EXPERT MODELLERS SHOW YOU HOW
HOW TO KEEP YOUR RAILS CLEAN
Clean contact surfaces are vital to ensuring reliable layout operation. George Dent offers some simple tips to help keep your trains moving, and trials a new rail cleaning fluid.
Maintaining clean and shiny rails will help to keep your trains working reliably.
PHOTOGRAPHY: GEORGE DENT
Track-cleaning is a necessary chore for any model railway, even if your layout is kept under dust covers when out of use. Whether it’s generic dust from the railway room or exhibition hall, stray paint deposits, or oil and grease dropped by passing locomotives, our track is inevitably prone to the build-up of unwanted contaminants.
Most track features nickel silver rail, which is naturally prone to tarnishing, while steel rail can corrode if employed in damp locations. The cleanliness (or otherwise) of locomotive and rolling stock wheels can also have a profound effect on the rails. There’s an argument that plastic wheels can lead to dirtier rails, although how true that is, I’m unsure. I do find metal wheels easier to keep clean, however.