Smoke catchers

11/26/2007 Smoke catchers
Loco sheds have large funnels above the tracks to help direct smoke out the chimneys. Since I was creating interior details of my roundhouse I have made smoke catchers. I need two per track. This allows a steamer to be parked head first or tender first, or even two small locos on one track.

I made mine out of a thin card and used a 6mm drinking straw cut to 30mm lengths for the new chimney. This allows the catchers to be positioned 60mm above the rails. The chimney caps from the Märklin 7288 roundhouse kit can be made to fit in the top of the drinking straw.

Construction Steps
Printed the shapes on thin card from a CAD program.

Cut each item out using a sharp work knife.
Scored the fold lines to create neat edges.
Used wood glue to fasten each side to its neighbor
Acrylic paint was used to create rusty exterior and sooty black interior.
Paint straws black
Straws glued in using wood glue.

Drilled holes in the roof panels (7/32")
Paint underside of roofs black
Push straws up through roof so that base of catcher is 60mm above rails. (This removes a lot of paint)

Repaint outside parts of straws
Glue chimney cap on

Update 2007-12-03
Now that the roundhouse is installed on the layout and wired up, I can try out the smoke catcher for real..

They work best when the smoke stack is directly below the chimney so that the puff from the smoke generator is strong enough to push it up the chimney. The smoke itself is not hot and thus does not rise of its own accord.

You can make your own using my design... download and print this pdf file.
Permission is granted for private use only.