Hello,

most of the cars of US or CDN prototype you can purchase today are running flawless just right out of the box.
This is also valid for cars built out of kits, but here you are more responsible in terms of accurate building, choosing the right wheelsets (metal wheelsets are more preferable over plastic ones), the right coupler (Kadees are still the best) and mounting them according to NMRA Standards.
Since the Kadee Patents have expired, there are more manufacturers of coupler heads on the market. The spectrum is stretching from clones of the old Kadee #5 and operate superb, over some plastic types which operate only in short trains satisfying and hav some difficulties in smooth coupling, to really junk type: remove-and thrash.

For my private affair, when i became a modeller of US railroads, i wanted to avoid the many mistakes i had made with my German prototype model railways. And to complcate things more than necessary, German Modelleisenbahn (aka' camouflaged toy trains) is a de facto world of non standards. Of course there are standards, but traditional and propertiary works standards and not compatible to other works standards. There was urgent need for uniform standards, but hassle was the rule.
In short term you wanted consistently standards.

So from the beginning onwards of my career as US model railroader i choose the Kadee #58 as my standard coupler. And from the beginning on i mounted this type of coupler on all of my rolling stock.
Next item were metal wheels, if not fitted by the manufacturer, i replaced the plastic ones with Kadee or Intermountain wheelsets.
Next item, i dislike wobbling or tilting. In many cases you have only slightly blewing with puckered lips to get the car tilting and rocking.

As an example i will descrbe here what i do with a new purchased car:


This is an Atlas Master 50' FMC 5077 box car just out of the box.
Atlas has mounted Accurail "sclale" couplers in their very special boxes.
The replacement couplers, Kadee #153 whisker type, are in the foreground.





The factory mounted coupler. I made my own trials with this type of coupler. They revealed failing in soft and smooth coupling action in comparison with the Kadee #58. A substantial "crashing" was necessy to engage these couplers. Further they showed failures under strain (we run trains on the meetings up to 14m (app. 45.9').
So they have to go.





Removing the truck.





Removing the bolster with ther own very special coupler box.





Fortunately Atlas has enclosed bolsters with normal coupler boxes which accepts Kadees.
And as i am not a friend of wobbling, one of the bosters got anti stagger supports in form of two suitable pieces of styrene. This may be small pieces of sprues.





They accept Kadee #153 whiskers.





Controlling the wheelsets. In US about 98% of the wheelsets are within the tolerance standards and so the 2% hassle creating wheelsets are found and can be adjusted to standard measure.
The car was reassembled.





Next controlling: Coupler heights.
Here it is O.K. If not, this is probably the reason for mysterious uncoupling during running. And according to Murphy's laws this (and derailments of course too) happens only in the very back of your layout in an area which is nearly unreachable.





Ready for ops.
But wait a little bit.





Now it is ready.


Lutz

anyone here have a MRC tech 7 1278  new or used for sale or know of where one could be attained ?
Jim

This has long been a method to stabilize our cars. Just recently someone suggested this
http://www.proto87.com/HO_Proto87_car_st..._help.html

[b]"FAST AND EASY" CAR STABILIZERS SUSPENSION UNITS
[/b]
has anyone had occasion to make use of them??

Hi everyone.

Cannot believe I joined this forum years ago & this is my first post. Well here goes.

I have a athearn genesis sd45-2 in pan am livery & its factory fitted with tsunami sound. It has a small packet of ditch lights pre wired & I would like to know how they fit. I purchased the model second hand & I cannot seem to see anything in the paperwork that covers fitting the ditch lights & I wondered if it was missing the instructions that covered it.
I've been out of the hobby for a long time & so I'm a bit rusty.

Thanks 

Si

This is HOn3.  Other than the wheels, motor and some brass wire this is all 3d printed (gears, too).  Runs great, too!  Painted with buck-a-bottle craft paint.

Attached Files

Thumbnail(s)
   

WPMA-29 working RailPort.

Bruce

   

In April 2020, I posted this photo of a Funaro & Camerlengo CNR Reefer kit I had built. 

   

I had bought two of those kits but I have only build one.  The second kit was put on a shelf waiting for the moment I would be willing to deal with such a kit having so many small details.

Since then I was lucky to buy three more kits on eBay and Facebook.  So I had not one but four kits to build.  Two have hinged doors and Dreadnought ends, two have plug doors and NCS ends but construction is pretty much the same except for some details.

   

This time I decided to build them together, one step at a time.  Each step will take four more time to be completed but no kit will be left on a shelf.

I started the project a few weeks ago. Here is the first step : Cleaning the parts and putting each kit in its own tray.

   

   

I will post more photos in a near future.

Does anybody here also belong to RR-Line and can currently log on?
Thanks

I'll start this weeks thread off with a pair of WSOR SD40-2's pulling a grainer...

In nov. 2019 they raised the notorious 11' 8" railroad bridge in Durham, NC about 8" to a new height of 12' 4": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YPt4ijPFzc8
We all thought the party is over and no truck will ever hit the bridge again and gets converted to an open top box truck.
But alas: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mPUL2SQ77uQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3jStdSyYpOA

You still can watch a complete roof removing of box trucks.

And train squeezes box truck under the bridge: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VxOUG87rxDA


Lutz