The MTH cars come with McHenry type plastic couplers which are mounted in the “out” position for radii down to 22 inches. There are second holes in the bodies to mount the cover boxes “in” for radii of 46 inches or more. The cover boxes are wide and have centering springs in addition to those on the couplers.
The car spacing is way too wide to look good in the “22” position. However, while “46” gives diaphragms in or very nearly in contact, some of the cars will derail at 35 inch radii (my layout). .
I started experimenting. Whisker couplers won’t work well in the MTH cover box because of the width and centering spring. Better to take it off and mount Kadee draft boxes. Underset couplers come out the right height. To get the car spacing optimal, I suggest the following:
determine the front of each car (seats, pictures, battery boxes). Mount a type 47 Kadee and box in the “46” position.
on the back ends, drill a new hole half-way between the originals and mount a type 47 set there.
if necessary, bend the steam couplings backward slightly to avoid intererence.
This combo gives a car spacing of only about 1/20th inch, and looks great. It also seems to allow the cars to corner OK down to somewhere around 28-30 inch radii. The triple diner/kitchen/lounge also works at these radii in the close-spaced mounting holes. Life is good.
Hal, first, thanks for sharing this as others may need this help.
I must however make two observations -
One, I would caution others about mounting couplers at different spacing on the same car - why not find the “correct” equal spacing so that cars can be run in any position and orientation?
Two, the very problem you are having is why I will not buy MTH, Walthers or other expensive RTR passenger cars.
I use American Limited diaphragms on all my passengers cars, I have Athearn, Con Cor, Branchline and Bachmann cars. I body mount long shank Kadee couplers to my own standards based on my work with the American Limited diaphragms.
On ALL my cars the diaphragms touch and stay touching under all conditions. My curves are 36" radius and above but I have tested my cars down to about 28" radius - they work fine.
Why can these manufacturers of these expensive cars figure this out?
I’m not paying $50-$75 dollars for cars I have to rebuild. If I have to do all that, I would just as soon add some detail to $12-$18 car. Many people have asked me “who’s passenger cars are those”, not even reconizing that they are simple Athearn and Con Cor cars that have just been modestly detailed up.
Sheldon, I have some of the same feelings about RTR’s needing work. I don’t like even having to replace couplers, let alone make changes in draft boxes. I didn’t treat both ends of these cars the same, because, with standard coupler lengths, it would require drilling holes too close to the close-coupling holes already there. I could have tried filling the holes with machinable epoxy and re-drilling them, but decided not to. Better, I could drill optimum holes for the Kadee draft box wings, and may do that later.I believe it would be possible to use the close-spaced holes on my 35" radii if I made adjustments to one or two individual cars. However, by leaving a 1/20th inch gap, I can also run these cars on our club layout with radii of 28 inches.
I don’t think anyone would want to replace MTH’s full-width diaphragms with something else, because they are well done to look like the prototype, yet are quite flexible. You have to see the cars to appreciate them.
In fact, these cars give me more for the money than others do, considering that they have supposedly correctly painted interiors, capacitive-hold lighting (I hate batteries*), and fully detailed car ends wth unusually good diaphragms. The observation car has working lighted sign, marker lights and flashing beacon. Walthers, Rapido, etc. don’t have these things; they have to be added.
The cars needed a little work, but relatively little, and really are as close to RTR as I have seen.
Hal
*ask somebody with dual-battery lighting how he feels about them the first time he forgets to turn them off. Let’s see, 10 x 2 …
Thanks so much for taking the time to offer the suggestions - I wish more people would do this.
BTW: I’m still WAITING on my 8 car set to get here - where did you find yours? I’ve got two sets of these on order and all I keep hearing from my LHS is that they haven’t got their shipment yet… I’m thinking of trying elsewhere but haven’t found them anyplace - any ideas?
Hal, did you try simply using a short shank Kadee with MTH box in the extended location? What spacing does that give?
I can surely understand about not wanting to change the diaphragms on the MTH cars, and from the photos I have seen they are very nice. But, not being an SP modeler they are not on my purchase radar.
My personal taste says 36" radius is the bare minimum for 80-85’ passenger cars - and being a freelance modeler, most of my passenger equipment sees the paint shop before it sees the layout, so the American Limited thing works well for me - one standard for all cars and they all interchange regardless of brand or type, just like real life. And i do have some with the American Limited full width diaphragms as well.
Sheldon, I did try that, but don’t remember what spacing I got. Main reason I didn’t do it that way is that neither the old Kadee’s (too thick with spring) nor the whiskers (box way too wide) work in the MTH. Better to simply put the Kadee box in place of it, with medium underset shank to correct the height.