Replacing Atlas 2-rail couplers

The rear of the coupler box (closest to the bolster) is a little flexible. You push it back with needle-nose pliers and pop the cover plate off. Then you can unscrew the box from the car. Unfortunately, Kadee coupler shanks don't fit in Atlas boxes. Installing Kadees usually involves drilling/tapping holes in the car frame to match the Kadee boxes "side" mounting holes so you can get the front of the box properly positioned on the car end sill.

Here is a nice little write-up that is portable across many modern 2-Rail Atlas cars, not just Berwick boxcars.  I made one of those tools mentioned and it works great.

http://rices-rails.blogspot.co...ees-on-berwicks.html

Scott Kurzawski

Austin, TX

Apply 12-16 oz of steel to it cushioning it ever so gently on this:

Thanks for the quick responses.  It's appreciated.   I like that last post with the anvil.  So far my experience with these coupler boxes makes me want to use one!

Mwb's method is the proper one. After all, why would you keep the original Atlas box anyway?

A problem with reusing existing AtlasO coupler pocket mounting holes to install replacement Kadee pockets on steam era cars is that the pocket will stick noticeably out beyond the end sill - detracting from the prototypical look of the car.  An alternative I'm considering is to acquire and modify a set of the newly redesigned "Kadee Clone" AtlasO couplers (the ones with external knuckle springs).  I understand that their operation will match that of a Kadee if one replaces the AtlasO draft gear and knuckle springs with ones from Kadee (I have plenty as spares come in Kadee envelopes).  If it works it would preserve the look of the car and not entail drilling and tapping new mounting holes.

What I'd really like to see is for Kadee to offer bolt on AtlasO replacement.  It would require a slightly different shank length and a pocket with two centerline mounting holes spaced to match Atlas pockets.  A pair of external countersunk flat head machine screws would fasten the pocket assembly to the car using the existing AtlasO tapped holes.  The same coupler/pocket could be used to upgrade the sub-par ones on tens of thousands of AtlasO and Atlas/Roco cars running on O scale railroads across the country.  Do you think there are enough dissatisfied users of AtlasO - Atlas/Roco scale couplers to create a viable market opportunity for Kadee??

Ed Rappe

Now you're talking. I probably have over 100 Atlas cars -- mostly 3-rail, but many 2-rail -- and I'd switch them all over if Kadee came out with something like that.

Matt, you'll be replacing the Atlas 2-rail couplers over time as the knuckles break..

Some of my cars have the new ones -- the ones that actually work. Time will tell. I don't want to put the old Atlas scale couplers on anything because I've seen too many of them let go.