bud good wotk
Thank you very much!
Its an evaporative cooler for a glycol fogger.
Genius!!
Thank you! But it was more trial and error than actual smarts. Thanks for watching!
This is really cool. Can you post a test where you replace the fog machine with a fan and compare the outputs?
You'll have a video posted this evening. What a great suggestion!
Exactly how I think to build my fog screen :-)
Heh.. I think I own the same brick shapped "pond" fogger. I also have an older one that includes a float that is round that I got 10+ years ago for messing with the same thing. I ordered last year a water pump to do the same thing (to keep the water level on the brick shaped pond fogger constant), but never got around to constructing a final container. A fish tank is a good idea, that was one thing I have not done yet.
But yeah, it's amazing the output. However one thing I've used is a duct fan (for heating) and a dimmer/fan speed control to adjust the flow on the output side because I've gone with choking the input side from the normal fogger (what I call the smogger) in order to reduce the spill output and then a timer on it so it has a controlled duty cycle. Hope my 2 cents helps anybody else!
The only thing I have to say is the water ends up getting fairly warm.. so perhaps a way of "leaking" water out slowly and replacing water from hose or something to keep it from getting too warm. My thinking is the cooler the water, the cooler the ultrasonic mist (pond fogger output) and the heaver the recombined glycol + mist will be -- with warmer water it doesn't seem to sink as fast. An additional 2 cents to solve out. What I've done is also add some ice, it it melts fairly quickly as these pond foggers (and the limited amount of water contained in the containers I've mess with) get QUITE warm over time.
A larger fish tank would help, but eventually the water there will get warmer and a way to chill the water would be nice to solve (thinking a slow drizzle of water from a garden hose and a way to keep the 2nd water level from getting too high, has to be below the upper water level for the pond fogger).
These are great suggestions! I wanted to use a float as that eliminate the need for the pump.
I originally wanted to use the pump to run the water through a radiator with a fan to cool the water being pumped into the misting bucket. I just ran out of time.
I really need to do some long term testing. It seems that the very warm water doesn't have as much of an impact as I thought it would. That's why there is little motivation to cool the water for me. LoL. That and I bounce from shiny project to the next.
But seriously, I was trying to keep this setup fairly uncomplicated. I also thought of having a small window AC unit to run the fog output through to further cool it, but now it's more complicated than needed.
However, I do worry about the heat of the water over time. So, I will revisit the radiator idea after I finish some other projects I'm working on.
Thanks for watching and for sharing your experience with this kind of setup. I think the DIY community can really help to refine this and make it killer!
WOW!!! Robert, Thank you for the information, I have tried DIY of both types of fog chillers you mentioned in your video: First was a HD bucket with ice that I passed the fog through and it contacted the ice... the ice melts an hour or so into the running the haunt and no more low-fog and no time to reload the ice... the second I had a long tube and the ice was isolated... limited effects and the plastic tube melted after an hour or so of operation and that was the end of that!
I can't wait to try and duplicate the effect you're able to achieve: I ordered a few single humidifiers to see if I can get the low hanging fog effect, I will need to design something different because I don't have a fish tank, I will try to figure it out around what I have, which are buckets, plastic boxes, and storage totes... so not sure what just yet, it would be soooo nice not to need ice at all and filling the bucket with ice while I'm running is such a pain!
Much appreciated for the info... It's the humidity not so much the coolness of the fog that makes it heavy and that's what hangs it low to the ground. I should have picked up on that fact myself, I've seen a lot of people say that watering the lawn / ground makes it stick better, and that's the KEY right there. Happy Halloween... Cheers!
Thank you so much! I'm curious how it turned out for you.
@@intocoasters It worked great, but the tote leaked like heck... I need to re-jigger the tote, but the mister thing was great, check my channel for the yard display 2021, you can see the glorious fog in the video!
@@raymitchell9736 oh, that's right! I saw that and I am steaing your "candles in front of the tombstones" idea. It's freaking beautiful.
@@intocoasters I'm glad we can inspire each other, you're awesome too, but I don't have the space (or budget) for a dark ride and all the other things... gosh I wished we lived close by each other, we'd be the terror of the neighborhood Bwahahaha!!!!
