I curious whether any of you have used a Kadee coupler with a longer shank for passenger equipment over 70'. I have some GGD P70s, an Amer. Standard 77' diner and a bunch of 85' Amer. Lightweight streamlined cars. I originally thought to use the Kadee 805 coupler, but now wonder if it couples too close for reliable operation on 60" radii.

I'm pretty sure you'll be fine on 60" radius; it's under 48" radius where I might be worried.

I have been using body mount Kadee 805s on all of my full length passenger cars. I tested this on 36 inch radius (0-72) for some of our 3 rail friends on this forum. these are the 21 inch K-line passenger cars. The minimum radius on my railroad, is 50 inches. My full length brass cars from Sunset and cars from Golden Gate Depot work fine.

One of the difficulties with short shank couplers on long equipment is that when on a tight curve, these couplers can cause a derailment by pulling the cars to one side, thereby lifting a truck and wheels off the track.

A longer shank coupler with a wider swing helps avoid this. Keil line has a little kit that doubles the length of a Kadee coupler shank for use on long cars, either passenger or freight. However it does not use the Kadee 'box' but is attached directly to the car's centersill. Doing this reduces the distance bewteen the pivot of the coupler and the king pin of the trucks and should give smoother, more reliable operation through curves and switches or when backing a train.

When using extended coupler shanks, the outer end of the coupler shank behind the head should be supported with a carry iron (which is what the prototype calls it). This part of the coupler shank slides back and forth on the carry iron as the car moves through curves. It can be made from heavy brass wire or strap. It should be made to allow for a wider swing for the coupler than the Kadee 'box' would permit.

Ed Bommer

Matt, Lisa & Ed, thanks for your replies.
I was concerned with smaller radii, down to 50"-54". Ed, the Keil-Line kit, or something fabricated like it, may be the solution. I'll have to test the equipment out on varying radii for performance issues.

Chris,
I don't think you have much to worry about with your 50" radius. Mine works fine with short tenders, pulling long cars. With the Short car to long car combination, you will not be able to couple on the curve. Two similar length cars will couple fine on the 50" radius curve. Test some of your combinations, to see what will happen. I think you will be surprised, to see what will work, with out problems.

lisa,

wow! dat's a creative idea about experimenting with coupling short and long
cars. didn't think of dat.

I've been working for some time on getting My GGD cars to close couple and run on 0-72 curves. I just started switching over to scale Atlas couplers. Atlas because all my freight cars are getting Kadees so the left over Atlas couplers partly because of their longer shank and finding a use for them. Between the long couple mounts and my soft rubber diaphragms I can close the gap and run them on 0-72 without derailing as long as the striker plates remain in contact. Radical S curves are just not not doable.

Because the GGD cars sit a bit high I had to lower the couplers to match up with the Atlas and Weaver head end cars body mounted couplers.

B&O
Joe