Track Cleaning... the new approach?

[Sir TophamHatt]

So it's pretty well known that track rubbers are the most unfavourable option for cleaning track.

 

I use isopropyl alcohol in a CMX track cleaner, which seems to be fine for me.

 

However the latest rumblings is graphite blocks. I've purchased a set for £5 from Amazon to try.

 

This video on YouTube suggests a different cleaning fluid:

I appreciate everyone has a different view and the subject gets done to death every so often but perhaps thoughts of whether graphite is better or not?

 

My layout is also built for reliability. Nearly every piece of track is connected to power, my insulfrog points have six (in total) connections so all but the blades are connected to power.

Track cleaning is low on my list of things to do as I rarely get stuttering.

Edited May 1, 2020 by Sir TophamHatt

[Nearholmer]

19 minutes ago, Sir TophamHatt said:

However the latest rumblings is graphite blocks. I've purchased a set for £5 from Amazon to try.

latest as in “been known about for donkey’s years”. People have been using carpenters’ pencils and the like for a very long time, and it works, provided the track is clean at the start - it won’t cure already dirty track.

[Gordon A]

For track cleaning I use electrical contact cleaner manufactured under by the same company as WD40 (But NOT WD40).

[F-UnitMad]

1 hour ago, Sir TophamHatt said:

...and the subject gets done to death every so often...

Doesn't it just??

 

I'm one of those delinquent reprobates who occasionally uses a track rubber, and I am totally unrepentant for such apostacy - the railheads are nice & polished, without any sign of the supposed Somme-like conditions as foretold by the Prophets of Doom, and I also use a 2B graphite stick as well.

For loco wheels I have a couple of old typewriter eraser pencils, although sometimes I'll use the "IPA on a kitchen towel pad" method, with a window wide open so I don't get in trouble with SWMBO for the smell.

All rolling stock has metal wheels; I never use plastic wheels.

 

[Michael Edge]

I put most of Herculaneum Dock up again in the shed in March, it had been stored since Train West last year (it wasn't cleaned there at all). All the track and locos still worked perfectly - I haven't really cleaned much since the Southampton show in 2016, just rub over with a graphite pencil if any loco does stall anywhere. Plastic wheels have been banned on my layouts for decades.

[AdamsRadial]

As an alternative to a track rubber, a piece of old leather belt can be used to burnish the rail heads, which it does remarkably well (works on razors so it ought to work on rails). My favoured method once I have clean track is the rub over the rails with an old wine-bottle cork which removes a surprising amount of black from the rails. Every now and then I clean the cork with IPA and a rag, or meths. No abrasion required.

[Il Grifone]

11 minutes ago, AdamsRadial said:

omis

wine-bottle cork

omis

 

Now that does seem like a good idea....

 

Edited May 1, 2020 by Il Grifone

[Oldddudders]

My OO/HO layout is in an unheated 1850 barn, with a low, beamed ceiling. I share the premises with spiders, mice and snakes, maybe others. Running in Winter is dire - I freeze! I try using a track-cleaning car with alcohol pads but it only touches the top, not the real dirt. 

 

So use of an abrasive seems necessary. If you have a better idea please do tell me....

[Foden]

12 hours ago, Oldddudders said:

So use of an abrasive seems necessary. If you have a better idea please do tell me....

Give said abrasive or instrument to the mice. Work smarter, not harder!

[RexAshton]

How many people clean their rolling stock wheels? They can be the biggest depositer of muck onto the railhead.

[Butler Henderson]

37 minutes ago, RexAshton said:

How many people clean their rolling stock wheels? They can be the biggest depositer of muck onto the railhead.

A golden rule - clean wheels, use metal tyres not plastic wheels, clean track, no traction tyres (or at least not of the material found on UK models). Not sure where Bullfrog Snot fits into that whether its okay or not. People are usually in that much of rush to get things running wheels get overlooked but it simply means the chore of the track cleaning reoccurs that quicker and more wheels ultimately need cleaning.

[hayfield]

14 hours ago, Il Grifone said:

 

Now that does seem like a good idea....

 

 

Seems a great excuse to buy anothe bottle or two

[boxbrownie]

14 hours ago, Oldddudders said:

My OO/HO layout is in an unheated 1850 barn, with a low, beamed ceiling. I share the premises with spiders, mice and snakes, maybe others. Running in Winter is dire - I freeze! I try using a track-cleaning car with alcohol pads but it only touches the top, not the real dirt. 

 

So use of an abrasive seems necessary. If you have a better idea please do tell me....

Move the layout indoors 

[boxbrownie]

53 minutes ago, RexAshton said:

How many people clean their rolling stock wheels? They can be the biggest depositer of muck onto the railhead.

I still use a very old PECO brass brush wiper and contact that powers the wheels, not found anything easier (and it’s effective) on Loco wheels as yet.