@@raymitchell9736 Oh man, I WISH! I would love to have neighbors like you that were as in to Halloween - the combined efforts/ideas would be epic!! (rubs hands together maniacally)
It’s like a fog screen. You should project something onto it and have the dark ride go through the fog. Kinda like in the pirates of the Caribbean at Disneyland used to do
One of my older videos shows where I have experimented with a fog screen. I hope to improve it and have it in use one year. I love the idea of the cart driving thru a projected image.
You should patent this and sell them! genius
Thank you! I did consider selling kits, but I was afraid that would take time away from tinkering on other projects. And besides, learned a lot from websites (before RUclips) where folks shared their knowledge and how-to projects. This is my way of giving back and hopefully inspiring future home haunters!
Awesome! Thanks for sharing!
Thank you ! I love being able to "give back" to the haunt community as I have learned a lot from home haunters myself.
Thanks for watching and Happy Haunting!
@@intocoasters You're welcome. I am going to try this myself. This must be how the 1300 dollar Cumulus works. I think you've just saved everyone a lot of money. Thanks!
@@cosmasindico I'd love to see your results!
I've had someone tell me this is very similar to the cumulus. I've never seen one in person, but their package seems easier for transport and setup. But still, saving over $1000 isn't anything to be upset about. LoL
@@intocoasters I think I can buy some caster wheels for under $1000. ;)
@@cosmasindico LOL. Too true!
I think the reason for the drop in temperature is due to the ambient temperature of the room + air flow evaporating the fine mist water droplets which draws energy from the surrounding fog as it passes through. The resultant drop in energy will also cause the entire chamber to densify it's gaseous mix. (less heat, less pressure, more density of constituents). Just a guess, but it makes the most sense.
I love hearing theories on how this works as I don't really know - It's awesome to have everyone sharing knowledge. Thank you!
My dude, you have gained a new subscriber. I was just unpacking my "dryer vent hose" and sighing as I imagined picking up ice for another night's show, in 47 days! I'm not sure I'll get around to trying this, but I'm going to try this sometime before the year is up. This is very interesting. Ultrasonic misters work by vibrating out of time with the water forcing water vapor molecules to break from the water cohesion. Water vapor molecules are defined as water molecule clumps less than 5 microns. This dispersal results in low lying fog due to the energy exchange in creating the the smaller molecule packs. Fog machines, on the other hand, work by flashing water into steam that is bound with glycerin allowing the vapor created to hang in the air and be visible for longer. However, this process creates water vapor that is of much higher energy, aka hot, to produce. If you run the ulstrasonic foggers for a long time, they eventually heat up the water, but its very slow and water has excellent thermal exchange properties. My guess is that when this fast vibrating glycerin fog machine meets the slower moving cold vapor of in your box, there is an energy exchange. Much like a cold spoon in a cup of coffee. Instead here, the water vapor from the mister evaporates off (not quite the right word, but much like it does about 6 inches from the top of your tank with the lid off), when it meets the hotter fog vapor. There is an energy exchange during that evaporation thus the fog vapor gives up some of its energy. Due to the surface area of vibrating molecules of water vapor (5 microns or less) to the glycerin bonded fog (5 microns or less) you get really efficient and fast energy transfers. The water will warm up too, as there is contact at the surface with the hot fog, but the ultrasonic process should still produce cooler water vapor just because its mechanism does not add much energy to the water vapor to break the water up. That's my thoughts anyways. I'm not sure if I will have a chance to try this out, but I surely will mark it down. Curious to see how long one can go on it with the same low lying fog effects, but I know I've generated low lying fog from hot water with the sonic sensors, so they moderate energy really well. If I build one, it will be labeled on the side with who came up with the idea! Well done sir.
What an awesome explanation of theory. I love learning about this effect.
I can say that the cooling ability worked for more than 3 hours. I had to refill the fog fluid during the night. Never had to replace the water.
I'd love to hear of your build when you tackle it. Thank you!!
@@intocoasters I've gotta say man. I was still a bit of a skeptic. But I just did a proof of concept on it tonight, and crap it works. You are going to make me regret all these years of ice hauling. I'm going to put the mister on a float and maybe add a water level garden hose valve. But this is looking like my new favorite add to Halloween. Just gotta put that good ole Roberts name on the side.
