Subject:
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Cleaning/Reparing electrical items
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.general, lugnet.trains
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Date:
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Wed, 19 Feb 2003 21:19:00 GMT
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Viewed:
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178 times
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I know this is far from a new topic, and has probably been discussed
before, but I thought people might be interested, or have something
to add.
I've received lots with electrical lego parts, and have had some
success in cleaning them.
You will need: Contact/Switch cleaner - easily and cheaply found
in Maplins (UK) and most likely in Radio Shack (N. America),
hobby knife or similar and paper towels or cloths.
9v train controller - there's lots of potential in this unit to
fill with dust and lots of surfaces to oxidize. Use switch cleaner
liberally on the inside parts. Incidentally, I have a universal power
supply with mine, set at 9v (it doesn't accept 12V), which doesn't
_quite_ give the same output as with a lego supplied one (which I
understand is closer to 10V).
With the controller, and pretty much all items, the metal can
oxidise over time. Where contact cleaner doesn't help, use
the hobby knife to scrape away the surface layer. This is particularly
important with 9v contacts, and the insides of battery boxes.
4.5V square battery box - I got one with snapped springs for the two
vertical batteries. I was able to fashion replacements from thin
aluminium strips with carefully placed notches. I was lucky, and they
fitted in such a way as to not need anything to keep them in place, but
you might need glue. The blue switch also pulls out with a little
effort, and this is definitely worth cleaning.
9V track (and probably 12V too) - tends to get very grubby. Plenty
of careful wiping with contact cleaner will do wonders.
4.5V battery boxes (box types) - you can actually use AA batteries in
these just fine, although you might need some padding (use kitchen foil)
in the square type for at least one of the batteries.
Hope this is of interest.
Peter
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