Okay, I know the tricks for cleaning deisels, but steamers are a PIA. Now I figure there’s got to be at least one of you that figured out a trick.
So spit it out.
Lay it on its back in a cradle and use jumpers to power up. Clean drivers as they turn. Dremel the tender, leading and trailing wheels.
Jim
Trix makes a device that works well for this- their ##T66602 wheel cleaner. It is a plastic box with pickups on the bottom and brass wire brushes on top, designed so that you can snap two or more of them together end-to-end to handle large locomotives (The photo Trix shows on its web site doesn’t match what they’re actually shipping). It works on the same principle as the Kadee wheel cleaning brush, but unlike the Kadee brush, it sits on top of the track.
I use two of them snapped together and set down on any convenient open stretch of straight track to clean the wheels on diesels and steam locomotives up to about the size of a 4-8-4. You just set the engine on top and turn up the track power. The only thing it doesn’t help with are the wheels on pilot and trailing trucks. I still do those by hand with a pencil eraser or a Bright Boy.
It works well, and despite my initial concerns about wearing off the plating on the loco’s wheels, I haven’t seen any problem with that over the three years I’ve used it…
The wheels cleaners aren’t cheap- about $25 apiece- but the amount of fooling around they save is worth it to me.
Chip,
The January issue of MR came with a bonus packet called Workshop tips - Locomotives and rolling stock, that had a couple of cleaning methods in it. One was on pg. 5 and used a Kadee wheel cleaner set up in a jig. The other was on pg. 6, and used a modified rerailer and a handywipe. Both methods avoided the need to put the locomotive in a cradle of some kind.
Tom
Assuming it’s a newer (non-brass usually) steam locomotive where the tender picks up power from both rails, I use the tried and true alcohol on a paper towell across an old piece of track and let the wheels clean themselves. I also use this method for diesels and in all the different scales I model…
…Except for three rail O scale. I’ve never cleaned that track or wheels and follow the old adage, if you can smell the track, it’s probably time for a cleaning… [:D]
Jeff
OKay, it’s cleaning time.
I seen a cleaner made from an old tape capstan motor the rubber wheel power the nopower wheels
B