@@Photon123 I'm stoked to hear that it worked for you as well! I, too, have added a float. One less moving part to worry about is always good, but I just cannot agree that a plastic float should cost more than a water pump.
It was so nice to not worry about checking the ice level or drain the melted water.
It's definitely one of my favorite projects. I have some other fog related projects I am trying to get working.
I haven't posted all the tinkering and testing and failures of this project... but I am really glad to share a working method with the haunt community.
Thank you again!
@@intocoasters Between the float and a water control valve I may put in later, I think this will be a big addition actually. Gotta do a lot to make this right still, but my proof of concept sold me on it. I was using my cheapo little walmart 20 dollar fogger too, and the output was impressive. I can't way to buck out ole goliath and pain the street with clouds. It definitely saves me that awkward rush to the store down the road before the show to grab ice panic.
Works well! ruclips.net/video/v47tiP_lCiE/видео.html
Having built a couple of fog chillers and watching many videos looking to improve, I found your video extremely educational. I use a mister for my cauldron. The issue with ice chillers is the ice itself and having to buy and replenish each time you want to run your scene. Your method allows for much easier and more run time in my opinion. I have to wonder what the difference would be if you CHILLED THE WATER WITH FROZEN WATER BOTTLES?? I will surely give this method a try.
I will try this too this year. The water does get quite warm after about a half hour of use.... But it still generates low hanging fog. So frozen bottles would help slow the heating I imagine. Great idea!
@@intocoastersThanks! I can hardly wait to see the result! Don't forget to try it with the extension tube and the fog curtain!
I can tell someone made some inventive bongs in their day lol 😅
Best comment yet!
Just wanted to say thanks! Ingenuity at it's best! Just orders parts and will hopefully have an ice-free Halloween!!
Thank you so much! I hope it works well for you. I'd love to see the scene once it's all assembled.
@@intocoasters Parts just got delivered. I went for simplicity, used large plastic tote for the water, and floating a 12 head mister, so no need for second container or pump. An elbow on top for entrance and flex pipe out for fog. assembled in under 30 minutes. All holes are in the lid so the tote is still functional for storing Halloween decorations. Did a quick test and I'm amazed at how well it works. Logs of thick, low fog. My display is small, a handful of tombstones, small fence a skeleton or two, so not that exciting. It's the fog that make it. First time I've done a haunt in years, so still fun. Thanks again for sharing your invention. This revolutionizes low lying fog.
@@nicksweet3826 Awesome to hear!! and yes, holes in the lid gave an accidental ability to still use it as a proper storage bin. I store the parts and some other props (usually loose bones) in the same bin after letting it dry out.
12 head! Dang, I bet that is awesome! I should upgrade now, LOL.
Thank you for the follow up and I am very happy to hear it works well.
Happy Haunting!
@@intocoasters Here's a short video testing it out. Now if I can only get people to stop calling the fire department as I work on tweaking it... ruclips.net/video/LAuQQjIE66c/видео.html
@@nicksweet3826 oh man that is beautiful! I love the crawl and the density.
I live next door to a volunteer fireman, the struggle is real! LOL
my mind is blown
This is incredible, but what really excites me is that this process occurs before the actual fogger stage. That leads me to the big question: what if one took this moisture-heavy fog and *then* ran it through a traditional chiller? I suspect you'd lose a lot of density to condensation, but whatever made it out the other end would stay even lower to the ground. Have you ever tried such a combination?
Fantastic! Now what happens if the basin in the bottom has ice-cold water? Guess I will build one and find out!
That is an excellent question - I haven't tried that yet. I can say that the water gets VERY warm during use. But the fog still lays low.
I was thinking of adding a radiator system to help cool the basin water before circulating.
If you build one with ice, I'd love to hear the results!
Water has a pretty high specific heat which means that the water vapor will likely have at least a slight cooling effect, however you are probably right that most of the effect is due to the fog picking up moisture and therefore weight. I'm curious to know if this would work as well in areas of high humidity.
It did fairly well. The coast of North Carolina gets quite humid during the summer. It was moderately humid during the filming of this video - I remember being worried it would not cooperate for the camera.
