Anytime on any list you will find some discussion on cleaning this or
that. Peter and I live about 20 miles apart, we have essentially some
of the same engines, rolling stock and perhaps even rail. Peter's
layout is in a spare bedroom (I would guess) while mine is in a purpose
built home addition. Because it only has a simple wall/window
AC/heating unit I probably have more dust/dirt issues than he does. Our
big difference might be that I probably have 10X the length of track and
all the things that go into it.
My experiences are thus: I do clean my track a couple of times a year,
with either a couple of CenterLines, a boxcar mounted Masonite pad plus
hand rubbing in some stubborn areas, frogs, points etc. I will
ocassionally find a tiny area--maybe a 1/2" that has a fair amount of
crud built up. I've never been able to find the source--perhaps some
kind of mystery bug leaving deposits.
I also have issues where a train doesn't pass through--a spur or dead
end siding. Because we have a tendanacy to just shove cars in and out
the cleaning cars don't do well there while hand rubbing near structures
can be dicey too. I have 4 SHS switch engines from various runs. Three
seem to always respond right away and run well, but one seems to need
frequent wheel attention--don't know why as they're not really dirty,
but some liquid wheel cleaner will be it back. The bulk of my road
engines rarely need wheel cleaning--maybe once a year. Steam engines
are a mix bag, but it's always the tender wheels that build up
crud--drivers rarely.
Now let's add a third Houston area modeler--our mutual friend Rusty. I
don't think Rusty has cleaned some of engine's wheels ever--and we are
talking two decades in some cases. He mentioned one time that the pilot
wheels on his Rex Mogul kept derailing. He finally found the entire
wheel was filled with junk to where the flange was nearly covered over,
but the engine still ran. He is a believer of the Wahl clipper oil.
During a session things started out pretty jerky. He put some oil on
the rails and in a half hour things smoothed out nicely--go figure. One
time I sat down and cleaned his freight cars wheels (many being the old
Ace plastic version)--there weren't many that were clean. My guess is
that that oil picked up the dust and dirt from the rail and put it all
on the non electrical wheels--especially those plastic ones. So one
might be wise to have a few cars with plastic wheels just to collect the
dirt on the rails and it seems like some light oil will help that along.
Peter is unhappy with his Digitrax system. Another good friend is about
ready to toss his out. It's a very large system--about 3000 square feet
in area. The system has been expanded and in that process something has
gone wrong. I had an issue after doing some minor modifications, but
after a bit of work things came together again, although I still keep my
eyes and ears ready for trouble. Overall most of the problems folks
have are the same as DC or AC. Whether battery control for all our
engines ever happens, I really don't care unless someone wants to have
me test their system and I'll let them try an installation in my PBL
Heisler first.
Regarding sound engines--the newer decoders can be set to turn off after
a short while. So put the switch engine aside and either wait a minute
or two or you can do a shut down and the engine will wind down very
realistically. Need to move a couple of cars--bring back the address
and it'll start up very nicely.
Bob Werre
PhotoTraxx
On 3/27/13 12:10 PM, Peter Vanvliet wrote:
Hi Dave,
My tests with applying metal polish to the rails helped remove all
stalling problems for about two months and then it was back again. I
am not a metal expert, but I did find that I have to clean the wheels
of my American Models engines before each run. The SHS switcher I only
clean before and after a club show. The RS-1 (north yard chassis) gets
slightly dirtier easier than the SHS switcher. So, yes, when I
mentioned dirty rail, I really meant dirty rail *and* dirty wheels
(and the chore of cleaning the wheels too).
- Peter.
On 03/27/2013 11:58 am, ctxmf74 wrote:
--- [email protected], Peter Vanvliet<groups@...> wrote:
a) I was tired of the stalling of the engines, and the subsequent
cleaning-of-track chore.
Are you sure it was a track problem and not a wheel problem? I never have
problems with track but I have had locos with wheels that oxidized and caused
them to stall, then the solution was just a new set of NWSL wheels..DaveBranum
--
.
