brass and nickle silver

[Brakie]

Absolutely..

Where to start?

There is all kinds of gunk on our track..Dandruff,dead skin flakes,hair,pet hair,dust,electrical residue,oils,spics of bug dropping etc...It never ends as its a constant bombarment...

Our train seems to roll right along.

[jim currie]

Metals form metallic bonds. Lerner.org may not discuss it, but that is because it is a simplification intended for the layman with no knowledge of the field. If you want to learn chemistry, go to your local library and take out a copy of Brown, Bursten, & LeMay which is a common college text. A chemical reaction is one in which chemical bonds are formed or destroyed...the creation of an alloy is a chemical reaction. You have, in several posts, failed to convey any understanding of this concept...only resistance to it.

We have had many personal testimonies in this thread as to the reason why most of us prefer nickel silver. Eye witness testimony trumps theory in courts...especially when the theory is incomplete and not presented by an expert witness. A proper experiment would involve ovals of track and climate controls...it would help to reveal the roles played by some of the variables which affect the corrosion of the track. If different alloys are used in brass and nickel silver rail, then additional test tracks would be needed. This wouldn't be a fun or short experiment.

Increasing the Nickel raises the resistance to corrosion.
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Let's not forget that in large scale, brass track is quite common. The wider rails decrease the risk of corrosion interfering with the electrical pickup...and the greater weight probably makes it more effective at polishing the rail.

On a related note, I wonder if nickel silver first came to prominence with eating utensils for its appearance, its corrosion resistance, or both.

Jim, you are a fine model railroader whom is a pleasure to have on the forum. I don't think that you have made any enemies in this thread...just a friendly disagreement.

Michael

again i don't care about friends or enemies I'm not out to convert anyone i just got tired of post stating that joe shome or linn knowitall said this and that . as to the ones that state there displease with brass might be because of the make of track some had very poor QC but that is a personal experience.the post used was simple but it put forth the idea that chemical reactions take place at the molecular level i cant open the URL you posted .

[Puddlejumper]

Wow, such a discussion about Brass Vs. Nickel Silver!!! I hate one and love the other, but give me the right price and i'll use both, but only on my Pennsy mainlines since brass is only available in code 100.

When it comes down to it, NS is the track to use because of the available diversity. I can get NS in code 55. Try getting brass in that code. Don't really care about anything else.

I'm glad you guys are so passionate about your hobby, but don't let it take you too far, it IS just a hobby...

Dave

[ray_m]

I have used both Brass and Nickel Silver track on diferent layouts with the same results.
Maybe it is the enviorment or the fact that I am used to keeping wheels and track clean no matter what they are made of.
But if I want to be prototypical I guess I should be using steel wheels and track.

[Russ Bellinis]

I would only add one point about plastic wheels. I have never seen any evidence of plastic wheels leaving residue on rails, but before I switched over to metal wheels on my rolling stock, I did find that the plastic wheels would really clean the rails. Unfortunately, all of the dirt that they pulled off the rails was deposited on the wheel treads! I found out about these deposits when I had cars suddenly derailing at places I had never had any problems at before. When I inspected my trains I found that the wheels of my locomotives were clean, but there appeared to be no flanges left on my freight cars! I spent a couple of hours with alcohol in a bowl cleaning wheel sets one night, and repeated the process on a regular basis on all of my Athearn blue box cars until I noticed that they were beginning to roll very badly due to rust on the steel axles! I then switched out the Athearn wheel sets for Kaddees, and later P2k, or Intermountain. I never saw any evidence of the plastic wheel sets deteriorating, but between the gunk pick up on the wheels and the rusting of the axles, I gave up on most of them. I think the only plastic wheel sets I have left on anything are on a couple of my cabooses.

[nkp_174]

Maybe there is a browser related problem...it works find for me...but not all websites work on my computer...

Here is the relevant text:
"The influence of other alloying additions
The nickel silvers are more resistant to tarnishing than ordinary brasses, the least tendency to tarnishing being shown by those of highest nickel content. Under indoor exposure conditions the tarnishing results only in the development of a yellow tinge in place of the original silvery appearance but long-term outdoor exposure can produce darker surface staining and, eventually, a deposit of light green corrosion products."

That website is from an engineering group which specializes in materials and corrosion.

