Have you ever posted on how you kadeed your sw1? Took the claws off my sw have the kds and now wondering what to do? Being a type A myself I would have to buy three SWs to get one just ok. So as you know not a thing being done and here I sit thinking some old #7 seven would help but that darn sw1 would still not have couplers on in the morning..
Lee
Kadeeing the SW-1 was quite simple. Once the trucks were de-clawed, I chose and the truck casting protrusion was cut off, I had to find a shim to fill the gap between the truck casting and the Kadee gauge. Turns out that the leftover faux column material from a Korber warehouse front kit was the perfect thickness. Next, I had to determine which coupler to use, a traditional 740 or a shorty 743.
The Kadee 740 had half the draft gear hanging out over the claw's pivot-post access hole, therefore, I opted for the 743. I cut the Korber shim to a snug fit in the pilot and glued both the coupler box top and the shim in place, mounted the coupler box temporarily as a drill guide, and head to the drill press.
Remarkably, the combined thicknesses of the pilot casting, shim and coupler box was 1/2 inch, exactly - the length of my 2-56 machine screws! I drilled and tapped the entire conglomeration as a unit, then painted, weathered, and reinstalled the completed pilot. I didn't try any fancy stuff, no fixed pilot, no fill the gap, just a Kadee. Before checking my OGR mail, I made a couple of moves with the SW-1, a heavily weighted Atlas covered hopper and a rib-sided caboose. To quote Del Griffith, "Very nice."
I used the Atlas covered hopper as an opportunity to use up a leftover Atlas version of a "Kadee". I removed the coupler and draft gear from a 2R car that I bought in error for my 3 rail operation; I converted the car and retained the coupler. There is no comparison, what-so-ever, between the Atlas coupler and the Kadee. There's nothing like the original. Rock on, Kadee!
