I have a question. The walthers taconite cars are equipped with dummy couplers on many of the cars. So, you who got them, have you changed these to Kadees or just the actual couplers? Would that improve running characteristics or are the dummy’s any good?
Are there any permanent draw bars to attach to each set of four?
I have 72 of them and if I do not have to kadee them all that would be great. My experience when running them is that it’s the McHenrys that fail rather then the dummy’s but I have not run them enough to be sure.
What I did is use them in groups of four, using Kadees only on the outside of the four car set. I removed the dummy couplers between the cars and replaced them with Accurail dummy couplers. The Accurail ones are inexpensive, and have a head about the same size as a Kadee coupler (in fact they will couple together with a Kadee, but won’t uncouple automatically) and have a short shank so the cars stay close together.
Also, I found the Walthers dummy couplers to be kinda tight in coupling together, you have to work to push the couplers together and to pull them apart. The Accurail ones are looser, so if (like me) you ‘fiddle’ your cars in staging you don’t have to pick up all four at once, you can pick each one up individually.
On a side note, I found the Walthers cars to have poor rolling quality in comparison to my old MDC ore cars. I ended up replacing the trucks with Proto trucks with metal wheels, and used Kadee ‘washer’ shims to give a little more separation between the car and the wheels. Now they roll exceptionally well.
At my club, I had to get our 40-car ore train going out of the box. Like wjstix, I put them in 4-car sets with Kadee #5’s on either end (I believe that DM&IR also had them in 4-car sets). For the inside cars, I made my own drawbars out of sheet styrene “sticks” from Everygreen. I chose a size that allowed me to drill a hole in each end for the coupler mounting post, and thin enough to fit in the pocket.
I like the drawbars because it tends to help control the “slinky” effect of having so many Kadees on so many short cars. I mean slack looks good when a 40 car train is 23’ long, but when the 40 car train is only 12’ long…it looks a little odd.
I use them in a unit train and can tell exactly where the McHenrys are because the gap is different. MDC used to make them and I use them on passenger cars also. They work very well
The DM&IR taconite cars were drawbared in 4 car ‘mini-quad’ sets. They only had operating couplers on the ends of the sets. The advantage was faster braking action in the cold Minnesota weather as there were no ‘glad hands’ between the 4 car sets, only on the ends. This reduced the air loss in the cold.
I have a couple of sets of 4-wheel hoppers that are connected in groups of four with drawbars made from scrap plastic. Kadees on the ends only. If they had swiveling trucks, they would be a PITA to place on the rails!
For my unit train cars, which DO have swiveling trucks, I connect the ‘interior’ cars with Kadee ‘K’ couplers given to me 40-plus years ago by a modeler who had just converted a large roster to the then-new Kadee magnetics. They push-together couple, can be uncoupled with a skewer when necessary (seldom to never) and look enough like MKD couplers as not to stand out. There is also a ‘K’ coupler on the hopper end of the end-of-train hopper-brakes. Only the brake-cabin ends of the latter have Kadee MKDs.
Walther’s used to include drawbars as an option for these cars. I bought several of the CN and DMIR sets five or six years ago. I’m assuming that they now do not include the drawbars [?] At anyrate I run mine as 4 unit mini-quads as well KD’s front n back and the supplied walther’s drawbars on the insides. I haven’t checked the availability but I wonder if Walthers still sells the drawbars as a separate add on piece.As with all rolling stock I own they received proto wheels to improve the tracking.
The Walthers dummy couplers are a bit of a pain to work with. For faster setup, Kadee on each end is faster and easier. They also seem to track better, and can be shoved. In some of mine, I used Accumate couplers. They seem to work acceptably well. A bit cheaper than Kadees, each car can be coupled by pushing together. Some slack events can cause uncoupling, however.
I’ve run 150-200 car ore trains, each car with Kadees. Just gotta watch the slack, and know what you are doing.[;)]
On 1:1 scale ore cars, the air hoses are mounted up high. There just isn’t room down by the couplers, as the wheels are pretty close. Kadees should probably have the trip pins removed.
Thanks for the feedback guys. I think I will begin with mounting Kadees on one in four cars. If I experience any issues I will replace the rest as well. Preferably I would make them permanently attached in set of fours.
I do as most have said, sets of 4 cars. I used the supplied dummy couplers within the sets with no problems thus far.
As for Pauls suggestion, and your question, If you like the seperation distance the dummy’s give, lay a pair, coupled, on your bench and duplicate that length. shorten or lengthen as you see fit to aquire the desired spacing between cars.