The disclosure relates to mechanical support rail cleaners for cleaning support rails of workpiece supports in machine tools, such as in machine tools for thermally cutting workpieces. The cleaners include one or more cleaning member carriers, which carry at least one cleaning member, and a parallel drive, by means of which the cleaning member and the support rail can be moved relative to each other in parallel with a lateral longitudinal face of the support rails and transversely relative to a longitudinal axis of the support rail to remove deposits from the support rail by means of the cleaning member. The support rail cleaner further includes a transverse drive configured to periodically move the one or more cleaning member carriers and the support rail towards and away from each other transversely relative to the lateral longitudinal face of the support rail.