So my pack has borrowed a 4 lane best track that we are going to run at a local festival. While picking up the track it is pretty dirty with graphite. Does anyone have experience cleaning graphite off a best track that they could share with me?
Cleaning Best track
- Thread starter Derby addict
- Start date
I do like pledge, but depending upon how "dirty" the track is, you may need more than just pledge this time. We cleaned the District's track a couple years ago. It had not been thoroughly cleaned for several years. We used Simple Green (recommended by Best Track) for the first step. We got maybe 80-90% of the graphite off. We then used brake cleaner and LOTS of rags/paper towels. We kept wiping until the rags almost stayed white when wiping down the track. I wanted to use Q-tips on the corners of the track, but decided we couldn't get it perfect. I did however, fold the paper towels and force them into where the corner of the running surface and the guide rail meet. This cleaned a significant amount of graphite from the track. We then used pledge. We did this several times. Each time it was allowed to dry for about 15 mins and then it was wiped with a clean cloth before the next application. I think that because we got the track fairly clean and did a good job with the pledge, that it now is much easier to "clean".
I also "cleaned" up the joints while we were doing this. They are not 100%, but they are plenty good for Scout level racing. I have not seen any noticeable wheel damage on the cars we have run.
The stop section friction material cleans up decent with many passes of a clothes lint roller. You can also do a quick clean of the stop section between groups/races. This helps cars from getting damaged because of a slippery stop section.
Hopefully you can get by with just pledge because it is not that dirty.
The cleaning (not counting the joint clean-up) of a 8 lane Best track took two of us about 5-6 hours.
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