What around the house cleaners work on dirty oily wheels and track? Rubbing alcohol, hydrogen peroxide, something else? Thanks, Denny
Rubbing alcohol
WOULD WORK THE BEST I THINK ANY WAYS[#welcome]
locomotive681
I would not recommend rubbing alcohol, I would suggest denatured alcohol.
I agree with Don, avoid rubbing alcohol because of its water content.
Isopropyl Alcohol. Please be careful re “denatured” alcohol. That covers a lot of ground and some of these products are prety toxic, particulalry methanol. All denatured means that you can’t/shouldn’t drink it. Rubbing alcohol comes in a couple of varieties including ethyl (this is the stuff that you do drink unless it’s been denatured). Goo Gone is pretty good at getting rid of grime. Use Scotch Brite pads or microfiber cloths.
Chuck . Isopropyl Alcohol isn’t that the same as “rubbing alcohol”? I was just watching a couple of DVD’s last night regarding maintenance tips, etc. All of the information i’ve seen is very significantly stated to avoid Isopropol Alcohol. Even though I would prefer to use it… And YES denatured alcohol has a very low flash point and can be dangerous, fumes, excessive contact , etc.
This is alway such a heated debate, probably the best anwer is all dependent on the specific track, a LOT of elbow grease, and MORE common sense.
The scotch brite is probably what I use the most often.
http://www.newton.dep.anl.gov/askasci/chem00/chem00102.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rubbing_alcohol
98% Isopropyl shouldn’t be labled as “rubbing” alcohol. 98% Isopropyl is available at discount stores in the drug/cosmetic sections. This suff contains little or no water and is what is used in many antiseptic cleaning pads. Main drawbacks are the stuff is very compustible and they aren’t kidding about it’s affect on unprotected skin. High volume ehatnol is much more expenisve and often harder to come by.
And if you want to take that black crap off of the center rail before it messes up the rollers on your new engine, get a sanding sponge from 3M at Home Deport. The grit does not come off the sponge so it will not foul the motors. It really makes a difference in engine performance with that black coating off of the center rail.
Yes the “Denatured” is not as easy to work with but that also can be a benefit , it dries almost immediately so if you are cleaning the wheels you don’t have to worry about it puddling.
Oh Heck…
Lets just run em till they stop then go get new ones. Seriously, anyone have any comments about the track cleaning cars available? Dry or Solvent ? Been considering one, don’t know which way to go.
Doug still think it would be a good fund raiser activity. But might be more trouble than its worth too, I guess. Anyway SD certainly doesn’t need fund raising anyway.
Dry pads beat a poke in the eye … Solvent units using foam pads are pretty good at getting the rail tops clean. There is a “wet” unit that uses a heavily weighted paint roller type pad that is soaked in solvent and dragged around the layout. I believe the vendor recommends Goo-Gone. The roller nap get down around the sides of the RailHead and Goo-Gone isn’t flamable. While Goo-Gone isn’ t flamable, it doesn’t readily evaporate either. You need to drag the car around with a dry pad to pick up the Goo-Gone and its associated crud.
If you keep the smoke fluid use down, don’t over lube and possibly cover the layout with a light weight drop cloth, the track stays pretty clean. Tin plate track does get a tin oxide coating. This is a conductive material and is a dark grey in color. It’s a little slick and can be wiped up with a microfiber cloth or an alcohol wipe. Nickel silver’s oxide is also elecrically conductive and the same procedures can be used to keep it clean.
Chuck – Thanks for the input, at the club I go to everyone spends a lot of time wiping the tracks with d-alcohol. As you know some guys can be fanatic, they are reluctant regarding the goo gone. But, I think it would be fine as long as you do as you suggested and wipe it up with a dry cloth.
I use cleaning solvents on a daily basis in my job and here’s what I know about the ones being talked about here. Iso-propyl-alcohol (IPA), is the most non-reactive solvent that I know of, which means it works well at cleaning without leaving behind residue. Rubbing alcohol can be up to 30% water, which can leave a residue and accelerate corrosion. The only time I would be careful, when using IPA, would be to not get it on anything made of rubber, or wipe it off quickly if you do because it will cause rubber to dry out more quickly, so we tend to avoid using it on things like rubber seals.
Goo Gone is just a diluted form of “Orange Terpenes,” which we use in a stronger solvent called OptiClear, which is an electro-optical grade of wax and pitch clearant. It works great at removing “goo” but leaves behind a residue that we clean up with the IPA. OptiClear is pretty strong stuff and will soften and melt latex gloves. I would wear gloves no matter which solvent I was using at work, though I frequently don’t, when cleaning track at home.
Don, This one has kinda perked my interest, http://www.netrains.com/ ,not that I need one at home. With my short track at home it is just as easy to use a lint free rag and d’natured alcohol.
I rub the track with Scotch Brite and pare the black stuff off the wheels with an Exacto knife.
Doug,
How ironic, just last night I was thinkning more about this and looking at the various ads. I too like this one the best. I think it has the best chance of being relatively functional.
Now if I could just get it to work on wallpaper, I could run around making choo choo sounds while running it on the walls, and save a lot of work.