I know that various track cleaning cars have been made over the years, and I’ve heard that they are generally fair to poor.
As of Christmas 2020, has anyone manufactured a good, effective, track cleaning car?
I am less interested in aesthetics than function.
Happy Holidays!
I’m very happy with my CMX track cleaning car!!! I use Arrow-Car Hobby Lubricants ACT-6006 to clean the rails. Been using it for 15 years and the combination has worked flawlessly.
The accumulation of crud here in Bakersfield is terrible and the CMX works great!!
Mel
My Model Railroad
http://melvineperry.blogspot.com/
Bakersfield, California
I’m beginning to realize that aging is not for wimps.
Thank you!
Happy Holidays!
CMX is the only way.
Another happy CMX fan. I use lacquer thinner as my solvent.
This is a heavy, heavy car. Unlike typical cleaning cars, you don’t pull a CMX car all the time, just a couple of passes on cleaning day, and it’s a good idea to give your trainroom a bit of ventilation. I would advise using two locomotives for pulling this thing. For stub-end yards, I just push it back and forth by hand.
Bachmann made some boxcar track cleaners, but I’m not sure if they’re any good.
Another happy CMX owner. If the layout has set idol for awhile, it makes a noticable difference in just one pass around.
I am planning a larger layout, so when I had the chance to pick a used one up at a good price on ebay, I bought one. So far on my small 4x6 layout I have only used alchol for a solvent and just dampened the pad, not used the tank. I will use it when I have the larger layout and possibly a different solvent.
I do have one Atlas RS-3 that will pull it, but will hang up on my homemade road crossings, if it is not going fast enough. As Mr B said, two locos work best.
Have fun,
Richard
I’ve used the CMX car and the 6006 solvent for years on my On30 layout. Just run it occasionally and it will make a world of difference. I’ve tried other track cleaner cars but none can come close to this one. A bit pricey but well worth the investment.
Mark B.
This is a tad on the steep side.
Until I get one, am I better off just using the rubber eraser-like tool, or is there something in between, like the Walthers car?
You got that right! When I bought my CMX it cost about $60 in the early 2000s or late 1990s.
I would think any car with a bit of weight dragging a flat chunk of metal (6 to 8 ounces) with a piece of felt on the bottom soaked in ACT-6006 would work pretty good. The thing that makes the CMX so good is the metering valve keeping the felt pad wet.
Mel
My Model Railroad
http://melvineperry.blogspot.com/
Bakersfield, California
I’m beginning to realize that aging is not for wimps.
Gidday Mr Shock Control, as you were asking about manufactured track cleaning cars, I was going to stay clear of this discussion as I only use “John Allen” Masonite track cleaning cars, with, I believe, good effect.
Here’s a link to a previous discussion…
http://cs.trains.com/mrr/f/88/t/283997.aspx
Cheers, the Bear.[:)]
The only thing I regret about my CMX track cleaning car is not buying it sooner. I always thought spending that much for a track cleaning car for my small layout was overkill until I finally broke down and bought it. Worth every penny as they say.
Don’t use any kind of abrasive track cleaner. It will scratch the surface of the track, and the scratches will collect more dirt and be more work to clean.
Hello All,
OK, I’m going to “Ass-u-me” that you are referring to HO scale track cleaning cars.
I, and the Colorado Model Railroad Museum, use a Dapol HO Track Cleaner.
This car is on the pricy side but…
It has several features that “drip” type cleaning cars or “scrubber” types; masonite, abrasive pad type, don’t have.
For one, it has a vacuum function that actually works! (Caveat listed below.)
Great for picking up pet hair from the roadbed.
It also has a “drip” type cleaner.
From the factory this unit comes “DCC Ready”.
The “What’s In The Box” includes- -the non-self-propelled car; it needs a pusher or puller, two sets of abrasive pads, an adapter for the abrasive pads, and a tool for removing the vacuum impeller to install the abrasive pad mount.
Unfortunately, it does not include the cleaning fluid, which the manufacturer claims is proprietary.
Now for the caveat: The pick-ups from the wheels to the motor, that power the vacuum, are are a circuit-breaking type.
If the voltage (inductive heat) from the wheels to the motor exceeds 12v DC the “coupling” is designed to “break” or fail.
Replacement links are available.
There is also an “On And Off” button on the top of the car to control the vacuum function if you only want to run this unit as a “drip” type.
What the gurus at the Colorado Railroad Museum did was install a 9v battery clipped to the outside of the car to maintain a voltage that would not trip the circuit from voltage overload by also isolating the wheel pickups to the PCB that controls the motor.
They run this car only after-hours when no guests are present.
One Facebook post from the museum showed what the vacuum had collected after one run around the pike.
I installed a simple DCC decoder (motor function only) into
I do own a CMX track cleaning car and I use denatured alcohol as the cleaning agent. It is OK, but I cannot get as excited about it as other others do.
I never find a need to clean my entire track. The one issue that has always caused problems for me is the infamous “black gunk”, a gum-like residue that will appear in spots along the mainline and on the wheels of locos and rolling stock.
No track cleaning car is going to remove that stuff from the rails. So, for that purpose, I use denatured alcohol on a piece of white cotton cloth and a bit of “elbow grease”.
Rich
Just visited their web site…
Price does not matter when the item is not available (there does appear to be 5-6 in stock at various places here in the colonies)…
Looks way too fussy, way to many moving parts…
Again, as posted in the track gleeming thread, I’ve never had much trouble with dirty track since leaving brass track behind in 1973…
Leave it to a Brit or German (I’m of good German stock) to over engineer something.
I like the American approach - “parts left out cost nothing and cause no service problems”.
Does anyone recognize that quote?
I have rags, a baby shop vac, various chemicals, several simple track cleaning cars… again have only needed to use them occasionally.
Oh, and no pets in the train room… (what are pets anyway? There is cat upstairs who lets us hang around becuase we open the cans, but she would never venture to the basement).
And then there is topic of gleeming?
I have never seriously gleemed a whole layout either, never had any issues.
Yes the gunk is nickle oxide, plastic wheels don’t cause it, but they attract it. Metal wheels not so much.
My understanding of the science supports the idea of gleeming, but I know lots of guys with big layouts who have never done it, their trains run fine, they clean track seldom to never, have few to zero dirty track issues.
I will be interested to see what happens on my new layout? I run DC, at a max voltage of about 14 volts, PWM speed control. More arcing or less arcing than the hybrid AC signal of DCC?
Sheldon
Do not use any rubber eraser thing on your track. They just cause worse problems later.
The “John Allen” masonite pad car is the only thing I use, but it should be run as much as possible. Two or three of them are good.
-Kevin
I have to agree with those who have praised the John Allen masonite pad car. I built one and just place it in front of one of my trains every so often and that seems to clear everything up.
wdcrvr
Thanks. What exactly do you mean by “John Allen” car? How do you find one on the InterBays?
Since you do not recommend the eraser, until I get a track cleaning car, is isopropyl alcohol on a cotton cloth OK?
That’s how I cleaned my track for the sixty years before I got smart and bought the CMX.[(-D]