Very cool. I am sure that you already made sure that the people movers sensor can see the guides on the floor with all that wonderful fog. I wonder if you are able to sleep much at this time of year ?
Actually yes! Thankfully the cart will still work in the fog.
I can force it to fail by shooting fog directly into the sensor head.but general fog effect on the ground doesn't seem to affect it.
Great video! Any suggestions on a specific ultraconic fogger?
Thank you. I just searched AliExpress for 10 head mister. I believe Amazon has a selection as well. I see some people are using 12 head units. I bet they are awesome!
But as for a specific one? I don't know if I know the difference between them.
Thank you for this beautiful and precious content, it’s really qualitative information !
Do you think it could work with small tubes ? I found a very thin metal tube that I used for this project. The smoke should come out of the thin metal tube where I placed the holes. But I don't think anything is coming out yet. Do you think it's because the air can't circulate in a small space? Thank you so much
What an awesome comment... Thank you!!
Small tubes can be a problem. I have a prop that uses small tubes (about 1/2" diameter). I have to occasionally empty the tube of fluid that condensed during use. These tubes are plastic. I imagine metal tubes would cause condensation quicker. I would try tubes a little larger if possible.
Hey intocoasters, this is awesome! Just wondering what the 48V transformer was for?
Thank you! The 48v transformer is to power the misting unit that is underwater.
Thanks for watching!
Hey! This is awesome! I’m trying to recreate this but having a few issues- can I get some advice? Do you think the size of the pipes will make much difference? And rather than having my smoke machine on top feeding into the lid and the fog tube also coming out of the lid I’ve gone into the left side near the top with the smoke machine inlet and then the fog outpour tube is on the opposite side. Near the top too, I’m getting some good results but it’s not quite right.
Hello! The size of the pipe should not matter. I have rebuilt this with larger pipes for this past year. As far as coming in from the top or the side, there doesn't seem to be a difference. My demo had it in the top because I was using a glass aquarium and did not want to try to cut through the glass.
Which part feels lacking? Not enough fog? Or is it not laying low?
I would say the most important part is to make sure the water level is the correct height where your misting unit is sitting. You should have quite a lot of water fog in your box or tub even before you start your fog machine.
The amount of fog output will partly depend on the fog machine you're using and how much mist you can produce.
Are you able to post a video of your setup and output? That could help with troubleshooting
Amazing man!! What is that black stuff which making haze? What is the exact type of this? Many thanks!
Thank you. It is a 10 head pond fogger. I bought mine from AliExpress. But, I have seen them on Amazon as well.
I am more that impressed. the fog coming out of the fog machine expands as it comes to contact with oxygen within the 3inches gap u left and mixes with the mist for a greater output. but my worry is , won't the water get hot at some point and reduces the effectiveness of the result?
Thank you! And you are correct - the water does get quite warm - but that is from the fogging unit more than the fog machine. I don't know how to accurately measure the drop in efficiency, but after 3 hours - the output is still quite similar to when it is started up. But I believe there is a change in performance. I am sure you could cool the water before recycling it into the tank to improve this.
I'm glad I saw this. You made my haunt preparations more fun. Last year I built a pure water fog machine using a 12 head ultrasonic pond mist maker. It worked OK but not great. The advantage was that it used water and had a continuous output. It did produce ground hugging fog though. The container was similar to your aquarium. I used a float in the container to provide the proper depth. The mist was forced out of the container through a 4 inch duct using a computer fan. Unfortunately, I let it go until all the water was gone and 12 head unit died. This year I replaced the 12 head unit.
After I saw your video, I was inspired to make a fog juice/water mist hybrid. The original idea was to get a "Y" PVC pipe to mix the output of the fog machine with the output of the mist machine. Good plan--didn't work. Somehow the computer fan stopped working. It was mounted in the top of the mister machine and I think it got wet. I removed the fan and used some 4 inch accordion hose to connect the output of the fog machine in the hole where the computer fan was removed. Essentially, I created your exact set up except the mist maker was on a float and not in a separate container.
It worked a treat! When the fog machine warmed, the fog went into the mist container. The fog that came out of the output 4 inch accordion hose was thick and ground hugging. Once the fog machine shut down, the fog/mist continued to flow out of the output hose. I think it was gravity powered at this point.
