Lane Issue

[perrotoro]

I'm going on 3 years with Carrera D132. The layout is in the back room of a two room antebellum cabin. We had some cool, wet weather last week and I opened cabin door to let the cabin air-out. The temperatures were no lower than the 50's - Farenheit.

Seemingly coincidental, one of the two lanes began to run irratically. At first I thought it was just the one car I was tuning at the time. I thought it might be a digital issue as I was resoldering the leads to the Carrera 26732 chip. The car would go anywhere from 2-10 feet and freeze - sometimes momentarilyand somtimes permannetly until I moved it along the track. Twice this same car - upon placing it on the track - began to run on it's own, though it was not set up as a ghost car. I think another car did this too - at one point.

I also noticed the inconsistent start/stop performance on the 2nd lane - but not as pronounced. The 1st lane is the one I run on mostly. I noticed the phenomena on near all of the twenty (or so) cars I tried - with all four different wireless Carrera stock controllers too.

Tryng other cars, I found that the issue was not solely related to the first car - though the first car seemed to exibit the inconsistentency the most. I changed braids on several of the cars and tis seemd to improve the performance. On the first car, I noticed a small copper-brown spot on the left braid - maybe a half millimeter in diameter. A few of the other cars had this, but I don't think I can be certain these spots did not already exist before this phenomena occured.

There was an all-day steady light rain when I opened the non-insulated cabin. I closed off the cabin and dried the cabin out a bit with the AC system and it seems all cars have come back to there prior state. One or two will still pause a bit - almost imperceptably.

I run stock magnets. I run several different manufacturers - Carrera, Scalextric, Scaleauto, NSR, SCX, Fly, etal. I have the Carson chip in the Scalextrix cars and the 26732 in all others except one with an Oxigen chip.

Has anyone else had dampness issues with a lane or lanes, such that I might reesolve this as my issue I experiienced? Or might I expect a slight scale build-up on the lane contacts after three years that I need to correct? 50 degF is not an issue - right? Any thoughts welcome.

[docdoom]

Try some inox on the rails and go from there

[dw5555]

Agree with running some Inox over the rails. If you don't have that put some WD40 on a rag and run that on the rails. Every fall when I open the track up in the basement I always have to run the above over the rails. Actually I do both, 1st Wd40 then the Inox. Good for the whole season.
Dave

I wish you would have posted this in the Digital Forum. We Digital guys don't have anything to read.

[perrotoro]

Thanks guys! So dampness when I opened the house to the humid air is my most likely culprit then? Moreso than just the age of the track or temperature.

I ordered some inox and have WD40. What is the reccommeded application procedure? I'm guessing I should keep it to the rails only as much as possible to keep from any residue build-up - right? Or do both the Inox and WD40 evaporate well enough to prevent build-up?

Just for grins - is zippo lighter fulid an option?

Sorry about the non-digital post Dave - wasn't sure where the question belonged.

[docdoom]

Just put a few drops on the brushes and run the car around the track. Might take a few applications on the brushes to get the whole track. Then after that when you start seeing issues again.

[indybob008]

I use Voodoo Juice on my brushes 'sold for slot cars. Pretty good stuff, Also AJ's TNT . But their are many things one can use like above.

[dw5555]

I wouldn't worry about buildup, although I've never put it on in excess so I can't say for sure. Like I said I do it once to get everything covered. I've done what the Doc has said too. I generally put 3 ghost cars on with inox on the braids and let them run for about 15 mins and all the stutters are gone.
Dave