I finally cleaned off most of the layout and ran my first train in I think 6 months. I have 22 of the very light Lionel 9013 red hopper cars. The overall grade is about 1.8% going over 48 feet in the climbing portion. Since this house I’m in was built in the 1860s, the floor, walls and ceiling are uneven and the train tables are not perfectly level but they look level. With 1 can motored metal body Lionel 4-4-2, 22 of the 9013 cars and 1 little 027 caboose it was spinning it way up the hill and a coupler released. Try again, coupler released. Try again, coupler released, rubber band on coupler. Add 5 ounces of washers to engine then, try again and again and again with other couplers releasing. I finally take white stickers and put them on the offending cars so I know which ones to put rubber bands on. Some of the times the train came apart there was no coupler failure, but simply enough pressure for couplers to seperate from each other. I even tried pulling on those same couplers and saw it before my eyes, they seperated without the coupler opening up. Did Lionel improve couplers since 1973? I certainly don’t have the $$$ to put new cast trucks on all my 22 9013 cars. I did get the train up the hill and down several times. Next I need to add electrical pickups to engines so they don’t stall on long switches. I took off the single Lionel 4-4-2 and put on 2 other 4-4-2s I have wired together.They made it up the hill but slow and I could smell what I think is burning motor after a while. Next project is to extend the climbing grade into and out of the closet (which I have thought about a long time) adding about 25 feet to the climbing grade and making the overall grade easier. Its an interesting design for a layout but I think I will eventually dedicate my office room entirelyfor a layout and move my office into one half of the bedroom. Next layout I will try to keep the grade at 1% or less.
Almost forgot, is there any kind of glue of something I could add t
I second Fife’s suggestion: try moving the offending cars further back in the train…where they will have less of a load on the couplers.
You weren’t clear - do the couplers seperate (without opening) by sliding one above the other? If this is the case, there was a thread on the forum a while back which described a solution consisting of inserting nylon (or metal) washers between the trucks and the car body. The trucks tilt if there is too much play, which there almost always is on postwar, which allows the couplers to slide up or down.
I have not tried this solution yet myself, but have merely rearranged the cars, or if particularly troublesome, have removed them. I pull a 20 car mixed freight, mostly postwar cars, plus a few KMT, successfully, if I fiddle with car arrangement. I’f I go much longer, slipped couplers become too much of a problem.
It also helps if all the wheels are clean and axles are lubed.
For couplers opening, the sol’n is to keep the release pin form opening. Not having tiny rubber bands, I wire some shut.
Couplers not separating vertically. Just loose enough that I can pull them apart with my hands. Near the top of the grade I saw trucks jacking at the front of the train. What I mean is the pulling force tilts the truck enough that one axle on each truck comes off of the track. Now I’m thinking replacing plastic pins with bolts is a must.
If that’s what you’re experiencing, those tilting cars are either too light, or you have some heavy cars at the rear (a diecast caboose will cause that everytime with light cars).
Boyd, what you said above is exactly what I was trying to explain to you. On a real train, the couplers are attached to the frame of the train car. On our trains, the couplers are attached to the trucks. So if there is any play or wobble in that attachment, the trucks can bind when under weight of a long train and one wheel can come up off the track, expecially on curves.
I will say again, what you want to use is a truss screw. An 8-32 with a 8-32 lock nut is what I use and at my hardware store this costs me 17 cents, so that’s not quite 35 cents per train car… a worthwhile investment. On flat cars where the screw shows, I use a pre-blackened hex screw with either a hex head or rounded button top. These cost a little more, around 30-35 cents each, but worth it to me for the better visual appearance. Sometimes I end up using a 6-32 screw with a small blacn nylon washer.
Another important point of doing this is to make sure there is no flashing on the truck or train car if you happen to have to drill out a rivet.
One more suggestion on your couplers. You could try removing the plastic coupler arm and give up some repeated bending action upward. You could try heating it up a little before doing to the bending actions. This will help to put more pressure on the end of the coupler arm where the pin engages the knuckle couplers, and thus will help to stay closed.
Another thing I have learned from buying used train cars is to have extra plastic coupler artmatures on hand in my extra parts. Sometimes just swapping them will cure the problem. Jeff Kane at the Train Tender has them, and you may be able to buy a bulk bag of them for a little less money per unit.
As I said before, when I started removing the metal rivets (and especially the plastic snap rivets) and replacing them with the truss screw/locknut method I have descriped, the derailments you describe disappeared from my layou
Boyd, have you ever considered ‘doubling’ the hill - break the train in two or set a ‘tonnage limit’ or # of car limit on that particular grade. My layout is pretty uneven as well - though it looks even - as a result of the foam boards sitting atop a rock-filled crawlspace cover. There’s some spots that certain engines have a hard time pulling certain trains - so in those cases, I back up to the nearest siding, take some cars off and head away - with the next train having to pick up those cars or run an Extra… think of the grade providing more operating possibilities. That said, I recognize you may not care a lick for this and just want to get a train of X length up the freakin’ hill. Cross-connecting the rubber bands helped so I loop around coupler 1 and then loop around coupler 2 in such a way that in it parts, the bands keep the cars on the track enough so when it next comes close to me I can reconnect them.
I probably won’t be running just one Lionel 4-4-2 with 5 ounces of washers in the cab up the 1.8% grade very often with all 22 Lionel 9013 cars. I have couplers on the front of 2 of the 4 4-4-2s I have. I will change the layout and run the climbing grade into and out of a closet and add about 20-25 feet of track in the grade. Not sure when I’m going to get to that project. I got tax papers to go through right now.
Boyd: As you know by now, I run old postwar. I’ve gone the rearrangement and rubber band route myself so I know where you are coming from. My last resort was to wrap a very thin wire around the coupler. I KNOW this is anti-purest but it worked for me. Good luck.
Geez - how many times have I been here and done this.
I have a very colorful string of 6464 boxcars I love to run - but I can only run them in a certain sequence. Can’t put the 6464-125 Pacemaker too close to the front as it has a slightly bent coupler. Can’t connect the 425 with the 275 because around ceratin curves the 425 rides high on 275 coupler. Have to put the 725 and 900 at or near the end due to weight.
I can run 18 cars with my Lackawanna Trainmaster on my outer loop, but only about 10 with my 726, even though it will pull the 18 without problems in certain sections. It has something to do with the smoothness of power delivery on the FM.
The remedy may not be what you want to hear, but - run shorter trains. Since I got off of teh kick of trying to run a lot of cars and have relegated myself to six and eight cars I am enjoying running trains a lot more than I was.