A friend brought over a bright yellow, slightly oversize, HO boxcar that I had never seen before. It is a vacuum cleaner in a boxcar! It is powered from the rails but sits dormant until it is moved. At this point, two tiny rare earth magnets on one axle trigger the motor circuit and the vacuuming begins. It has filters to prevent the dust from re entering the room and a VERY soft bristle brush to dislodge stubborn dust. We haven’t tried it on a ballasted layout yet but don’t expect any problems. The couplers had to be changed to fit our KaDees and the wheel flanges had to be cut down a bit as we have code 70 rails but that was all. Seems to work very wel except, being slightly wider than usual, it may bind on too close structures etc.
$400.00
Vacuum Train aka the Super Sucker.
LION will make a passable model there of.
ROAR
$400!!! I’ll just keep using my Shop-Vac with the small brush attachments…[2c]
My friend says he paid $50 for it. I will find out more if interested.
Maybe this is cleaning car in question:
http://www.lux-modellbau.de/cms/front_content.php?idart=191
Normal price for a new car is between 160 - 170 Euros. This car exists for a long time, but I never bought it.
Unfortunately, english version of a web site is “under construction”.
It automatically stops vacuuming when car is stopped (e.g. in front of a signal, if pulled within a train), and starts again when train is moving. It has NEM 362 draft gear pocket, so it is easy to add Kadee coupler #17.
Regards,
Hrvoje
The track vac car sells for about $ 290 in the US, which is certainly not a bargain.
I would question if it worked or was a gimmic. The suction can’t possibly very high and I wonder if that is good or bad.
These vaccuum cars must have been out for a while - there was a RMC article a few issues back where the author backdated/North Americanized his vaccuum car by giving it a dark red CN livery, along with several other modifications (I think he also added weight also for better tracking in the dust collection bin). He definitely cautioned user to be careful of the fine mesh on the collection bin.