I'd guess that this is part of the reason that it became popular for use in silverware...hence the nickname "German Silver".

Yesterday I was reading a British forum (with tons of great scratch building projects of locomotives and cars), and they discussed the benefits of using nickel silver in place of ordinary brass for building locomotives. They cited both its resistance to corrosion, easier to solder, and being easier to work with as the reasons for it. I'm inclined to try it out. Looking around, I noticed that some of their cottage industry builders offer their kits with 0.020" thick NS chassis and 0.012" brass boilers, cabs, and such.

Russ, that issue has been raised before just like track cleaning. It is an interesting subject! I know exactly the gunk that you are referring to...I've also cleaned it off! I suspect that plastic wheels clean the track...especially if any types of rubber or oil residue remains from cleaning. I have a mix of plastic and metal wheels. I prefer metal wheels for the sound they make and their smooth rolling...but haven't felt enough of a desire to switch over entirely. I'm also using a mix on my On3 layout...as it is tough to afford the $7 per car needed for NWSL's superior quality wheels.

Michael

[nachoman]

I would only add one point about plastic wheels. I have never seen any evidence of plastic wheels leaving residue on rails, but before I switched over to metal wheels on my rolling stock, I did find that the plastic wheels would really clean the rails. Unfortunately, all of the dirt that they pulled off the rails was deposited on the wheel treads! I found out about these deposits when I had cars suddenly derailing at places I had never had any problems at before. When I inspected my trains I found that the wheels of my locomotives were clean, but there appeared to be no flanges left on my freight cars! I spent a couple of hours with alcohol in a bowl cleaning wheel sets one night, and repeated the process on a regular basis on all of my Athearn blue box cars until I noticed that they were beginning to roll very badly due to rust on the steel axles! I then switched out the Athearn wheel sets for Kaddees, and later P2k, or Intermountain. I never saw any evidence of the plastic wheel sets deteriorating, but between the gunk pick up on the wheels and the rusting of the axles, I gave up on most of them. I think the only plastic wheel sets I have left on anything are on a couple of my cabooses.

That's just my hunch. It's like tires on your car - just rolling causes little bits of rubber to wear off until you need new tires. I assume a plastic wheelset would be the same. I have some older ones that have noticeable wear on the tread, and I assume that plastic dust gets deposited on the layout. I don't consider the problem severe enough that I would fork over my limited hobby money in order to replace all my wheelsets. Instead, I replace problematic ones with metal as needed. The same would be true with brass track. If I had a layout that has some brass track, I would not waste my time and money replacing it just because I think nickel silver works somewhat better. Brass may take more effort to keep clean, but my experience is that that extra effort probably would not justify the time and cost.

[Russ Bellinis]

My actual problem with the Athearn wheel sets was rust on the axles, rather than problems with the wheels (once I had cleaned off the collected junk on the wheels). You may not have that problem in Az since your climate is drier than it is here near the beach.

[doctorwayne]

The majority of cars on my layout have the plastic wheels which they came with - I don't change them out unless there's a problem with them, such as not concentric on the axle or out-of-round, etc. Even then, the replacements are usually more plastic ones. Some newer cars have metal wheels, of course. The only wheels that have occasionally required cleaning have been those from Kadee. At first I thought that this was because these wheels were on my cabooses - they obviously ran more often than any of the freight cars, so it stood to reason that they might collect more gunk. However, as the handful of freight cars with Kadee wheels cycled on and off the layout, I also discovered the same "disappearing flanges" problem with them. It may have something to do with the blackening agent that they use - I'm going to polish the treads as they come in for cleaning. Most of the other metal-wheeled cars haven't enough mileage on them to notice any build-up. Other than one or two locos with brass wheel treads, I don't have to clean wheels, and I don't clean track, except immediately following ballasting.
My first layout had brass track, and did require regular track cleaning, although it performed well when clean. The current layout is nickel-silver, with all rail joints soldered. With about 140' of mainline in service, and another 110' or so to be added, there is only a single pair of feeders soldered to the rails near to the power source. Control is DC, via handheld throttles, and I have run over a dozen locos at a time, with no apparent loss of power due to the relatively poor conductivity of nickel-silver. As they say, your results may vary.

Wayne