a greeting and a question on couplers

S class

Member
hello gentelmen and ladies, im new around here and took a stab in guessing this was the place to ask my question (so please don't get mad if its not).

I have a four pack of roundhouse brand 3 bay hoppers that came factory equiped with rapido couplers but had MDC couplers included, can any one tell me how I am to go about taking the rapidos off for replacement with the MDC's as there are next to no instructions and the roundhouse website appears to be gone.

when I bought the models the guy at the hobby shop suggested that i run the cars in consist and only replace the wheelsets on the outside cars, which is what I intend to do insted of replace all the couplers. But, as the wheelsets are mounted with a cast plastic pin insted of a mounting srew like on my athern cars, it appears i can take the wheelsest off for fear of breaking the mounting pins could anyone provide a suggestion as to how to go about this with minimum destruction.

any advice would be greatly appricated and I look foward to my membership here (and new layout)
 

TrainGuyRom

New Member
The guy was right. I have atempted to replace couplers in N and each time I had to get help from some one with better hands.
If you want to replace the trucks, even if they just have the pin takes about 45 seconds per car. just use your finger nails, pull and it should pop out. then put the pin back in with the truck on it. it should go right back in and not fall out.

I suggest you get Micro Trains brand trucks. They are expensive, but the best trucks you can get in N. A good alternatave is Kadee. they are a bit cheaper, but almost as good, and easier to find.

Some advice from a life-time modeler, find out what model railroad Shows & Sales are in your area. You should see good ideas on what you can do, pluss get great deals. Before buying ANYTHING, see what the prices around the show are, and look out for anything that is to good to be true. chances are, they are crapy (parden my french)

If you have any more questions, ask them here.
 

S class

Member
hey TrainGuyRom thanks for the advise. today i played around with the cars and lo and behold the mounting pins came with a little effort (and needle nose pliers) i had always worried about appling such force to the wheel sets as i thought i would take the truck, mounting pin and the underbody bolster with it but now i can get to work preparing my fleet. so again thanks, ill upload some construction images of my first layout tomorrow, as judging from the forum you guys can provide feedback.
 

GWoodle

New Member
hello gentelmen and ladies, im new around here and took a stab in guessing this was the place to ask my question (so please don't get mad if its not).

I have a four pack of roundhouse brand 3 bay hoppers that came factory equiped with rapido couplers but had MDC couplers included, can any one tell me how I am to go about taking the rapidos off for replacement with the MDC's as there are next to no instructions and the roundhouse website appears to be gone.

when I bought the models the guy at the hobby shop suggested that i run the cars in consist and only replace the wheelsets on the outside cars, which is what I intend to do insted of replace all the couplers. But, as the wheelsets are mounted with a cast plastic pin insted of a mounting srew like on my athern cars, it appears i can take the wheelsest off for fear of breaking the mounting pins could anyone provide a suggestion as to how to go about this with minimum destruction.

any advice would be greatly appricated and I look foward to my membership here (and new layout)

The guy is right. Don't use the MDC couplers. They don't work, and were an attempt to replace MTL couplers. You could paint them rusty for the broken coupler bin.

You could use a small flat screwdriver to pry the old coupler out. One twist of the blade should work nicely.

When you get MTL couplers & trucks, they will give you some new bolster pins. Just be sure to use the correct ones. You can test-fit them before mounting the truck. One may simply be too small to fit the bolster hole. I've never seen Athern make replacement trucks with the screws included.
Your choice of Bettendorf or Roller Bearing truck styles. Depends on what era your car fits. Bett's would be good thru the 1960's, roller bearing on new or rebuilt cars. A short shank shoild fit the hoppers nicely.

Another idea is to use MTL on the first/last cars & use Unimates in between. Depends if you want to keep the cars coupled together without much switching.
 

TrainGuyRom

New Member
That's great!!:mrgreen:

sorry I didn't reply until now. I don't go here often enough.

I agree with Steamhead that that is a good start (I just opened another tab to see that post) I would say you should keep the trains indoors.

The way I store my N scale trains is a toolbox, with removable containers that include tiny compartments perfect for N scale trains. It is also portable so I can take them to train shows & run them on the club layout.

Keep us posted!
TGR
 

S class

Member
good idea TGR.
ive made some progress but the joys of tertiary education mean that work is back to a crawl that said i hope to have an update in the other thread by the end of the weekend
 
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