I my new Annie just produces a little smoke. I poured some down the chimney and turned on the smoke switch behind the smoke box door. I just get a few little tendrils of smoke, that's all. Hard to even see it.
The instructions say three or four drops of smoke fluid. A glob came out of the bottle, probably more than that. I turned the loco upside down and some dripped out. Then I put in three drops. Still just a little smoke.
They have to be run pretty fast to produce smoke, even then it is not very realistic and comes out as you describe.
Not to be a party pooper but the smoke isn't very good for you to breathe anyway and causes more mess then it's worth in my opinion, I run it only for a couple Christmas tree pictures and videos then its turned off.
Lastly if the Large scale locomotives produced a real looking plume of smoke the room would quickly be filled with smoke you could hardly see through. ;D
Happy Holidays
NM-Jeff