Bottom line, I now have a ground hugging fog/mist maker. The mist maker and the fog machine are mounted on a shelf behind one of my Halloween props. Both units are 32 inches above the ground so that they are easy to service. The output accordion hose goes to the ground and snakes into my graveyard haunt. I'll take a picture tomorrow. Thank you for your video and Happy Halloween. AZAtheist.com
This is so cool! I knew I couldn't be the only one to try this.
I've been thinking about the size of the tank... I want to see if a smaller tank will impact it too much and would a larger tank improve it.
I do like the siphon effect to have a light continuous mist in between fog blasts.
Did you have an issue with condensation in the tubing?
@@intocoasters I discovered the siphon effect accidently then saw that you had also discovered it in your follow up video.
Water does condense. Having the mist container elevated from the ground helps. The condensed water runs out of the end of the output hose.
My "mist container" is a plastic storage box. I had built a mist fogger with a computer fan to provide pressure and an output hose to direct the fog. I removed the computer fan and inserted a 4" accordion hose from the fog juice fogger where the computer fan used to be.
I don't know how to include a picture here so I'll create a blog entry about the "Halloween Fogger." You can catch it at www.AZAtheist.com.
Thank you for your RUclips video. I think that the combo of the mist maker and the Glycerin fogger is a good one. I've built ice chillers before but your "Robers Fogger" is, so far, the most satisfying DIY ground hugging fog machine that I've tried.
azatheist.com/2019/10/16/halloween-fogger/
@@donaldlacey4194 nice write up!
I'm glad you mentioned trying to achieve this one way and it didn't work out, so you changed some things and made something better. I think that is such an important lesson to share with other DIYers. Never be afraid to fail, that's when I learn the most.
Thank you for the mention and for sharing your project! I love to see what others are building! I also love the idea of raising the tank so that the mist is constantly self deploying in between fog blasts!
Thanks guys. Inspired. I found a ten head system with floats (head unit sit in the float) on Amazon. I will be trying it in a couple weeks.
I'm going g to do this, but I picked up a humidifier at the goodwill for three bucks. I might reverse-engineer this. Thanks. Good science.
I'd love to hear if that humidifier worked out
Hi, love the video, did you ever try low lying fog fluid.
Hello, and thank you! Yes, I have tried low lying fluid. The results are a little bit thicker then without. But for this video, I wanted to use the cheap stuff to show how big of a difference the missing unit creates. Thanks for watching!
Excellent. Thank you so much for sharing. I just wonder if by simply adding a fan rather than a fog machine... will it work similarly. Adding the fog juice over the pond mister maybe? I am simply and ideas guy... just a thought. Thanks again!
Just whay i was looking for there this machine on this concept... its called chauvet comulus. It uses fog, destile water..
Thank you! I looked it up. It seems pretty expensive although, a cleaner and more portable system for sure!
Yo, this was a very interesting way to go about getting the fog to stay closer to the ground. I wouldn't have ever thought to go this route. Awesome job.
Now I was wondering if u have tried using a humidifier instead of the pond fogger? If its the humidity the fogs mix with, couldn't that give u more? Plus that would be pulling in more fresh air to operate solving the warming of the air issue.
Idk just a thought, what'd to see what u think and if maybe uve already tried it.
Thank you! The pond fogger is essentially 10 of the mist units from a humidifier. So .... kinda? LOL It was watching the water mist from the decorative misters that made me go down this path.
That's genius! So I wonder, in theory, could you use a cool mist humidifier in something similar could you get the same effect??
I initially tried with a single head mist unit that I have for a table-top cauldron. It seemed to make the fog a little bit thicker, but could not keep up with the flow from even a 400 watt machine.
Cool mist humidifiers are usually made from ultrasonic misters, so, yes, in theory this would work. But they're not designed to produce as much mist as rapidly as the 10-head ultrasonic mister shown here.
