Is the atlas trck cleaning car any good[?]
you are telling me no one owns one of these.
What do you mean by “any good”? Does it clean rails? Probably so. Is there a cheaper or better way to clean rails? Probably so. Are there more expensive ways to clean rails? Probably so. “is it any good?” is not a very specific question. I might really like it and you, once you try it, might really hate it. Would that make it “any good”. Maybe.
does it do a good job of cleaning track. sheesh.
Wow…
I had one in HO a long time ago. But I couldn’t really “get into it.” I found it to be a pain to run (it liked to run on the scenery more than the rails.)
I see a lot of those little non-prototype heavy cars with cotton rollers in mags and at clubs, but I never really gave them a lot of thought until recently. (I am in N Scale now.)
I too had one years ago, in N. I found it worked fine as long as you first gave the track a good cleaning, then used it regularly. If you waited too long between cleanings it didn’t work too well.
Mark
That was probably my mistake at the time. Now, I just keep my track maintained by hand. It gives me a chance to find what the gremlins did while I was asleep.
I dont use any car that cleans track. Too much trouble. As mentioned before it may clean the scenery and everything else near the track but the rails. I had a cleaning car years ago and it did one of two things…
1-Grind the rails to unusable heights and 2- never cleaned that one dip that refused to be fixed while tearing the switches up.
I get down on my knees with Bright Boy (A eraser) and clean the rails. Also I use Nickel silver, no more brass for me.
Are you talking about the new N-scale track cleaning car? It’s not due out until next month.
The more popular HO ones are
www.centerlineproducts.com upper $60s + shipping
http://www.ttx-dcc.com/technews/clean_machine.htm for $99.00 + shipping
www.aztectrains.com the Annihilator for $125.00 incudes shipping
I traded up from the centerline to Tony’s clean machine
It really depends upon your HO layout size.
If it’s single deck, 200 feet or less, within reach you don’t need the above.
I own the clean machine but no longer use it. It’s been retired and up for sale.
My substitute is MAAS, a 2 oz metal cleaning paste for $3.00 at target.
You can also use automobile polishing compound from any auto store. A seven oz
can for $3.00
It need not be expensive to clean track unless you’er in the 36% income bracket
and don’t care about money
It need not be expensive to clean track unless you’er in the 36% income bracket
and don’t care about money.
Or have catenary and don’t want to tear it up.