Fog Machine Dilema

[HauntedDeadEnd]

Why is it fog machines always have issues. 1 fog machine works great the other 2 worked as I was testing then gave up. They are all 1k watts 1 pisses the fluid out won't warm up the machine is cold the other gets hot but no fluid comes out. It appears I need a pump for one and heating element for the other. Is there a place to get replacement parts? Should I even bother or just junk them for 2 new ones?

[damon carson]

Take them all apart and make you one good one. LOL! Just my two cents. I know its frustrating. Been there done that with the elcheapo fog machines. Or buy you one really good one. There is another thread on fog machines. Everyone is talking about Rosco Fog Machines. I love mine.
Damon

[Brandon_K]

IMO, the thought to fix is up to who made the machine. If it's a high end machine (which I'm guessing it's not, since you're already having problems with them), yes by all means, fix them. Jem / Martin, Rosco, Omnisistem all make great foggers and yes, they are expensive.

Anything bought at Part City, Spirit, Spencers, etc, IMO if you get a season out of it, great. If it still still works the next year, even better, you should feel lucky. This includes even "expensive" low end brands like Chauvet. We picked up 12 of Chauvet's F-1050's, $110 a pop if memory serves. They were great, when they worked. One or two died the first season, then a half dozen didn't work the next season, even after being properly stored. We didn't get more than 3 seaons on all but a few.

Here's my take in general on Fogger's in the haunt industry;

If you run a year round attraction, by all means, buy theater grade foggers. If you have a haunt that has a layout that allows you to run a few large foggers and duct the fog throughout the haunt, by all means, spend the money and buy a theater grade fogger.

If you don't fall into either of the above categories, IMO you're better off buying new, cheap foggers every year. We have a ton of small rooms and they're all spread out among 4 buildings (we're an indoor / outdoor), so we don't need a huge fogger that can fill a stadium with fog in 30 seconds. We run much lower durations, maybe 10 or 15 seconds every 5 or 10 minutes in each room. We generally end up buying 10 or so new foggers every year and we usually are able to pick them up for $20-30 a piece as a "bulk deal" from the local Spirit and Party City. Running out for an hour, spending $200-300 on new foggers and being done sure beats screwing around with them, troubleshooting them, ordering parts, waiting for parts, installing parts, etc, at least for us.

That's my 2c.

[Jim Warfield]

Rosco's, loved them, eventually they quit. I sure couldn't fix them with their computer boards, ex cetra.
I bought others, meager results.
When running a haunt show timing is everything in the scare, but the last foggers I owned were deciding if or when they were going to do their part of it, very frustrating!!
More trouble than they were worth, I haven't used any foggers for quite a few years now= one less thing to get upset about or distract me.

Of course I also don't have and don't use a great many other things most consider basic or essential.
Money comes "In", then it goes "Out". Figure out how to go about hanging on to more of it and life might be easier.

[Mr. Haunt]

I'm probably not smart by buying my foggers from Target, but have had them for 5 or 6 years and don't have any problems but keeping the tubes clean. I recently just cleaned them 3 weeks ago.....went to fire one up the other day and it looks like I have to clean them again.

Vinager works, but is there a better way???

Mr. Haunt