AUTOOL Automotive Smoke Machine Lead Detector DC 12V EVAP Vacuum Diagnostic Tester with Built-in Air Pump for Pipe System

This is great! Easy to use! I used a small amount of mineral oil. It makes a very good amount of smoke, it's adjustable, I turned the dial about half way. It connects with clamps to your positive and negative battery cable so it's totally portable to use outside if you're not able to work on your car at home. If you're in an apartment or don't have 110 AC, this is great because it runs off 12 volts DC. If you needed you could connect it to a power bank but the car battery works well . I was using it for approximately 10 minutes and it did not drain my car's battery to a point where it would not start. There was plenty of cranking power after I thought. I'm not sure how many amps it pulls . As far as the Air supply, It does not have a built-in one. You need external Air supply but you do not need to have shop air compressor, I used a bicycle pump with some acrylic tubing, a tire valve stem, hose adapters and a quick coupler for an air compressor hose for the female end to connect to the smoke machine. The bicycle pump method worked perfectly. I could control the flow of of air by hand. Very easy and there is no risk of pumping in too much air during your testing. You do not want to have a high amount of air pumping into that machine and filling up your engine Chambers with the too much air could blow something. Only need about 5 psi. No worries with there the bicycle pump method and it was very cheap to rig up. This is a must have diagnostic tool for all mechanics. This has helped me find vacuum leaks with ease. I would have never found this leak I had, it was a massive leak of air my car has in the throttle body area. It's in a tight spot. This helped me to determine where the exact leak was coming from. The TB gasket turned out to be fine after 35 years, it was the gasket to the air tube that seals around the mouth, which was an easy fix. I also had a small leak around and after market CAI intake elbow joint. I confirmed the repairs with the smoke test and the car ran much better. I recommend this.

Nice & affordable smoke machine! Ive been using now about a year a few times per month. It has pretty much all you need to smoke test exhaust, evap or induction. Ive made my investment back many times over.

Great piece of kit. Paid for itself within 15 minutes of arriving on my doorstep (overnight - thanks Amazon!). Immediately helped me identify the cause of a mysterious air/fuel issue I’ve been fighting for weeks. Easy, cheap fix, but in a spot I never would have been able to get eyes on without a stream of smoke and an inspection mirror. Saved a lot of time and money swapping out engine sensors trying to identify the true cause of the issue. I chose this unit over other similar and dissimilar models particularly for the built in air regulator and the assortment of fittings. While cheaper units with the built-in mini air compressor are appealing, the compressors have a high failure rate and a very low airflow volume. This kit is as reliable as the compressor I connect it to. Plenty of smoke output, and the adjustable smoke output is helpful, as too much can actually obscure the source leak. Only slight complaint is I feel the manufacturer should have included a single use 20ml container of smoking fluid (mineral oil). I knew it didn't include any, and I already have butcher block mineral oil on hand, but the principle remains. Overall, an affordable, full featured and compact unit.

I used this to find a vacuum leak in my vehicle. After reading some of the lower star reviews, I was skeptical, but purchased it anyways. Some one star reviews indicated user error in my opinion, so I took the chance. It started making smoke in short order and worked better than expected. I made sure not to add too much liquid... probably 9ml as opposed to 10 since some reviews said they added 20. Directions say 10. In this case, less is more. Anyway, it blew a ton of "smoke" out and once hooked up, revealed a tear in an intake boot that I couldn't visually see. The only thing I didn't like is that you need an air compressor. I had one, so no worries, but it would be nice if it had something self contained to produce pressure. Maybe it stops working on subsequent uses as some have reported, but for my needs, it worked great. Instructions were obviously written without a good Chinese to English interpreter but it wasn't too hard to figure out. I'd recommend it.

