How to make couplers work smoothly

Phil,

Have you thought about putting Kadee couplers on your equipment? I have pieces from all the common manufacturers and have replaced all with Kadee couplers, freight, passenger, and engines. I do a lot of switching and couldn't be happier. If you also have command control (I have DCS with 3 PS2 engines) you can switch at crawling speeds!!!

I'll second Bob's post, above. Up-grade to Kadee O-Scale #805 couplers. You don't have to bash them together in order to get them to couple, and they NEVER just "open" or come uncoupled. Also, don't let anybody tell you that you can't pull long heavy trains with the Kadee couplers.

Kadee's are a fine product, and typically (not always) work well. I have way too much stuff to
consider a change, and the knuckle O-gauge couplers can function just fine. They're even a bit more
prototypical than the Kadees in design, if not size. I do wish that we O-gaugers had gone to a Kadee-type
device 30 years ago...

Anyway, dry lubricant (graphite) can help you quite a bit; comes in a tube, and can be squirted sort of
like a liquid. Spray some down in the mechanism/knuckle area. Can't hurt anything (don't use oil or
grease). It helps them close and open. OK for Proto/Electro couplers, too.

Some O-gauge couplers, especially older, or Weaver plastic, very early K-line plastic, and even
some early K-line metal couplers were cantankerous. I got some early K-line hoppers with metal trucks/
couplers, and they would not even mate/close knuckles with each other most of the time!

The "high-end" modern O-gauge couplers - Lionel, MTH - I find work as well as Kadees, 90% of the time.
If you have a car that's just hopeless, swap the trucks and/or couplers.

Finally. just work with the things and tinker a bit.

Phil, I can't address the lubricant part of your question as I've never tried that. But, I have my doubts that it alone will achieve the desired results. I say that being in your same position with cars of literally every maker.

The best advice I know of has to do with car placement in your consists. You have to know which brands do well with "their own kind" and which are more "flexible". For instance, K-Line couplers work extremely well and easy with other K-Line but not with the competitors. Or at least that's been my experience.

You also have to be willing to use yard track stub end track bumpers to force some cars to couple up. This takes a steady hand and practice, otherwise the obvious will occur.

I also make it a practice upon receipt of a new car, to open and close each coupler a hundred times. It's not the best way, but I think it's a good idea. If you could take them apart and polish with a real fine grit the mating surfaces would be better imo, but that's difficult to do.

That's some of what I know about it.

quote:

The "high-end" modern O-gauge couplers - Lionel, MTH - I find work as well as Kadees, 90% of the time.

They really don't. You still have to hit a car pretty hard to get them to couple AND latch. You don't have to do THAT with properly installed Kadee couplers!

Replace spring. Buy the spring for Lionel's standard gauge. Cut in half and they work perfectly. Takes seconds to do and I think the springs are about 75 cents each and each spring is good for two couplers. The couplers still stay closed under load and close easily.
See bob bartizeks railroad at www.pennwestrr.com he did it and they work great. He could probably get you the Lionel part number.
Also, remove the hoses, especially on the atlas couplers.

You dont want Kadees if you plan on doing switching, to my knowledge theres no electro coupler on the Kadees.

magnets between the rails work just fine and no need for wiring electro uncouplers

quote:

Originally posted by kevin b:
You dont want Kadees if you plan on doing switching, to my knowledge theres no electro coupler on the Kadees.

THANK HEAVENS FOR THAT! Besides, I haven't seen an "electro-coupler" on any freight cars yet either. Switching is VERY easy with Kadee couplers, especially with the "delay feature". The HO and O Scale modelers have been using Kadee couplers, and switching with them, for more than 40 years. Plus, as I said, you don't have to BASH into the Kadee couplers to get them to couple.

I second what HW and others have said about Kadees.

If you enjoy switching cars , but think you have too many to convert, consider converting just part of your fleet. A train or two of more easily converted Atlas or Weaver cars will give you plenty of switching action when you get the urge. The remainder of your fleet can keep its 3-rail couplers.

A few conversion cars (Kadee on one end only) will allow all to be used together when you wish.

