I bought the 4-pack Bachmann Passenger Cars new and recently bought six more that a person wanted to sell due to downsizing his equipment. He had problems with the couplers staying on the cars and unseccessfully tried to modify them. the couplers are body mounted and I was wondering if anyone has had problems with them in the past and had a resolution to getting them to work properly. The new ones seem to be fine but I have heard of people having problems with them “tracking” and staying on the tracks when running several.
I have a couple of the Daylight heavyweight cars that are from their Spectrum series. The only problem I’ve had with them is the coupler mount hanging a little low. This could be a direct result of the coupler mounts ability to “swing with the trucks”. I hear other people have installed new Kadee mounts to solve the problem. If you have somewhat sharper curves, this may be out of the question.
If these are the Bachmann Spectrum Heavyweight passenger cars with the coupler mounting boxes that swivel with the trucks, put Kadee #5 or #148 couplers on them and clip the trip pin short so it doesn’t snag on turnouts and crossovers. I have 8 of these cars and have no problems with them after replacing the Bachmann couplers.
Thank you for the suggestions, I’ll give them a try. I wasn’t aware the couplers turned with the trucks but will check that out. Going to use them on 40" radius.
I bought the same four car set and a number of add on coaches. I’d agree with everything said about them. I have replaced the couplers with KD #5s and that helped. No problems side to side but vertically there is a problem. Some of the couplers sag badly. In fact I have had them uncouple on occasions by dropping below the coupler it is connected to. I will probably get around to replacing them with body mounted coupler pockets but right now I have other priorities.
Most of do not “switch” passenger cars therefore the solution is much cheaper and easier. I believe it is MDC that makes dummy couplers with a hole for a screw in the draftgear area or you can just use a piece of styrene screwed to one car with a hole in the other end. On the second car put a screw in and cut the head off then you can use the shank as a pin to connect the cars.
On the contrary, passenger car switching is one of the most interesting aspects of model railroading. If a terminus is modeled. Arriving trains are broken up and departing trains must be assembled. In route, passenger trains will pick up or drop off cars. In some instances a train is split in two, with one half continuing on one route, and the half taking another route. On the return trip, these two halves will be joined together. In some cases, passenger cars are interchanged with other railroad cars. In the golden age of passenger travel for example, sleeping cars from western railroads arriving in Chicago would be forwarded on to eastern railroads to allow the passengers to make a cross country trip without changing accomodations. Even a modeler who just runs his passenger trains from one staging yard to another might want the flexibility to change consists from one operating session to another. A modeler who permanently joins his passenger equipment together is greatly limiting himself.