Smoke machine advice

[Sad Sack]

Hi all, I know it’s a squarebody forum but there’s plenty of members here that are pretty smart in the auto repair arena so I’m looking for smoke machine advice to check an evap system on my 2004 Jeep Grand Cherokee SE 4.7V8 throwing a P0455 DTC. My budget is $70. My question is… does anyone have experience with budget priced smoke machines and given my price point looking for suggestions / recommendations. What I have done so far is removed gas cap, inspected the sealing surfaces, lubed it with petroleum jelly, cleared the codes, looked for bad evap hoses (didn’t readily see any with issues) and monitoring for the DTC to reappear. If it does I may need a smoke machine. So if anyone has suggestions I’d like to hear them, thanks all!

 

[idahovette]

Try the cigar thread

 

[Radiohead]

The grand caravan is doing the same thing. Something is broken, a full tank on an incline will become a not so full tank in short order. Boy, that's a whole can of worms with all the corrosion underneath from it being a Minnesota and Kansas rig before here.

 

[Sad Sack]

Try the cigar thread

 

[Sad Sack]

The grand caravan is doing the same thing. Something is broken, a full tank on an incline will become a not so full tank in short order. Boy, that's a whole can of worms with all the corrosion underneath from it being a Minnesota and Kansas rig before here.

A very annoying situation indeed.

 

[idahovette]

Why would you do that to a defenseless old man??????.............lol

 

[legopnuematic]

Autool(?) might be something to look at for a budget option. I believe that Junkyard Digs on YouTube has and uses one.

The one I have I inherited from my grandfather, it’s not homemade but sure looks like it. 1 gallon paint can filled with mineral oil, 12v heating element, air regulator (looks like a propane regulator), and hose. It sure works though.

Edit: found a picture with it in frame

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[fast 99]

one shop I worked at had a real nice [expensive] Matco unit. Another shop had a cheap smoker probably from Amazon. Matco unit was far superior. Heated oil better, could control air flow, had a gauge to monitor size of leak. Cheap unit had to watch the temperature closely and no way to monitor how big the leak was. Both did provide enough smoke. Cheap unit too much if temperature got high. Cheap unit would probably work OK on older vehicles like SB where your probably chasing fairly large leaks, but would not be satisfactory on later models with more sensitive EVAP systems.

 

[Sad Sack]

Autool(?) might be something to look at for a budget option. I believe that Junkyard Digs on YouTube has and uses one.

The one I have I inherited from my grandfather, it’s not homemade but sure looks like it. 1 gallon paint can filled with mineral oil, 12v heating element, air regulator (looks like a propane regulator), and hose. It sure works though.

Been looking at them, and some have doodads and some don't, was hoping someone would chime and say "get one and make sure it comes with such and such"...

 

[DoubleDingo]

Been looking at them, and some have doodads and some don't, was hoping someone would chime and say "get one and make sure it comes with such and such"...

Get one and make sure it has such and such

 

[Sad Sack]

Get one and make sure it has such and such

 

[DoubleDingo]

I don't have experience with smoke machines, well, not ones used for diagnosing evap systems on cars. I spent many years around "smoke machines", they could burn through packs a day with ease.

I will be paying attention to the replies, though, as the info will be good to glean from if I need to get one for my newer vehicles.

 

[Sad Sack]

I don't have experience with smoke machines, well, not ones used for diagnosing evap systems on cars. I spent many years around "smoke machines", they could burn through packs a day with ease.

I will be paying attention to the replies, though, as the info will be good to glean from if I need to get one for my newer vehicles.

Been there before, my dad was over three packs a day, pretty sure that's the major contributor of what did him in.

 

[Sad Sack]

Well after browsing, looking hard at this one, but CEL hasn't returned yet...

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0DNS49MKY/

 

[bucket]

The smoke machine I used to use didn't use oil or fluid, it used a fine powdery stuff that I called pixey dust.

I need to get a smoke machine myself. A buddy of mine owns a shop and I asked him what he uses. He bought and uses this cheapo one from Ebay:

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He says it actually works very well.