Any fix for Athearn wood reefer couplers?

[Anonymous]

I bought two Athearn wood reefers, and am using the Kadee offset couplers but still do not have enough clearance for the coupler trip pins! They snag on crossovers and turnouts... I remember someone listing a fix that involved drilling out the pivot and putting a screw through it into the body (Rather than gluing the coupler pocket permanently). What screw size? The problem is, of course, the coupler box sags which points the coupler down. Geez, this seems like something Athearn would fix! Nope. All my other cars have the same coupler height, including other Athearns. One of these is a custom painted one by Greenway, nice paint, bad choice of a car to paint it on, considering the $16.00 price! I'd prefer Branchline or even Accurail, both being more detailed.
I think I wrote down the fix, I remember writing down screw sizes for my Accurail 55ton hopper truck pins as well. The plastic pins fall out, and I don't wi***o glue them permanently. But, at least they run 99% of the time.

[rogerhensley]

I will keep it simple. You MUST use a Kadee gauge to set the coupler height AND the height of the glad-hand. If the coupler box droops, shim the coupler or replace the box, but all couplers need to be set to the gauge. If the glad-hand snags the track, bend it upward.

2-56 is a common screw size for trucks and couplers.

Roger

[BRAKIE]

Dean,That is excellant advice Roger gave you.You see some times the trip pin for the KD coupler comes bent to low that is why you need to check them.
When ever you build any car kit there are some things that need checked while building the kit.Here is some things to look out for.
1.Is the floor bent?
2.Is the frame bent?
3.Did the coupler clip click into place? This will also cause a coupler to droop.
4.Is the KD coupler itself bent? I have found
very few bent KD couplers over the years and usually the coupler knuckle itself.

Now,I have 243 cars,175 is Athearn,I have had no problems with them. You see,I check each and EVERY car regardless of brand name,to ensure there is not any defects.I have Athearn,Atlas,MDC,Accu-Rail,KD cars,and some Walthers as I just stated ALL get inspected before being place in service on the home layout or the club layout.This is not to brag or toot my own horn,I have a good reputation at the club for having smooth running and reliable quipment.Any thing less for me is unacceptable.Yes,some of my cars have fail some times on both layouts.The problem is usually a coupler spring flew off.What is the point of this babble? When one builds a car kit or gets a car RTR one needs to check all things on the car,by doing so they will end up with smooth running and reliable equipment that will be a joy to use.

[dknelson]

There are some variations among Athearn cars and while most have good coupler height automatically a few need some help.
Kadee sells two kinds of insulated washers to lift the car further up from the trucks. This can compromise appearance however. Kadee makes offset couplers where the head is higher on the shank -- sometimes higher than what you need.
Another trick some people use -- exchange the 33 inch wheels with 36 inch wheels.

I agree with the prior post that speculated that the plastic frame might be bent (cheap to replace). This happens and can be deceptive to catch.
And yes an available option is always clipping off the cast in coupler pocket and mounting a standard box on the floor using a screw (I have also used wood screws for this without tapping the hole). But use your Kadee coupler height jig FIRST -- it measures floor height, coupler head height, AND pin height -- to make sure you aren't just creating the same problem all over again. Frankly if the cast on pocket is wrong so is an added pocket likely to be wrong.
But the big thing is to make sure you have the Kadee coupler height tool.
Dave Nelson