Couplers - a "couple" questions

[Justraincrazy]

This is probably a very old subject, but I'll ask anyway.  Following the recent holiday "run everything" month, we found three issues regarding coupler perfomance with our Lionels.  Hoping someone can help.

We have an 18308 GG1, which we use to pull our four car "shorty" plastic PRR passenger cars of 1990's vintage.  All note they are intended for O27 use.  However, if we close the couplers on the baggage car and GG1, the baggage car derails at every O27 corner.  If we close the engine coupler, but leave the baggage car coupler open, the engine successfully pulls the train around the layout.  OK, I suppose the simple answer is to run it like this, but does closing both couplers really change the geometry that much?

Also, running our first year issued Polar Express engine and about seven of the matching PE cars on level track, the baggage car disconnects at different locations, allowing the engine to race off while the cars stop.  The vertical alignment of the baggage car coupler is lower than the engine when sitting still, which is exacerbated when the engine pulls the heavy load of cars (those lighting wipers on the trucks really introduce rolling friction on a massive scale).  Can these truck-mounted plastic car couplers be raised/lowered as they are a single piece?

Last, many of our postwar and older modern era couplers do not "snap" open any more when released.  Is replacing the spring in these couplers difficult with old eyes and without special tools?  Has there been an article on how to do this published?

 

[Buckeye Riveter]

The PRR couplers should work closed.  If not, one possibility is that one of them has a tiny manufacturing defect such that tolerances are not correct and creates a binding situation because the wheel set on either the GG1 or the baggage car may be too tight against the locomotive or the car. The truck is not swiveling and the coupler is not rotating.  (Unfortunately, coupler standards are the bane of O Gauge trains. (I have a new Lionel locomotive and a K-Line box car that hate each other.)   

The Polar Express can be fixed by a replacement wheel set with coupler, a fine piece of wire around the shank (bread wrapper wire with paper removed)  to hold the coupler pin tight, or a tiny rubber band (See your dentist) around the shank. Unless you are doing a lot of coupling and uncoupling remotely this is an inexpensive solution.

Now after these suggestions, the easiest and cheapest suggestion is to lubricate your couplers with graphite.  Graphite lubricants are very common but you don't want something that reacts with plastic.  I would almost bet that if you lubricate your couplers with graphite, at least 80% of your problems may disappear.  LaBelle is the brand I use on all my couplers and my rotating air craft beacon.  

 

 

 

[TrainLarry]

Concerning your GG1 and baggage car, where in the train is the baggage car? Right behind the locomotive? Does the front or rear of the baggage car derail? Do not understand how you can pull a train with a coupler open on the baggage car, unless you are just pulling the baggage car and the rear coupler is open?

Are both couplers on your PE baggage car the same height, or is it only one? Are the couplers on the baggage car the same height as on different cars, or lower than all your other cars?

The springs on the postwar couplers can be replaced without special tools. The video shows how to replace the knuckle spring. Although the video is for a coil coupler, the technique for the knuckle spring replacement is the same.

 

Larry

[lionelsoni]

Prying the knuckle hinge pin out risks marring the coupler, perhaps damaging the pin, and may not even be possible if the pin does not have enough end play.  I turn everything upside down and drive the pin out using a slender icepick (you could use a small nail) which follows the pin through the holes, keeping everything together.

For reassembly, keeping everything upside down, put the pin in halfway, put the spring onto the pin, then put the pin in all the rest of the way.  Next, put the knuckle in place, with its hole next to and pressing against the side of the pin, with the spring in position at what would normally be the top of the coupler.  Gradually withdraw the pin, sliding it along the knuckle to keep the spring in its place.  When the pin just clears the knuckle, slide the knuckle's hole into line with the pin, which is still retaining the spring.  Then push the pin back through the knuckle and all the way back in.  Flare the pin just enough to keep it in place, no more; and it will be easier to remove the next time.

[ADCX Rob]

Justraincrazy

If we close the engine coupler, but leave the baggage car coupler open, the engine successfully pulls the train around the layout...

I'm with Bob, I'd like to see how this works.

[Justraincrazy]

Thanks for all the suggestions.

The GG1 couplers are all metal (including the knuckle), and seem to hold the baggage car coupler very tightly when closed.  When open, the GG1 coupler shape holds on to the baggage car plastic knuckle, which has a small rounded end on the insode of the knuckle.  As long as the GG1 is pulling, it stays together - even when pulling all four illuminated passenger cars.

The Polar Express baggage car coupler doesn't open when being pulled.  I believe it is simply so far out of vertical alignment with the engine's coupler that, over turnouts and ever so slightly rough track, the baggage car coupler simply drops that last 1/8 inch and the engine roars off, leaving the cars behind.  I never thought of simply tying the couplers together when set up - you're right, we don't uncouple the trains once they're set up - until we decide to change trains!

I'll try to lubricate the couplers with Labelle lubricants - that's all I use also.  We are always careful to store the trains with their couplers open, but as many of them were bought used, and many of them are not "top of the line" models, I believe that forty years of closed couplers in basement storage might have permanently compressed the release springs on a few.  Thanks for the link to the video - I might try to take a coupler apart on one of our "parts only" cars to see how hard the task is before tackling a dozen or so couplers that need repair.