car separation

[finkel]

i am using ez-track and all equipment is less than 2 years old. everything runs fine for about 5 minutes but then eventually cars separate. i have clipped off those bleeping wires hanging down intended for remote decoupling which never works anyhow. i have also spent a good deal of time checking wheel separation using one of those metal gauge thingies u stick between the wheels.

i suspect the problem stems from the turnouts but i just cant figure out how.

all suggestions welcome.

[trainman203]

For what you are doing, the X2F couplers appear to be doing what you need.  You stated a good case for using them in the unusual environment in which you are running your trains.  In all my years of model railroading, though,  this is the first time I've ever seen an advocate for these early couplers over relatively prototypical appearing knuckle couplers.

101 scale miles per hour in a loop at an exhibition for children is different than a seriously operated model railroad with train make-up, interchange set-out and pick-up, customer switching, local freights working communities enroute, and at the final destination, breaking up the train, switching the interchange on that end, customer service, etc.  in this setting the X2F will never work well, virtually unable to uncouple without picking the cars up. I know, I used to have them and wildly celebrated the day the last ones came off the railroad.

If you merely running trains continuously, not uncoupling your cars, and can't see the couplers, you don't need realistic ones, you don't need ones that look good. But, as soon as you start moving cars independently of permanently, coupled trains, most modelers want to see a coupler that has at least some prototypical appearance.

I do have to say that sagging couplers can be corrected by more careful installation. A Kadee coupler gauge tells all.  But you have to use it. Some cars need more work than others or may need a more specialized coupler, Kadee makes dozens.  Plus, I can't imagine Kadee couplers breaking unless some kind of inordinately hard usage is happening.  If you are running 100 car trains at 101 scale miles an hour and stopping them dead within an inch, the weight of the sudden slack action probably will break couplers.  Imposition of astronomical toy train level demands on a fine scale product will probably cause failure.  Kadees aren't made with this in mind.

My last comment is about train speed. The clubs I've been in, when open to the public, all the children complained the trains are too slow, and aren't happy until they are running at rockets speed. We use that as a teachable moment to tell them that in the Railroad age, Trains did not run that fast, we are trying to present a relatively historically accurate  operation. Most of them will accept that when you tell them. Railroad history is little known and obscure enough already without perpetuation of unrealistic images.

[trainman203]

You could just connect your cars with drawbars too.  Or dummy scale couplers from the Jurassic before any kind of operating coupler had been invented, and no one switched at all. These would look really good, not break apart, but be separable for transporting the trains to, and from the exhibit

[jward]

Back to the original poster.

One thing you ar4 going to find very valuable in this hobby is patience. It appears from your statements that you have little.

Those couplers that "never work right anyway" have been the standard among serious model railroaders for generations. The simple fact is that they DO work right for many people. And those people have taken the time to adjust the trip pins so they meet the standards established my the Kadee coupler height guage which is itself an adaptation of the NMRA standards in a much easier to use form.  Properly adjusted trip pins DO NOT snag on trackwork. And they work pretty reliably on the magnetic uncoupling ramps when they meet those standards. I should know. I helped my dad build an operating railroad like Trainman describes, and it's been running continuously since then with very little problems. Trains are regularly made up and broken up and rarely are the same two cars coupled to each other from day to day.

That said, I do think I see where your coupler problems stem from. Plastic couplers like the EZ Mate are far more fragile than the metal ones by Kadee. If you haven't adjusted your trip pins and they snap on trackwork, unlike the metal couplers, the shank will bend as it is somewhat flexible. From my experience when this happens it is almost impossible to bend the shank back the way is was. This throws coupler height off, and mismatched coupler height is the most common cause of unwanted seperation on knuckle type couplers. In fact, rather than try to reuse a bent plastic coupler, I replace them with metal ones as they fail.

Bottom line, do not assume that everything meets the standards right out of the box. It only takes a minute or two to check them against the coupler height guage and adjust the trip pins. And by doing so you catch small problems before they become big ones, and your reilability and enjoyment will greatly improve.

As for the other types of couplers, been there, done that, tried most of them. The horn hooks have a nastly habit of coming uncoupled by themselves under slack. this often happens when two locomotives pulling a train are mismatched in speed, and the faster one bucks up against the slower one. The result is the rear locomotive is left trying to pull the entire train as the front one merrily speeds off. There was also a couplermarketed under a variety of names (Mate-a-Matic was one) that were designed to couple to both horn hooks and knuckle couplers. These are the poorest performers of the bunch. In their quest to couple to anything, the designers came up with a coupler that wouldn't reliably stay coupled to anything including themselves.

[trainman203]

That railroad sounds like a very complicated and intense way to have fun. 

I have the opposite mentality.... Slow speed easy going steam powered 1940 era local freights on a loose schedule if any, maximum speed 15 scale mph, minimal paperwork if any.

I always think of the long gone Reader Railroad in southwest Arkansas... "The Possum Trot Line."😂

I'm retired.  My work life was too long and too involved, intense and responsible to do any other kind of railroading.

I never have to worry about breaking a coupler.😂😎

[Geeper]

Hi Finkel;
I suggest getting an HO "Coupler Gauge" and check all couplers on your rolling stock. If any coupler is out of spec, remove it and reinstall. Check it again, if still out of spec. Replace coupler with one that will put it back into HO spec. Running different mfr railcars and building different railcar kits, will give you some out of spec couplers to adjust.
I keep on hand EZ Mate "medium length" over shank, under shank and center shank couplers for railcar adjustments. Once I had to get "long length" center shank couplers for two F7A locos.
For never fail magnetic decoupling, I use a Rix Stick magnetic uncoupler... it works fantastic in my rail-yard. Works best on rail-car "A" end as "B" with brake wheel can be tight to some locos. I always hook to loco with rail-car "A" forward.
Good luck... Keep smiling...

[Quentin]

I have an odd medley of EZ-couplers and X2F (aka Horn Hook) couplers, and I don't set speed limits on my layout. Fast, faster, and fastest is how we roll here! 

The EZ couplers are great for slower layouts. Horn hooks are best for speed. However, I can say that I've only had a train separate at an EZ to EZ section when someone took a switch too fast. ON the mains and up/down the grades, both the EZs and X2Fs stay connected.


If you're wondering how I have this sort of medley, I have some railcars that have an EZ on one end and a Horn hook on the other. Works for me!

[wfletcher]

I use the kaydee as well.  Rarely do I have them uncouple on any part of the track nor going thru turnouts. 
But I do use #6 turnouts.  I have longer engines and cars and the need the wider radius.
I also got a coupler gauge.  It sits on a piece of track and I place a car on it to make sure the coupler is the same height as the coupler gauge.
Until I tuned the coupler height and got the wider radius; I had uncoupling issues as well.  Still got all my dangly things to for uncoupling.