I recently purchased a Beautiful Nakamura, Class A Vertical Boiler HOn3 Climax. It came in the original box, but alas, no papers. Would anyone off chance know which Kadee, or others, coupler I should be getting for her.
thanks,
Mike Maloney
Charlotte, NC area
Whoa, nice find!
Most HOn3 locos are set up to use the Kadee 714.
For rod-type engines, the tender will certainly have a spot that fits and likely be drilled and tapped for an appropriate screw (which can vary some.) The loco's pilot often has a dummy in place, which may or may not provide a spot big enough for the draft gear.
I've yet to have a geared loco, so not sure exactly what you'll find. More than likely, it will be similarly set up to use the 714 and its draft gear. Sometimes, the draft gear will need to be trimmed and the 714's box can be trimmed with a little caution if need be. The instructions have an illustration showing where and how much you can trim the box to fit.
Note that the Kadee 713 is the same coupler, only cast in a rusty red plastic, instead of the 714's black plastic. Some prefer the 713's look.
Often, the coupler screws are either installed on the loco or are included in the small parts bag included with the loco. If not, try a 00-90 or 00-80, but sometimes it is metric. NWSL offers a selection of tiny hardeware and may actually know whoch you need if you call them. Alternatively, the thread-cutting screws that Kadee supplies will work, but may mess up the original threads.
Mike Lehman
Urbana, IL
Thanks Mike,
I'll get a couple and give it a try....Will let you know how it turns out...I'll even try to post a pic when done.
Thanks again.
Have you contacted Kadee for the correct coupler or don't they list your engine?
Kadee's coupler conversion charts are pretty good for mass market stuff, not so much with brass. For PFM (no separate Nakamura page) they have listings for HO brass and HOn3 brass, but the HOn3 listing indicates "see manaufacturer's instructions." As the OP noted, he has nothing in the box to guide him. There is a general fitting instruction to use the 714 with HOn3 brass, which is about what I told him, but in much less detail.
That was the 1st thing I did....whent to their site, but My particular model wasn't shown. Will Try the 713/714, if it doesn't work, I'll contact Kadee directly. Tying to think of any other compatable Coupler Man'f.
Charlotte, NC Area
In HOn3, the only other potential coupler would be by Sergent, their RN87K: http://www.sergentengineering.com/EN87.htm
It's a narrow version of their draft gear, but remember a fairly long draft gear. Don't know if you have enough length to make it work or not, but that's the first thing I'd check if you want to try them.
IIRC, there's mixed record of trying to run Sergent and 714 Kadees together. If you have other HOn3 stock with 714s already, you'll probably want to stick with it. The Sergent is a neat little coupler and elminates the bobbing effect caused by the springing in the 714. However, most people plan to convert the whole fleet to Sergent if they go in that direction.
"Back in the day" most of the better brand standard gauge brass tenders (less often, pilots) came drilled and tapped for a Kadee #5 coupler draft gear box (which of course can handle certain other KD choices), so you could see at a glance that standard KDs were the choice. I myself do not know what a 714 draft gear box looks like, but is the engine drilled and tapped on both ends for some sort of couplers? I'd think an HOn3er would already have a supply of likely choices for couplers that could be tried out.
Dave Nelson
Dave,
Unless one wants to enter into the Sergent realm, the 714 is pretty much it. I suspect the model is drilled and tapped, which is why I suggested trying different screws first to see what to attach the couplers with. That's typically the most difficult part to figure out with mounts intended for the 714, as it can vary.
Usually the setback of the tapped hole is correct. Often the opening in the end beam or whatever provision is made will not fit the 714 draft gear's generic opening for the coupler on the draft gear. This is because NG brass often has this detail already present and nicely done in brass. That's one place where the draft gear can be trimmed as shown in the 714 instructions, basically putting the rest of the draft gear behind the brass "face" (buffer, or whatever that's called, darn CRS), with the tapped mounting hole suitably spaced. It would not surpise me that's what the OP has going on, because these little Shays were typically very detailed.