Ok,here it goes. I’m new to all of this so bear with me,thanks. How do you opperate the couplers on HO trains? My fingers are way to big. I have read some on KD’s,they sound really good but i’would have to buy a set for each piece of rolling stock i buy,right??How do I know I’m buying the right one?,and how do they work???My local hobby shop is more into plaines than trains so he’s not rally that up on what i need to do,he just said to go with KD,so yeah,go figure. Well thats all for right now,thanks again for reading this and the help from all of ya.
Thanks again,
Diesel
The Kadee website has a very good article on how they work: http://www.kadee.com/animation/c1.htm . It also shows how they’re uncoupled using magnets in or under the track.
But they’re also easy to uncouple by hand. You can use a bamboo skewer, and MicroMark, Rix and others sell uncoupling tools that work pretty well. They let you manually uncouple the cars without having to pick them up or stick your fingers between them.
As for buying them, just about all recent (last couple of years) rolling stock now comes with either Kadee or Kadee-compatible (i.e., clones) couplers, so you don’t have to buy them unless you’re converting older cars, or prefer read Kadees over the clones.
Yes you would set for each car, the #5 is the standard coupler and fits on a majority of of rolling stock. It is cheaper to buy them by the 20 pack. There are also couplers made by McHenry/Bachman but they are made plastic so are not as durable as the Kadee’s. I have had good luck with Accurail couplers.
Any way back to the Kadee’s, their website is the best place to go for most of your questions and what coupler fits what car/loco.
I highly recommend a height gauge. kadee.com
You may decide to purchase McHenry couplers. If you do, make sure NOT to buy the ones with the built in plastic “flex spring”. Always get the Kadees or McHenry’s that have the tiny copper “Coil Springs”. These will last years. The only downside to these is that from time to time, the little springs may pop off and your coupler won’t work. Buy a pack of “Coupler Springs” to keep handy in case you lose one or more of these little “buggers”.
Since you have large fingers, also purchase the “Spring Mounting Tool”. Makes spring mounting a snap!
Another idea you could try is to convert one side of one car over to KD’s while keeping the horn-hook on the other side.
I did this when I got back into the hobby & everyweek I did a few more cars until they were all done.
Saved me the large expense up front & was still able to pull any car I had.