Add weather stripping to the part the wood sits on. You might need an extra weight to make it seal but it's better than taping/re-taping
Agreed! I rebuilt the whole thing in a crate with a built in gasket. Made a big difference. You can see it here: ruclips.net/video/JBruBgdCFVA/видео.htmlsi=UGqp1zvdDEy0lbMv
I was like HECK YES.... then I went to Amazon and saw the price for the Ultrasonic mister with a float ring, and I was like... So ice you say
LOL... Right?!?! I know a bag of ice is less than this build. However, running it every night in October for two years so far would've required a lot more ice. And the impromptu ability means I can test this in a new scene whenever I wanted without having to run to the store to buy a bag of ice.
But yeah, It's not a project for the casual haunter I guess.
I think you're right. Fog from the machine is not a gas, it's basically a mist, I think the fog attaches itself to the water mist in the tank making the fog very heavy. then gravity does its work
So would you achieve the same effect by simply putting a few pieces of ICE into your Fog Chiller hose? You would have the cold on the outside of the hose in your chiller) andthat extra bit of moisture on the inside that your Fog picks up on its way through the hose and Fog Chiller apparatus... Without having to remake your existing chiller and adding the aquarium and other electronic components.
I'm not sure - but it could be a fun experiment. I have also wanted to try to add dry ice in the tube as well.
Water vapor is very good at absorbing energy via evaporation, that's why misters can cool the air on a hot summer day (and not just get you wet). The water vapor actually absorbs heat energy out of the air. I'm sure that's what's happening here. With a lot of water vapor at a lower temperature than the fog, it absorbs heat energy from the fog making the fog more dense and heavier.
the energy transfer vi heat makes a lot of sense. Even though the water gets warm, this is still effective hours later.
Noice!
Fascinating. Are the input and/or output tubes above the water or under the water?
Thank you!
Both tubes are above the water. Although now you have me wondering what would happen if I drop the input tube a little into the water. Hmmmm 🤔
@@intocoasters My guess is not enough pressure on the intake side to force the fog into the water, but it it could it would maybe gain a ton of moisture and cooling.
Accolades, you are the best. I don't want to over praise you, BUT son that is some seriously, seriously great information. Thank you for sharing.
Off topic, I saw a door knocker for sale on some Prop site. It is just a free game knocker from a pinball machine. If you have ever won a free game playing, you would know just how loud they are.
I have the knocker, but I think it is 50 volts. Would your power supply for 48 work? Where did you or more importantly what is the power supply to?. Video games power supply were 5 volts and 12 volts. Unless there was I a terminal for 50, I don't have one to check.
Again, thanks in advance and how you don't have WAY more subs is beyond me.
Thank you very very much! Seriously, thank you.
the power supply is just a general 48 volt DC power supply. And I don't see why it would not work with the solenoid. Are you sure it's 50 volts and not 24? I have to pinball machines so I am very familiar with the credit knocker. One of which is very startling.
I found the power supplies add an online wholesale supply.
I use to buy, sell, collect pinball machines. Actually anything coin operated. I tried looking for the info on the knocker and what I saw was if you use 24V it will be real weak. I sold off my last 4 machines so I can't test it. Thanks for replying.
How about a video of the construction of this fogger?
I am thinking of making a 3rd version of this - I will make a build video on that. But I do have a breakdown of sorts on the 1st version I made (before changing to the float) ruclips.net/video/o5M-YbGWf4g/видео.htmlsi=q-i_9eVOKDJng43y
Hopefully that could help with build ideas until I make the 3rd version.
what size pvc are you using ? I am building one myself and will be using it along with a Hologram.
I am using 1-1/2 pipe for this set up. I changed the output to 4" dryer hose when I rebuilt it.
I'd love to see your setup when its done!!
I made a fog screen that has a floating image kind of effect: ruclips.net/video/Xc2jr2DB-FQ/видео.htmlsi=upCAFx8XSSrhN8E7
Do you have any specs for the pipe on your outlet. That’s the exact effect I’m looking for to have fog roll down curtains
Hello and thank you! I used 1-1/2" PVC. I drew a line on the side of the black pipe and drilled 1/4" holes about 3/4" apart from each other down the length I needed. Here is a video of how I made the fog dispersion tube: ruclips.net/video/Xc2jr2DB-FQ/видео.html
Its almost like a swamp cooler.
I had to look that up.
And yeah, it does seem to share some qualities of a swamp cooler. I didn't even was that was a thing!