[mezzoman253]

An alternative view https://www.railwaymodellers.com/track-cleaning-for-model-railways-with-simons-shed/?utm_source=Model+Railway+Scenery&utm_campaign=14ce67d974-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_1_5TH_OCTOBER_2019_COPY_15&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_9553e44ac6-14ce67d974-326254165&mc_cid=14ce67d974&mc_eid=1398c20398

 

Rob

[mikeg]

I use a 2in square of hardboard glued to a piece of 2x1in timber with the rough side outer most which is used to polish the rails before a running session, my block has been in use for about 30 years, once a year I clean the hardboard with a brass brush to take off the black dross from the rails. I tried the carpenters pencil but I found that the wheels on the stock just picked it up and I had to get a scratch brush to clean them up, it took hours and 30 years ago I did not have the spare time to spend cleaning wheels. A good friend at that time suggested the hardboard and as they say the rest is history!

 

regards mike 

[Michael Edge]

The wheels do pick up the graphite, loco wheels look quite grey - but it's conductive dirt, doesn't seem to affect the rolling stock wheels at all. I do clean rolling stock wheels from time to time but it's years since I've done it.

[kipford]

On Brighton East. I use Iso-Propyl Alcohol applied with a lint free cloth the day before an exhibition. Apart from that at home I never clean the track, the layout lives in a bedroom so is not subject fluctuating temperature and lots dirt in the air. Wheels, I have not cleaned any wheels on the loco or stock for over 5 years and I do check for dirt. Steel wheels and DCC seem to keep it all clean. Conversely my stock for straight DC on Hope - under - Dinmore is cleaned before each show. 

[Right Away]

22 hours ago, RexAshton said:

How many people clean their rolling stock wheels? They can be the biggest depositer of muck onto the railhead.

Very true, and not forgetting the bogie and trailing truck wheels of steam locomotives. The wheel backs also can accumulate a considerable amount of grime which will need removing.

 

I was just recently checking over a Pacific, cleaning the drivers and tender wheels with cotton buds dipped in IPA (the non drinkable kind - unless you're desperate!). The bogie and trailing truck wheels looked shiny and clean; nevertheless I gave them a wipe and was surprised at the dirt deposited on the cotton bud. 

 

 

 

 

 

[Torper]

The ranting chap in the video inthe OP's initial post is quite right - do not use IPA.  As for graphite, more is worse - one quick swipe on the inside railhead  is enought, if you can see it you've used too much. 

 

Where do i get this information?  If you go to https://www.scalefour.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=6426&hilit=track+cleaning and then go down 11 posts to one by John Palmer, you'll find a link to a pdf.  Open it and you'll get an article that appeared in The Model Railway Hobbyist.  It appears to be scientific based and was written after the author found that a well known US model railway club had been using IPA to clean the track on their extensive layout only to find the harder they cleaned things, the more quickly they got black gunk buildup again.  Anyway, to cut a long story short (read it for yourselves) the author found that non-polar solvents protect metal surfaces from forming new oxides because they inhibit micro-arcing, and he gives a longish list of the best stuff to use for track cleaning.  Top of the list is kerosene (useful now when the price of heating oil is so low) but perhaps more manageable and just as good is WD40 Contact Cleaner (that's not the ordinary WD40, although even that should perform reasonably well).  Way down the list at 22, and very much a polar solvent, is IPA. 

 

Make of it what you will - someone suggested that it's fake news. I personally have been using Halford's Surface Cleaner, basically because I happened to have some at the time.  It seems to have all the right ingredients (Naphtha (petroloeum) hydrotreated light 30-60%, Propan-2-ol and Xylene.  I carried out an extremely unscientific test on a length of nickel silver track - I wiped one rail with a some IPA on a cloth, and the other with some Surface Cleaner.  The latter appeared to remove more muck.  Possibly more appealing in that it doesn't have any Xylene would be Halford's Electrical Contact Cleaner, the sole ingredient of which, other than propellant, would appear to be naptha.  Most appealing of all comes from another poster on that Scaleforum topic who points out that in France people use wine bottle corks (the traditional variety) to clean the track.  They apparently work well, but don't last long and have to be frequently renewed!

 

DT

[jukebox]

Hmmmm 

 

Chemist #1.

 

Bottom line, this black gunk is mostly metal oxides formed from micro-arcing between the wheels and the rail. This contact point is quite small, as you can see in [1]. Essentially, the electricity flowing at this tiny contact point triggers a chemical reaction in the wheels and rails. The electrical current in effect “explodes off ”metal alloy molecules from the wheels and rails. It oxidises these metal molecules, forming a fine dark grey powder. So the key to slowing down the buildup of metal oxide is to inhibit the micro-arcing.

 

The chemist told me that non-polar solvents work best to both clean electrical contacts and to protect them by inhibiting micro-arcing. Apparently, polar solvent molecules get trapped in micro pits of the metal surface, leaving an “electron charged” microscopic residue. This electron-charged polar residue encourages micro-arcing in the presence of an electrical current, quickly forming new metal oxides on the metal surfaces in electrical contact.