On some evenings on my layout, we have operating sessions with scale, weathered, Kadee equipped cars. Other evenings, the 3-rail coupler equipped trains hit the rails when we just want to sit back, relax and watch them go.

If you really enjoy switching, you will consider at least a partial conversion effort to be entirely worthwhile.

Jim

quote:

On my layout we have operating sessions with scale, weathered, Kadee equipped cars on some evenings. Other evenings, the 3-rail coupler equipped trains hit the rails when we just want to sit back, relax and watch them go.

That's the quote of the year so far Jim!

A person could equip just one switcher with Kadees and a number of freight cars. A car with a Kadee on one end and the old style coupler on the other end for running the main. Leave the combo coupler equipped car with the engine and set off the full Kadee cars to be switched by the Kadee equipped switcher! You might have to do something with a caboose to handle both coupler types, but it's not difficult.

I would start with a couple of Weaver cars, they already come with coupler pockets for Kadees as do the newer MTH cars, just need shims. Atlas and Lionel cars can be modified, but take more effort.

Thanks for the responses folks. How hard is it to convert to kadee?
Phil

Phil,

What Bob said, plus here's some info on Atlas cars:

Converting Atlas

Jim

quote:

Originally posted by Hot Water:

quote:

Originally posted by kevin b:
You dont want Kadees if you plan on doing switching, to my knowledge theres no electro coupler on the Kadees.

THANK HEAVENS FOR THAT! Besides, I haven't seen an "electro-coupler" on any freight cars yet either. Switching is VERY easy with Kadee couplers, especially with the "delay feature". The HO and O Scale modelers have been using Kadee couplers, and switching with them, for more than 40 years. Plus, as I said, you don't have to BASH into the Kadee couplers to get them to couple.

Plus if you have a layout large enough you can couple fifty cars or more and not have to work about a coupler letting go.

quote:

Originally posted by Phil R:
Thanks for the responses folks. How hard is it to convert to kadee?
Phil

Depends on the car. ATlasO, Weaver and Kline are easy. Have not tried Lionel and the newer MTH cars take big time modifying of the truck.

This may sound dumb, but that 2009 thread makes it all sound a bit daunting. Also are the kadee's scale size? If so I think this makes it a non player for me as I could not couple up to my loco's without changing all of those.
Phil

quote:

Originally posted by Phil R:
This may sound dumb, but that 2009 thread makes it all sound a bit daunting. Also are the kadee's scale size? If so I think this makes it a non player for me as I could not couple up to my loco's without changing all of those.
Phil

Kadee will latch on to over-sized couplers with no issues or you can use a transition car, one side kadee the other side keep original for the engine. Kadee are close to scale, slightly oversized.

Just seeing the slack run out when you start a train is worth the conversion for me. not to mention how close the cars are to each other. This is not a conversion you want to do for curves under 0-42

quote:

Originally posted by Hot Water:

quote:

Originally posted by kevin b:
You dont want Kadees if you plan on doing switching, to my knowledge theres no electro coupler on the Kadees.

THANK HEAVENS FOR THAT! Besides, I haven't seen an "electro-coupler" on any freight cars yet either. Switching is VERY easy with Kadee couplers, especially with the "delay feature". The HO and O Scale modelers have been using Kadee couplers, and switching with them, for more than 40 years. Plus, as I said, you don't have to BASH into the Kadee couplers to get them to couple.

Lionel/Mth couplers are still better then flimsy Kadees.

For stubborn couplers I brush the coupler with Greas-em (powdered graphite lubricant) by Kadee. It works!

Gary,
Thanks for mentioning radius. I am good on all my manlines but in my yard I have some fastrack 036 turnouts. So I think that also may doom my thoughts on convesion. I guess I will try the dry lube option.
Phil

Have anyone had success on 036 curves? Mine are close at 042 but still room to turn without derailing.

quote:

Lionel/Mth couplers are still better then flimsy Kadees.

Kevin

Flimsy? You have GOT to be kidding! Obviously you have never used Kadee couplers. Even back in my HO modeling days (started in 1957), I could count on one hand the number of HO or O Scale Kadee couplers I have had break, and that was due to running into them too hard! Those of us in the Independent Hi-Railers, Mid-West Division modular layout group, run 50+ car trains with Kadee couplers, and don't have break-in-twos nor "mysterious un-couples" as with those unreliable lobster claw couplers.

