Cleaning old track gives you black hands

This weekend we went to a local train swap meeting of MSC Achterhoek, which was larger than expected. I just purchased some small stuff; new color-coded wires and a rectifier.
In the evening, I repaired the 1668E, which had a loose wire between the E-unit and the electromotor. Well, it was still cotton insulated wire, so I cannot blame it for its age. Thus I replaced the wires with modern plastic insulated wires. It ran fine of the new Merkur tracks, but not on the inner half circle of old Hornby-Meccano tracks. The third rail pick-ups sparked and the trains did not ride steadily. Therefore, I tried too clean those old tracks, which a Dremel with a brass comb brush, followed by a rinse with tissue paper and alcohol, which rinsed off most of the black charry deposits. The top surface of the old rail now looked like a shiny mirror and my hands looked like those of a coal shoveller.
Some engines now handled the inner curve good, others did not. Engines with sliding shoes as third rail pick ups performed better than those with rollers as pick ups. Anyway, I reackon that I need to buy some more clean new Merkur tracks after all. That is a new project for next week.

Lionel 1668E running on the new tracks

The Lionel 817 caboose has the right size to fit with Merkur coaches.

The Lionel 603-604 coaches look like silly dwarves compared to the Merkur coaches;
Who said that everything American is bigger?

Towards a permanent layout

During the holiday season I build the benchwork for a permanent layout in the attic. The layout will have two levels; the lower level with Märklin h0 scale trains and the upper level with Lionel trains. Here are some pictures of the construction.

The new long Merkur coach was used to test the clearance of the new layout. The three rail 0 scale layout has a U shape with a bridge between both extremities. Merkur rails with roughly a 042 radius were used for the outer circle and the side track. But I will probably use Lionel 027 tubular tracks for the freight yard on the middle of the table. Well, there is still plenty to do.