Community Theater Green Room Discussion Board: Medusa the smoke machine rig

Not attempting to be pedantic Eddyz - well no more than is usual mate!
Do you experience any build up of fluid or residual from the delivery nozzle, which is normal with smoke MacHines splutter or spitting, within the hose or delivery pipe &/or could this be a problem at all?
With the interest you have created. Me thinks it may be in your interests to register the design, as previously suggested!

Joe
Western Gondawandaland
turn right @ Perth.
Hear the light & see the sound.
Toi Toi Toi Chookas {{"chook [chicken] it is"}
May you always play
to a full house}

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At least Eddyz it solves the problem of fluid deposits on the stage in front of the nozzle.
Thinking of residual fluid, I remember this became a problem years ago, with a dry ice machine.
It happened during an Opera Galah [oops Gala] Concert, in a regional venue in the bush.
The Producer/Director & of course the leading diva of the pathetic company, was the all knowing type, who reminded me of the chairwoman of the Farndale Avenue HETGADS.
She insisted on a flow of dry ice to run down a raked 10M x 10M rostra, that covered about 2/3 of the stage area, from US to the DS to the edge of the Apron. The Rake was built up to 2M at the back, giving an oblique angle stage to perform on. Which they built themselves & took about 6 hours to bump in, along with 3 large arches, set DS of the cyc on top of the raked rostra, that looked like a roman viaduct. Believe it or not this was only for 3 performances, although they hired the venue for 10 days! This opera company always seemed to have a heap of money from grants to chuck about & waste.
Anyhow her majesty wanted the dry ice for her grand entrance as a preface to the finale, when she would appear at the top of the raked rostra, between the US central arch, to worble her song to lead into the entrance of the whole cast walk on for the finale chorus.
We didn?t have a large enough dry ice machine available at the venue. So she got her people to make up a home made one from a 44 gallon drum. As it had electrical elements I tested & tagged it as complying with the code, prior to being used.
It had a circular ice basket which was lowered by a lever on the outsider of the drum, into the boiling water & expelled it the expanded fag through an elephant hose at the top. The hose was fed into to a manifold along the tip of the rostra, that dispersed it evenly to flow down the rake.
They used their own crew & tested it three times during the tech & dress rehearsals, which took up most of the day on the Saturday of the opening night.
I pointed out to them that they had to keep the hose straight & level at an incline to reach the manifold at the rostra.
Come the performance which surprising went well. The grand diva in her flowing robes mounted the top of the rosta, while a duo was performing down stage on the apron, in front of a black scrim. Come the cue for the fog & the transposition of the lighting to bring her in view. The scrim went out but no fog, I tried to get to the bods operating the machine, between a gaggle of performers, Just in time to call out don?t try & add more ice. Too late they attempted to remove the catches on the drums lid, when they had difficulty holding down the loosened lid,
She was coming to the end of her song when they couldn?t hold it any longer. The lid flew off & there was a great woosh of fog & hot water with ice as well, Which shot up in the air completely enveloping her, as she was standing just above it. To which she screamed a note that could break glass & her robe ballooned up above her head. I bet she was glad she listened to her mothers advice to always wear clean bloomers or she had them on.
I dived for to disconnect the power cable & called for the black smother to be dropped in, then got the cast to enter & sing the finale, while we got rid of the old bedraggled trout off the stage. At least the band picked up on it & played on.
At the post mortems we discovered that the prop holding up the hose on the incline, had been fell down during the show & the hose had hung down in a bend, which had filled with water, therefore not allowing the dry ice to pass through the hose & over pressurising the drum. Which became worse with the expanding gas siphoning more water in the hose, as in a miscus action. Unfortunately all the novice crew had to do was increase the fall of the hose, which would have drained the water & allowed the fog to pass through. But they didn?t & thought they need more ice!
I never got to speak to the diva again after the performance, as she evaporated from performing again in the other shows, as her complexion fashion coordinated with her bright pink bloomers.

Even though the dry ice worked well for the rest of the performances.
The only comments she made was to the local news rag, when she tried to blame the venue staff for the accident. She latter put in a retraction & said it was caused by her own crew, after a number of heated phone calls!
Sorry to prattle on about it.
But I got to admit I almost cacked my self

& only wished I thought about getting it on the in house video system. I?d have made a packet on one of those funniest home video TV shows.

Joe
Western Gondawandaland
turn right @ Perth.
Hear the light & see the sound.
Toi Toi Toi Chookas {{"chook [chicken] it is"}
May you always play
to a full house}

IP Logged

Author	Message
Gaafa Celebrity Joined: 3/21/04 Location: Australia Online Status: Offline Posts: 1181	Posted: 10/16/06 at 2:22am
	Not attempting to be pedantic Eddyz - well no more than is usual mate! Do you experience any build up of fluid or residual from the delivery nozzle, which is normal with smoke MacHines splutter or spitting, within the hose or delivery pipe &/or could this be a problem at all? With the interest you have created. Me thinks it may be in your interests to register the design, as previously suggested!
	Joe Western Gondawandaland turn right @ Perth. Hear the light & see the sound. Toi Toi Toi Chookas {{"chook [chicken] it is"} May you always play to a full house}
	IP Logged