"flimsy" my a$$!!!!

quote:

Originally posted by Ginsaw:
The best advice I know of has to do with car placement in your consists. You have to know which brands do well with "their own kind" and which are more "flexible". For instance, K-Line couplers work extremely well and easy with other K-Line but not with the competitors. Or at least that's been my experience.

My experience with K-Line couplers indicates that their knuckles need to be pressed in farther before they'll 'catch' the armature pin. A dab of hot glue or epoxy on the outer surface of the knuckle may allow other brands of coupler to push them in far enough to latch. Haven't tried it yet though.

quote:

You also have to be willing to use yard track stub end track bumpers to force some cars to couple up. This takes a steady hand and practice, otherwise the obvious will occur.

My method is to use a handbrake--my finger used as a chock behind the truck being coupled to. It's surprising the amount of pressure a heavy loco can apply pushing against it.

As for 'lobster claws', if they had fixed knuckles with hooks on their inner faces, they wouldn't uncouple accidentally either

---PCJ

quote:

My experience with K-Line couplers indicates that their knuckles need to be pressed in farther before they'll 'catch' the armature pin. A dab of hot glue or epoxy on the outer surface of the knuckle may allow other brands of coupler to push them in far enough to latch. Haven't tried it yet though.

That's an interesting idea. Should you ever try it, I'd like to know the results.

A couple other points about K-L couplers - I really like the short stem or shank which sets the couplers back deep toward the frame, thus minimizing the size. Those that do that are not at all objectionable looking. It also makes for better coupling because of the closer distance between cars and thus shorter more narrow angle or range of motion in the coupler. The other thing about K-L is, the compatibility problem is solved by leaving the K-L coupler closed and opening the coupler of the other brand car to be mated to it. That works.

Anyway, I did an experiment. This is on straight Ross track mind you - coupling on curves in O Gauge is a no-no, and I assume everyone already knows that.

I have a train on the track with cars from Atlas, MTH, Weaver, Sunset and one Post War Lionel 1950s reel car. They all coupled up JUST FINE to each other. No misses. No repeat tries. And very light pressure only applied. That's Atlas to Atlas, Atlas to MTH, MTH to Weaver and so forth.

There was no slamming together at all needed.

I think most of the cases of needing to "slam them" is because of stiffness in the parts of a particular car's coupler and not all couplers in general. It's also because sometimes a truck has gotten angled wrong and is a little "off" and they're not going straight into each other. And, the biggest problem of all is when we forget a primary rule of O Gauge couplers and try it on something other than a straight away.

That is, coupling on curves is something that simply doesn't work at all. I learned that in the early '50s with a simple little 027 layout. And that has not changed any through the years (maybe that's why they never made curved uncoupling sections).

quote:

Originally posted by vbkostur:
Replace spring. Buy the spring for Lionel's standard gauge. Cut in half and they work perfectly. Takes seconds to do and I think the springs are about 75 cents each and each spring is good for two couplers. The couplers still stay closed under load and close easily.
See bob bartizeks railroad at www.pennwestrr.com he did it and they work great. He could probably get you the Lionel part number.
Also, remove the hoses, especially on the atlas couplers.

Anyone know which spring this is? Or have a link to a diagram? I have a few of the newer high-end cars, and have found them hard to couple.

quote:

Originally posted by Ginsaw:
You also have to be willing to use yard track stub end track bumpers to force some cars to couple up. This takes a steady hand and practice, otherwise the obvious will occur.

We are working with toys and if one hand on the "throttle" (transformer) is an acceptable engineer, than the other hand should be an acceptable brakeman.

When coupling I just put a finger on the roof of the stationary car.

quote:

When coupling I just put a finger on the roof of the stationary car.

Those of us that use Kadee couplers don't have to do THAT!

quote:

Anyone know which spring this is? Or have a link to a diagram? I have a few of the newer high-end cars, and have found them hard to couple.

