Fixing old(ish) Hornby couplers back onto wagon

[craziej2k]

I bought a Hornby shunters wagon (R.028) off of ebay a while ago and the coupler has come off of one end. It's one of those Hornby-Triang D-link couplers that are secured by a metal O in the centre and supported either side by a thin bit of plastic. What would be the best way to re-secure the coupler back onto the wagon? Is there a way to replace the metal bit thats gone or would it be better to do it another way?

[GeraldH]

If it's the rivet that secures the coupling to the chassis that 's gone awol, then fill the hole in the chassis where the rivet was with Milliput or some other filler. When the filler has set, drill a small pilot hole through the filler with a pin vice and then use an appropriate sized self tapping screw to fix the coupling back on. If you don't drill a pilot hole the screw will spilt the plastic and you've got a problem .

[Mountain]

I have used cheap runny superglue and it seems to work. Maybe not ideal, but if it did come off the glue is cheap enough to re-glue it. One may need to sand or file to roughen up the surfaces that are going to be glued. But better still, why not use GeraldH's method and after apply a little runny superglue as runny superglue gets sucked up into the joints, so it will be the best of both worlds! Just a thought!

[craziej2k]

If it's the rivet that secures the coupling to the chassis that 's gone awol, then fill the hole in the chassis where the rivet was with Milliput or some other filler. When the filler has set, drill a small pilot hole through the filler with a pin vice and then use an appropriate sized self tapping screw to fix the coupling back on. If you don't drill a pilot hole the screw will spilt the plastic and you've got a problem .

The rivet's still there, it just the bottom end that held the coupler in place that seems to have been broken off. It's still big enought to hold the rivet in place, just not to hold the coupler.

[GeraldH]

If it's the rivet that secures the coupling to the chassis that 's gone awol, then fill the hole in the chassis where the rivet was with Milliput or some other filler. When the filler has set, drill a small pilot hole through the filler with a pin vice and then use an appropriate sized self tapping screw to fix the coupling back on. If you don't drill a pilot hole the screw will spilt the plastic and you've got a problem .

The rivet's still there, it just the bottom end that held the coupler in place that seems to have been broken off. It's still big enought to hold the rivet in place, just not to hold the coupler.

If you unclip the body from the chassis you should be able to extract the rivet from the top of the chassis. You may have to pinch the end where the coupling was with some fine nosed pliers to make the rivet small enough to push through.

[Bufferstop]

I've messed around with those rivets, and they can give you some aggro, because they fit in a bulge in the middle of what should be a flat buffer beam. Araldite or similar seems a better adhesive for them than superglue.