I just bought a few Burlington Northern gunderson well cars and they came with a drawbar. The diagram that came with it didn’t tell what to do with it. Does it hold to of gunderson well cars together better then couplers?
THANK YOU
yes, they are the type of cars that are permantly connected so the drawbar is prototypical. I suppose that you could hook them together with couplers if you wish, after all it’s your little world (my tribute to Bob Ross!)
Randy Johnson
Cars with drawbars are normally considered as one car, ex. one car number for all the cars.
Bob
Drawabars can’t come uncoupled, drawbars have no slack.
Dave H.
Waaaayyyyy baacckk in the olden days when they first came out with the big diesels the E units were too stiff to run on a lot of mainline curves on some railroads, EMD then split some in two and added trucks where they became two units. They hooked them together with drawbars so they were still considered a locomotive. If you look at pictures of the old FT’s the back of the A and the front of the B unit were shorter than the other ends and had no steps. Later on they extended them to add rear steps and couplers so they were truly separate units.
The drawbars also don’t need as much maintainance as couplers. In model form the only snag with them is if you store your cars off the layout - it’s near-impossible to pick up three drawbar-connected cars. I keep a 3ft piece of scrap MDF handy as a carrying surface for mine, which makes it easier to move them.