Nickle-Silver vs. Brass

[BlueMountain]

Help,
I have some brass track mixed in with my Nickle-Silver track. After some years I'm ready to start laying track and I don't want to lay the brass track. I don't know what I to look for to separate the two. Color, texture, flexibleness. I feel very dumb right now. Any help or ideas?

Thanks,

-BlueMountain

[Anonymous]

The brass rail should appear to be darker in color than the nickle silver rail. If you take a bright boy or other type of abraisive cleaner to the top of the rails, the nicle silver rail will appear to more silver in color. Hope this helps.

[Anonymous]

Take the point of a sharp Xacto knife and scratch the web of the rail ( the flat area between the top and bottom) If its brass the scratches will appear to be an almost "gold" looking color...Vic

[snowey]

brass rail is copper in color (the color of a shiny, new penny) & nickel silver is silver, like the name says. You made a good choice in deciding not to use brass track, but I should tell you, brass & nickel silver ARE compatible-that means they both work together

[Anonymous]

I recently read about somebody (it might have been somewhere in this forum - I don't recall) who was using his old brass for sidings and industrial areas where locos wouldn't likely be running, and so electrical pickup wouldn't be a concern. Properly weathered, ballasted, etc, it would be hard to tell that it was there. Sounded like a workable solution to me.

[Anonymous]

Mike... I do the same thing with my old brass and other than having to clean the track a little more frequently than the rest, I've had no problems...
Matt