 

(source: https://www.scalefour.org/forum/download/file.php?id=20572&sid=39351ad3545f6bcbaf0e5de943185eb0 )

 

1 vote for Kerosene/Paraffin, with a dielectric constant of 1.8

 

 

Chemist #2.

 

Organic chemical solvents are available in a bewildering assortment. Solvents vary in strength according to their chemical nature, characterized by a chemist’s term called “polarity”. Unfortunately, “stronger” is not always better, since it depends on what type of contamination we are attacking. A simple rule of thumb to remember when dissolving a solid is “like dissolves like”. This approach can be quite effective in a chemical laboratory, where we often know what material we are trying to dissolve. Two practical examples of solvent polarity effects come to mind: Sugar is freely soluble in water (water and sugar both being highly polarized chemicals) but totally insoluble in something like lighter fluid or mineral spirits. On the other hand, ordinary paraffin wax is fully soluble in relatively on-polar solvents like lighter fluid or mineral spirits, but virtually insoluble in water.

 

Since we, as model railroaders, have no means of identifying the individual track contaminants, we may as well proceed in a “worst case” orientation. In doing so, we can simply assume that there could be some of all three categories of contamination present on our rails. Because we are usually dealing with such a “hodgepodge” of contaminants, we need something that covers a wide range of solvent strengths. The best we can hope for is to partially dissolve and loosen most of the foreign matter and have it transfer onto the cleaning pad.

 

As one of my fellow model railroaders is quick to point out, if we soften the foreign matter on the rails without removing it, we are simply “making mud”, which will dry out and remain on the rails after the solvent evaporates. My recommendation for this broad utility cleaning agent is lacquer thinner. Lacquer thinner usually contains a mixture of petroleum distillates, methanol, toluene, acetone, methyl ethyl ketone, propylene glycol monomethyl ether acetate, ethyl acetate and xylene. Some of these chemicals are not even available to the general public in their pure form. (Further reading will also inform you that this mixture “cannot be made non-poisonous” and that it is highly flammable. These properties of lacquer thinner mean that it must be used with utmost caution.) Because of the array of solvent strengths represented here, lacquer thinner is well suited for track cleaning, and is probably more effective than any single component solvent.

 

(source: https://tonystrains.com/news/chemist-reviews-cmx-clean-machine/ )

 

1 vote for Lacquer Thinner, with a dielectric constant of 33.6

 

As Mark Knopfler once sang: "Two men say they're Jesus - one of them must be wrong..."

 

Now, I'm not a chemist.  There could very well be logic that is true in both these learned gentleman's arguments.  And I'm very much from the live-and-let-live school.  As an engineer, I *do* subscribe to the theory that anything abrasive cannot be good for the rail head - creating micro abrasions that can only ultimately be filled with dirt - so I wasn't overly impressed with Old Mate in the OP's linked video suggesting wet and dry paper as the go to to clean rails.  And I do know that using lacquer thinners in a CMX works for me; I accept the logic that using the strongest chemical agent possible is most likely to remove as much contamination as possible.   

 

Of course, Your Mileage May Vary, as they say. If what you do gives you clean rails and trouble free running, then more power to you.  Literally!

 

Cheers

 

Scott

 

 

[Torper]

Well, you pays your money and you takes your choice.  At least neither of them recommend IPA.......

 

DT

Edited May 3, 2020 by Torper

[Right Away]

Recommendations pertaining to the Do's and Don'ts, Pro's and Con's of using Isopropyl Alcohol for track/wheel cleaning purposes continue to roll on.

 

Having great respect for those who, for various reasons choose not to utilise the product, I can only offer guidance from my own experiences.

For very many years, I have had no problems whatsoever when using 99% pure IPA carefully on trackwork and rolling stock wheels. (The OP's video does refer to the 70% strength, the water content of which slows evaporation, making it more effective for disinfection purposes and furthermore much less suitable for electrical applications.) 

 

The railway (DCC) continues to function perfectly even some time after cleaning when a light conductive tarnish appears on the railhead.

 

 

 

 

[boxbrownie]

33 minutes ago, Right Away said:

Recommendations pertaining to the Do's and Don'ts, Pro's and Con's of using Isopropyl Alcohol for track/wheel cleaning purposes continue to roll on.

 

Having great respect for those who, for various reasons choose not to utilise the product, I can only offer guidance from my own experiences.

For very many years, I have had no problems whatsoever when using 99% pure IPA carefully on trackwork and rolling stock wheels. (The OP's video does refer to the 70% strength, the water content of which slows evaporation, making it more effective for disinfection purposes and furthermore much less suitable for electrical applications.) 

 

The railway (DCC) continues to function perfectly even some time after cleaning when a light conductive tarnish appears on the railhead.

 

 

 

 

Agree, although when using a switch cleaner type solution (of whatever flavour is your preference) leaves a conductive film on the rail heads as well, but as you say 99% IPA is the only one to use if at all.

 

Just try buying it at the moment 

[mikesndbs]