Works great, lots of smoke. Beware the heated mineral/baby oil will stink up your garage for a long time. So bad I am unable to use this inside my garage. In storage the smell is still so bad, I have to store this outside. For the money I am satisfied. Still could not find the Evap leak on my 2005 Suburban, but not the fault of the machine. Think the leak may be on the top of the gas tank where I cannot see the evap lines. The pressure gage is a must. It is missing on other similar priced smoke machines. Tells you there is a leak if the ball does not fall to the bottom. To test, close off the smoke tube and it will go to the bottom.

Works really well. Unit uses fluid like baby oil to produce smoke. I've used it a few times already. Both to find leaks on the intake side and also the exhaust side. For the exhaust side, I really like the inflatable airbag you pressurize. Stick it in the tail pipe, pump it up until it inflates to the size of the tailpipe and there is no more air gapes between them, then pump the exhaust full of smoke to find your exhaust leak. Does what it's supposed to do. Don't know if it would last in a shop where it would get used constantly but great cost effective alternative for DIY's.

Very high quality unit, comes with everything you need. Works great.

These diagnostic smoke machines need to do two things well. Naturally, they need to produce smoke. This is a given for all of these machines. They all produce smoke. So what's the next big deal? Getting that smoke in and keeping it in to whatever is being tested. THIS is where the different models differ dramatically. All the bells and whistles of pressure gauges and adjustable controls are a distant third factor. And the ability to get and keep the smoke in is where THIS UNIT FAILS SPECTACULARLY. The number one car component these machines are used to test is the intake. Intakes are tested to see if there is a vacuum leak. So, 99 times out of 100 how does one get smoke into the intake? Through the throttle body. And so what must the smoke tester do? Get the smoke into the intake through the throttle body and keep it there. And what does this machine NOT do? Get the smoke into the throttle body. It comes with a throttle body adapter, and so on paper this machine looks good. This is exactly what I bought this machine to test primarily, intake vacuum leaks. The included throttle body adapter does not work with my throttle body. Or more specifically, the connector hose from the intake filter to the throttle body. Since the throttle body has the throttle plate, although it can be done, it is generally impractical to pump smoke directly into the throttle body. Throttle bodies and the hose that leads to them are always the same size, so using that intake hose isn't a big problem. The included throttle body adapter is not nearly big enough to seal the throttle body or hose so the smoke can be pumped in. Not even close. None of the other included adapters can be substituted. This machine includes one that can be blown up, but at it's maximum it is smaller than the included throttle adapter. I tried to create an adapter to fill the gap between the throttle body and the included adapter, but that didn't work out well. Just by coincidence, I happened to have a bunch of reusable clear plastic bowls and other containers with a taper, but getting them to seal against the throttle body hose was an issue. I shouldn't have needed to do that anyways. If the kit contained this most important component the issue would be moot, but it didn't, and therefore it isn't. Now, maybe my throttle body is just too big. I've got big stuff. But no bigger than millions of other throttle bodies on millions of other cars. Maybe if I had some little anemic 1.6l mouse-like motor I'd be all set. I don't, and so I'm not. The machine's pressure gauge and smoke creation control? USELESS, since I couldn't even get the smoke into the component to be tested. It's a dumb mistake for the producers of this machine to make, and they made it. In general terms, the machine is reasonably small. I wouldn't consider it light weight, nor heavy. It comes with several adapters, all of them useless for my task. The unit is nicely packaged. The manual is well written from a spelling and grammar standpoint, but the content of the directions it provides are at best mediocre, and in practice, useless. Also of note, this unit uses mineral oil to produce the smoke. I purchased the purest, cleanest mineral oil Amazon had to offer, and that smoke smells AWFUL. Plus, that smell LINGERS for days, at a minimum. The stink still hasn't gone away. My advice: if you're a DIY-type, get a machine that will produce smoke, and look for one that has the MOST adapters possible. That component alone will make or break the usefulness of the machine.

Great for finsing vaccum leaks!

Fait le boulot

alles gut

Not good brand

Worked for 5 minutes and then stopped producing smoke and started to spray fluid out of the nozzle. Followed all instructions, maybe it was just a defective item I received, but not sure.