Simple Green50% in water should take it right off,something a little stronger like Purple Power would do the trick.
There is no way to wipe it on with a sponge on the sides and between the rails. I cannot believe it could soak into the rails and reappear, maybe the flanges pull it off inner sides and that causes the reappearance.
I never tried the Simple Green. Last time I was able to get it off by just using the Tar and Wax, Swifter and potentially rain fall.
I don’t think it reappeared or soaks into the metal. I think it was never off to begin with. Why I was able to get a day where it worked and then a week later where it didn’t is unclear to me. I actually ran most of the stuff I owned with only some minor stuff happening with cars not performing properly. I recall my NW-2 not being able to push as much as I remember it doing.
The drywall screen made the tops of all the rails nice and shiny. Not necessarily what I am going for but it should have scrapped off the top layer. I did a scrub with a wet swifter, scrub with a drywall screen, scrub with the tar and wax, followed by a scrub with the swifter again. Hoping it rains tomorrow so it will all get rinsed now to but may take the garden hose to it. I will also be cleaning the wheels of the engines that I ran the day it was all slipping just to be sure.
I might try simple green in the future. I also might try to come up with some sort of “rail caps” that I can lay over top of a section of rail quickly…spray it with the Armor All and then remove the caps and move on to the next section.
I did try applying Armor All with a using a paint brush, but it was not very effective and still getting stuff on the rails. I suppose I could try a sponge but I feel like it will miss a bunch of spots underneath the the rails. I have a year to experiment with this idea of caps. Something I can lay over top of the rails like tubing split down the middle where I can lay it down for say 2 to 4 foot sections at a time, spray, remove and move to the next section and continue in this fashion. That should help solve the issue, at least for non-turn out spots.
Maybe some of this in your size choice will help Nicolas
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Thanks for the link David. I may try to use that to cover the rails at the 1/4 inch side, but your link gives me a much cheaper and better source for tubing i need to protect the air hoses for all my air-powered turnouts. I tried to bury the pneumatic tubing in gravel and sure enough it punctured the tubing. The split tubing should be perfect because i won’t have to remove and reattach all the pneumatic stuff I have laid out already. I can just add it in place and should be enough to protect it.
Could run some masking tape along the rail tops, spray, then pull off the tape.