How do you keep you underground track clean . I have good access to my undergound track, but it still a pain. What’s the best way to keep maintainance to a minimum?
Yeah, good question. At first, I thought my problem was plastic wheels, so I stopped that. Now I’m running only metal-wheel stuff down in the subway tunnels. My Lifelike R-17 subway train is fine, but the Bowser PCC car needs its wheels cleaned after every 10 or 15 minutes of running. The Bowser has brass wheels. Is that part of the problem?
I’ve been seriously thinking of a track cleaning car. Someone suggested using Mother’s Mag Wheel polish (an automotive product) which supposedly cleans the rails and keeps them clean. Is this the stuff to use?
I always use a track cleaning car in myconsist, now about the dirt. I use a shop vac and hold my hand over (cupped over the track and the hose) the end as I go over the track. one more thing; people always leave access to your track, anyhing could happen.
I run a track cleaning car every few weeks for twenty minutes or so. It seems to work well. I wouldn’t use Mothers Mag Wheel polish on your rails. I use it on my Trans Am’s wheels and it is a very messy, sticky paste that really works well on them but for very small rails it would leave a mess. Paste would find its way under the tiny lip of the rail, that would be hard to get off with a rag, you would need a toothbrush or something like that. Mothers also leaves a tiny protective coating after you polish your wheels that might effect the performance of your loco’s.
I heard Mother’s Mag Polish was a good thing for rails.
I take a bright boy track cleaner and tape one end of it to a ruler or yard stick depending on how far i have to go inside a tunnel or hard to get to track and push it back and forth along the rails to clean them…I then put a very small drop of whal’s clipper oil on the rails and let the locomotive carry it into these areas on their wheels…the clipper oil keeps the track cleaner for longer periods of time as it also cuts down on any rail oxidation…not really a problem on nickel silver rail but it does help on brass rail…chuck
I use it (Mothers Mag Wheel Polish) on my layout (2700 ft of track) and only had to use it once. It has been over 2 years now since I had to clean my track and all my sound engines never miss a beat on sound.
I have also used Blue Coral (which is a liquid – unlike the Mothers a paste)! And have had no problems.
It is just how you apply it. I use an old piece of HO cork roadbed and spread a little on it and then just rub the rail heads. I then use a clean piece and buff the rails. That’s it no mess.
Now if you are careless you will get it down along the sides of the rails. Just use a clean cloth and wipe it up. No big deal.
It sure is nice not having to find an excuse to run my layout (I have to run a cleaning car before I can operate). I want to do operations not clean track.
And we run the layout. Operations every other Thursday night and usually two times a year we have an OPTUD (OP Till U Drop) which runs 12 hours. I have had operators from as far away as 100 miles.
So having a layout that runs well is something very important to me. And the metal polish has done this!
BOB H – Clarion, PA
The track I have in the tunnel is steel. (yeah I know) Any experience with that?
Chip
Try the metal polish anyway. You will soon find out if it works!
We used it on the Club’s Lionel layout and it seemed to make a difference!
BOB H - Clarion, PA
If people say they used the Mothers Polish and it works for them then great, I’ll give it a try too. But if I end up with a sticky mess I’m going to be upset, lol.
Remember a little goes a long way 
BOB H - Clarion, PA
Chip, I would makea thin, long reacher, out of cedar maybe, and affix some type of cloth to one end, with the material wrapped up and back over the leading edge…just a 3/4" X 3/4" pad. I would place one drop of (name a metal polish, but not Silvo or Brasso), and run it back and forth into your mine doing each rail. Three minutes at the outside, including getting set up and putting away.
A heck of a lot cheaper than a cleaning car.
Edit - P.S. - Seven months into running trains on nickel-silver EZ-Track, and have yet to clean my track. None of my engines, all sound, misses a beat…anywhere.
At the club here we use a 2"x2" wood block that is wide enough to span both our mainlines, we put it into a discarded small footie sock, and then spray it with 409 cleaner. It Works Great!! However we have to do it often because we just have too much dust in this part of the country, and I have a Walthers Dash 8 Locomotive that has Bronze wheels, so they gum up really fast, only after about 10 - 20 minutes.
Thanks Chip, I always wondered what the lyrics were after oops…
(We are DEVO)
Actually that was a cover.
I’m Speed Racer and I Drive real fast.
selector, how expensive is a cleaning car?
How about one of those algae scrubbers they sell for aquariums?
Guys, I don’t have a long reach in the tunnels.
I can’t say for sure, but the one’s that get the best reviews run into the 50-90 dollar range.
Now that I think of it, I would get one of those sanding blocks, the kind that has a screw to remove a piece of sandpaper when it is worn, and put a piece of terrycloth or flannel sheet on it. I’d use that as a scrubber with a small bit of metal polish.
I’d say that I hate to say “I told you so,” Chip, but, frankly, I just love to say “I told you so!”
A track cleaning car might be your best bet for basic track maintenance–something with a Masonite pad that rubs on the rails and plenty of weight. And you have switched to metal wheelsets, right?