The part you want is the 400E-103 "spring for pilot or trailing truck" for a Lionel 400E standard gauge locomotive. Lots of parts dealers have this spring. I got some for 35 cents each to try, then placed a large order to do all of my cars. They were 25 cents each for this larger order.

Cut the 400E-103 in half and replace the coupler armature spring on Atlas or older MTH cars with half of the 400E-103 spring. You only need a small Philips screwdriver and it takes about 30 seconds a car. You'll be amazed at how easily the cars couple with the new springs. Very nearly Kadee performance and you can always replace the original springs if you don't like it. I've been running these springs in all of my Atlas and older MTH cars for 4 or 5 years now.

could someone run by me the method most commonly used to uncouple kaydees? How do the "magnets" work? Do most of you use a hand tool to uncouple? There was some mention of a "delay"? thanks

quote:

could someone run by me the method most commonly used to uncouple kaydees? How do the "magnets" work? Do most of you use a hand tool to uncouple? There was some mention of a "delay"? thanks

You need to find some guys in your area who do operations and try to get invited to operating session(rare for o gauge/scale). Personally, I don't like HO operations...I hat the tiny couplers, which is why I am one who hasn't "seen the light" and gone 100% kaydee.
But doing as much as you can, that's the best way to see what you like and don't like.

Given unlimited time and resources, Kaydee may be the best way to go. But I am not convinced they are that greatly superior operationally to "good" lionel claws. I was amazed at how well those oversized couplers work on Bob's penwestrr. Coupling is super easy.
Read my lips... NO BANGING! and for just 25 cents per car with only a minute of time to convert no matter what the brand, not bad.

No, they still will not look that good compared to kaydees. Not even close. But for such a cheap price and little time needed to convert, we all need to prioritize.

I am sure hot water is 100% correct and I will see his way is the only way someday.

quote:

Originally posted by Bob:
The part you want is the 400E-103 "spring for pilot or trailing truck" for a Lionel 400E standard gauge locomotive. Lots of parts dealers have this spring. I got some for 35 cents each to try, then placed a large order to do all of my cars. They were 25 cents each for this larger order.

Cut the 400E-103 in half and replace the coupler armature spring on Atlas or older MTH cars with half of the 400E-103 spring. You only need a small Philips screwdriver and it takes about 30 seconds a car. You'll be amazed at how easily the cars couple with the new springs. Very nearly Kadee performance and you can always replace the original springs if you don't like it. I've been running these springs in all of my Atlas and older MTH cars for 4 or 5 years now.

Bob, thank you for your reply. You didn't mention...does this trick work with Lionel cars also, or is that a whole 'nother thing? Thanks again.

quote:

Originally posted by wb47:
could someone run by me the method most commonly used to uncouple kaydees? How do the "magnets" work? Do most of you use a hand tool to uncouple? There was some mention of a "delay"? thanks

Laidoffsick posted a neat video on that a while back. It's a clever system.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RjTfq3XU15o&feature=mfu_in_order&list=UL

The first time I ever saw HO type couplers or Kadees in O Gauge use was when a LHS repairman really got into that and converted some of his. He showed them to me. This was quite a few years ago now. I believe his toy train background was HO.

My first reaction on seeing the Kadees was, I thought they looked out of place in conjunction with the oversized flanges of O Gauge wheels. I really think they'd look better with scale flanges and wheels, like in 2R. If I was in 2R I would definitely and positively have Kadees.

The other thing I didn't care for were those things hanging down that are supposed to look like brake lines. I think it'd look better without those. I thought it looked like they needed to be hooked up or something. I have more or less the same opinion about the brake lines that Atlas hangs on the sides of their 3R O Gauge couplers. To me they look peculiar and also interfere with use of the side uncoupling tab (until they recently switched sides with that).

But, it's all academic for me. Conversion at this point is impractical, for all the usual reasons. And I've been getting along OK with O Gauge couplers for 60 years now, and they've stood the test of time.

I did a few videos for YouTube about 3 rail Kadee usage and between the rails magnets. Check em out, there's more than 1 video, and one that shows the cars being switched out and how it all works.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...G2de7115AUAAAAAAABAA