EddyZ Star Joined: 8/21/06 Online Status: Offline Posts: 60	Posted: 10/17/06 at 12:58am
	I'm currently researching a design patent (what you call a registered design) vs. a regular patent for it. Yeah, there's some residual fluid -- I don't know that I'd call it "build-up" but, yeah, some drippage accumulates. The occasional teardown of the hoses/splitter is probably helpful if you've a long run and you're using a lot of smoke. Running your hoses so that gravity can help you "collect" leftover fluid in one or two places would probably be helpful, too. I've not had to do it yet with our current production, but then, we've only this week gotten the whole thing together techwise. (We open Friday night, so we're cutting it a little close.)
	EddyZ http://webpages.atlanticbb.net/~ezahurak/ www.nailsouptheatre.com/
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Gaafa Celebrity Joined: 3/21/04 Location: Australia Online Status: Offline Posts: 1181	Posted: 10/21/06 at 1:53am
	At least Eddyz it solves the problem of fluid deposits on the stage in front of the nozzle. Thinking of residual fluid, I remember this became a problem years ago, with a dry ice machine. It happened during an Opera Galah [oops Gala] Concert, in a regional venue in the bush. The Producer/Director & of course the leading diva of the pathetic company, was the all knowing type, who reminded me of the chairwoman of the Farndale Avenue HETGADS. She insisted on a flow of dry ice to run down a raked 10M x 10M rostra, that covered about 2/3 of the stage area, from US to the DS to the edge of the Apron. The Rake was built up to 2M at the back, giving an oblique angle stage to perform on. Which they built themselves & took about 6 hours to bump in, along with 3 large arches, set DS of the cyc on top of the raked rostra, that looked like a roman viaduct. Believe it or not this was only for 3 performances, although they hired the venue for 10 days! This opera company always seemed to have a heap of money from grants to chuck about & waste. Anyhow her majesty wanted the dry ice for her grand entrance as a preface to the finale, when she would appear at the top of the raked rostra, between the US central arch, to worble her song to lead into the entrance of the whole cast walk on for the finale chorus. We didn?t have a large enough dry ice machine available at the venue. So she got her people to make up a home made one from a 44 gallon drum. As it had electrical elements I tested & tagged it as complying with the code, prior to being used. It had a circular ice basket which was lowered by a lever on the outsider of the drum, into the boiling water & expelled it the expanded fag through an elephant hose at the top. The hose was fed into to a manifold along the tip of the rostra, that dispersed it evenly to flow down the rake. They used their own crew & tested it three times during the tech & dress rehearsals, which took up most of the day on the Saturday of the opening night. I pointed out to them that they had to keep the hose straight & level at an incline to reach the manifold at the rostra. Come the performance which surprising went well. The grand diva in her flowing robes mounted the top of the rosta, while a duo was performing down stage on the apron, in front of a black scrim. Come the cue for the fog & the transposition of the lighting to bring her in view. The scrim went out but no fog, I tried to get to the bods operating the machine, between a gaggle of performers, Just in time to call out don?t try & add more ice. Too late they attempted to remove the catches on the drums lid, when they had difficulty holding down the loosened lid, She was coming to the end of her song when they couldn?t hold it any longer. The lid flew off & there was a great woosh of fog & hot water with ice as well, Which shot up in the air completely enveloping her, as she was standing just above it. To which she screamed a note that could break glass & her robe ballooned up above her head. I bet she was glad she listened to her mothers advice to always wear clean bloomers or she had them on. I dived for to disconnect the power cable & called for the black smother to be dropped in, then got the cast to enter & sing the finale, while we got rid of the old bedraggled trout off the stage. At least the band picked up on it & played on. At the post mortems we discovered that the prop holding up the hose on the incline, had been fell down during the show & the hose had hung down in a bend, which had filled with water, therefore not allowing the dry ice to pass through the hose & over pressurising the drum. Which became worse with the expanding gas siphoning more water in the hose, as in a miscus action. Unfortunately all the novice crew had to do was increase the fall of the hose, which would have drained the water & allowed the fog to pass through. But they didn?t & thought they need more ice! I never got to speak to the diva again after the performance, as she evaporated from performing again in the other shows, as her complexion fashion coordinated with her bright pink bloomers. Even though the dry ice worked well for the rest of the performances. The only comments she made was to the local news rag, when she tried to blame the venue staff for the accident. She latter put in a retraction & said it was caused by her own crew, after a number of heated phone calls! Sorry to prattle on about it. But I got to admit I almost cacked my self & only wished I thought about getting it on the in house video system. I?d have made a packet on one of those funniest home video TV shows.
	Joe Western Gondawandaland turn right @ Perth. Hear the light & see the sound. Toi Toi Toi Chookas {{"chook [chicken] it is"} May you always play to a full house}
	IP Logged

EddyZ Star Joined: 8/21/06 Online Status: Offline Posts: 60	Posted: 10/28/06 at 9:19am
	Just a followup, after a several shows of massive fog usage, I've discovered that Medusa will gradually fill up with fog juice like a trumpet fills up with spit, limiting fog output until you drain it. No biggie, really, just make sure to put it somewhere where you can get to it. I may thing about adding a "spit valve" to the design, or turning the head around so the extra screw-off cap is on the bottom of the rig, not the top. Other than that, still working beautifully, no melting hoses or anything.
	EddyZ http://webpages.atlanticbb.net/~ezahurak/ www.nailsouptheatre.com/
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Set Design and Construction
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Topic: Medusa the smoke machine rig( Topic Closed)
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