I have a pretty big track set up on a 4x8 with two levels. If I blow it off with an air compresser and run the Oscar around on the track about 6 times each side and run the cars for about 15 minutes all is good. Problem is, the very next day I have to do this again. If I don't use it for the work week, 5 days, it's a real pain in the a*@. Is there a trick for this?

I use a swiffer duster.

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once a month i clean the groves with a tooth pick,alcohol and gun clealing pads. then use a lint free rag with alcohol. i run cars on it every nite. i found when i let it set up, it contaminates rapidly.i found those painters tack clothes work extremely well. i also got a little vacumm for christmas thats rechargable that works well. every 6 months i use a super fine sanding block to resurface the rails.no more problems here and we have 3 cats and 2 dogs.

MCD4X4
About once a month or ever other month I put a heavy coat of WD40 on my track and this keeps the corrision in check! I do vaccum and "tack rag" the track before inviting the boys over for a day of racing. Just a few laps with a magnet car puts the rails back in excellent shape. After four years I have never had to sand my rails!
I too agree with AfxToo in that Oscar is more a toy than a tool!
I have often wondered Why car builders out there can come up with all the technology ij the world to make cars go faster and stay on the track better year after year BUT No one can build a track cleaning car!?!?!?!
Some have tried but with little success in my opinion. Seems so simple maybe some day I can be the one to come up with it!
Sincerely
Ted

Ted,
I've been told by many not to use the WD40 because it puts and oil residue on the plastic which makes the cars lose traction?

I use alcohol with the lint free rag to get the dust off the plastic. Then I take those LL or TYCO magnet cars and run them around three or four times and the track is ready for my good cars. ;) rr

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The Oscars have a small overhang in the rear where the cleaning pad comes out. My track has a lot of those AURORA bridge tracks in it. If I leave the body off it runs fine, with the body on the ass hangs up and the rear wheels lift enough to stop it form making it up the hill. I also have a second leave on the track like that highway in LA, so... to wipe the track down by hand is a bit of a project to because of all the tressels posts. Before I built it I did a little pasting on the PC, here's what I came up with. The only thing different is the hill climb is made of 17 curve tracks, which meant I needed to add 4 bridge tracks to come down from it.

Someone did a Super G+ powered track cleaner a couple of years ago. It somehow snapped on the front end of a Super G+ chassis, replacing the front axle. It had a fine abrasive pad on it. The magnet traction made it work better than an Oscar.

Any pictures of one of these? The Oscar seems to help after like 7-10 trips around but the shoes wear out really fast.

Since the original question was more about dust prevention I still say that having a cloth track cover is still a viable option.
I've been using a couple of old bed sheets to cover the track when It's not going to be in use for awhile. Keeps some of the junk off and prevents the wife from making it a storage table for her little odds and ends that seem to filter their way into the Batcave. :) rr

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I have a set of those train, Thats the project for the week. Works the same as this one How did you find that one? Good work. :thumbsup: http://www.portlines.com/trackcleaner.htm

No WD40 doesnot hurt my track 2.5 years of heavy use. Is a matter of fact for some unexplained reason the cars sun MUCH quiter and it some how improves the traction? Go figure!
The tires too stay cleaner longer after cleaning with WD40 and I dont wipe it down after applying it with a rag I just continue to wipe it and it disipates somehow!
Hope this helps
Ted

My track is in my hobby room, and it gets quite dusty at times from all the sanding on my other projects. If its really bad, I use a vac with a soft brush, but for a quick wipe down I use a painter's tack cloth. Takes all the dust right off. If it's race night, I give it a quick wipe with Life like track cleaner. I'm also going to try rail zip, which is a model railroad product that is supposed to stop corrosion, but running a car around a couple of laps is enough to clean up the rails.

I would just dust the track off, then we would run some tyco us-1 trucks around a few times to warm it up......every other month or 2 we would wipe it down with denatured alcohol, or rubbing alcohol.

WD-40 is sometimes slammed by people. But what they don't know is that not only WD-40 conditions the plastic track (like lotion for skin) to keep it from drying and becoming brittle, it also does the same thing for tires. The problem is when you use too much, it will make things slick. As mentioned, spray some on a rag, and make sure the room is ventilated, don't want to be racing high off the stuff :freak: .

I am just getting back into SlotCars. Haven't used them in about 12 - 15 years, but my son has discovered he enjoys em. So I bought a whack of track (bout 70') and have been cleaning it with a nickel to get rid of the oxide on the rails. Would a sanding block be better? And since we aren't going to be very serious into it, I am assuming we wouldn't need to do our cleaning quite as good as some of you guys do? I was hoping that I would not have to do much other than run a vacuum over top of the track once a week. Or should I look into one of those "Oscar" track cleaners. Sorry if the post is rather nu-bish, but would appreciate a short brief cleaning list for normal "fun" use cleaning.

Hi,

Depending on how bad the rails are:

1. Soak the tracks over night in "CLR" from any hardware store.

2. Rub the rails with a cleaning block sold in Train type hobby stores.

I buy a lot of track from garage sales and places like that. This is the way I clean them before selling them. The cleaning block will not scratch the tracks like sand paper.

MCD4x4 NY

MCD4x4, thank you for the suggestion. I will give that a try. The rails are in pretty bad shape. I have cleaned about 1/6th of the track so far with the ol nickel technique and it has done quite a good job, but it's quite tedious. Your way sounds like the best thing to do. Thanks again.

That CLR is good stuff and it even gives the plastic a nice luster. Takes the workout of it too. :thumbsup:

Thanks for the tip. The soaking in CLR works really well even in a really diluted batch. I used some emery cloth afterwards and a gentle pass left the rails looking pretty new. The track isn't oily anymore and it just all looks new. The track is from the mid 70's and looks like I just bought it. I probably saved a good weekend of bitching thanks to you.

That's what these board are all about. People don't think about them much but between Google and forums, you can find out just about anything you need/want to know. Two days a go I'm sitting in from of the computer and I thought, wouldn't it be cool to have my name on the little green button on the lower left instead of "start". Well, I did a search and found the info. Now my start button says "Brian". Than I wanted to go further and change the windows icon next to it and found that info. Cool. Well, have fun.


MCD4x4 NY

I designed that Turbo Train track cleaner. I have found that the best method for cleaning my track rails is the Bright Boy and then a clean rag like a folded old cotton crew sock. This is however very tedious with 4 lanes and 85 feet of track. The Turbo Train conversion seemed like a cool idea to automate this method but it needs tweaking. The odd Tyco chassis that powers that train needs traction improvements yet it has odd, tall narrow wheels. I couldn’t find silicones to fit these wheels. You would neede to cut down some other wheel/tire combination. Also, all the cars need more down force to be effective. It does work after a couple of rounds around the track, but my layout has the steep banked turn and the train often drops a car at that point and then flails around bashing trackside stuff.

Our current method is simply hand rubbing the rails with the bright boy every other race or so. It is tedious but gives the best results. Then just go over the track with a special track cleaner. We use a pivoting drywall sanding block that attaches to a painting pole. Instead of clamping the 3M scuff pads, we just clamp in a square clean rag and can then reach all the way around the track, pivoting around the corners. You can see the dirt you’ve removed. I have to take a picture of the device since I cannot find an example on the web.

Only once in a while do I use a liquid cleaner. Periodically I’ll go around with a clean cloth that has been treated with window cleaner since this evaporates pretty quickly. This is done FIRST. The last step always is cleaning the rails.

I agree that there has to be an easier and more efficient way of cleaning HO slot car tracks. It is an important step to getting the most performance out of your electric slot cars.

-Scott V.