Manually Operated Couplings For 00 Gauge.

[Mountain]

Those of you who are looking for a cheap coupling method which looks good and avoids bufferlocking may find this interesting.
I came across it while looking at other things on Youtube. It might be what some of you are looking for.

https://youtu.be/hk9j7lieBvs

[Bigmet]

Simple, robust and well proven. The guy (at one of model engineering shows that were held in Methodist Central Hall Westminster) who showed me this sometime in the late sixties made his hooks from Florist's soft iron wire. This comes ready blackened and has the further advantage that it may be manipulated with a magnetic wand.

[Mountain]

I like the way the hooks hook round the buffer when not in use.

[Bigmet]

I like the way the hooks hook round the buffer when not in use.

Yes, if using relatively short hooks for the closest coupling your minimum curve radius allows, it is necessary to have the pivot point forward of the buffer beam so that the hook can lie parallel with the bufferbeam and hook over the buffer shank.

When I experimented with this method, I found it preferable to go for open loops and an unattached staple shaped coupler hook, as my operation at that time routinely turned wagons around. While I liked it for economy, it dawned on me that if prepared to go this trouble I might as well use 3 links, and that's what I settled on.

[Mountain]

One could make it look like a 3 link but keep it rigid. The advantage of this is that if one has a slightly larger loop to drop the hook into, it is far easier to use then a 3 link coupling. I have very much found that the narrow gauge couplings I use are actually very easy to use if lifted with a home made shunters pole and while these for 00 gauge use are not quite so easy, they are still a whole lot easier than 3 link. I would personally shorten the bars so that on ones sharpest curves the buffers almost touch as the demonstration film on Youtube shows them a little too far apart compared with what one can make them to be. A slightly wider loop will allow the slightly shorter hook like bar to hook around the buffer, but if one has made them look like 3 link rather then a thin bar, why not let them drop down and look the part or why not then go for 3 link couplings anyway but with a slightly enlarged loop and make the three links rigid? This will then make them look right AND prevent buffer locking if the "Proper" looking 3 link hooks are long enough in height to prevent the loop from jumping off in compression.
In a way my narrow gauge couplings are like that BUT they have central buffers which are functional items. They are overly large being converted drawing pins, but this actually aids them to make them work better. I would much rather oversized buffers which actually clash together then have pretend ones which do not meet as somehow dummy buffers never did satisfy me even if they are sprung. I want the real thing! Mine are not sprung but they make a little sound when they clash together which adds to the atmosphere and makes them feel real.
The challenge in 00 is to try and make a coupling which can turn sharper than prototype curves and yet looks like the prototype and allows the buffers to clash. Not easy!

Finally a thought. I am certainly not against the theory of hands free automatic couplings but to me, hands on coupling and uncoupling is something that makes me feel like I am operating a railway as it should be operated. (In my point of view), but the aim here is for easy to use manually operated couplings. If they are fiddly to use, the joy of the "Hands on" approach is lost, and if one can combine 'Easy to use, with looks prototypical and cheaply and easily made' one is onto a winner.

[Bigmet]

Very much 'horses for courses' for the mainline timetable operation I enjoy. Auto coupling and uncoupling is essential on full size trains! There's just me rather than a team of shunting staff. The 'little shunt' to an industry private siding: the stock for that can be three links.

[RAF96]

If small neo magnets were planted in or behind the buffer beam and three link couplings were made of iron they would almost be self coupling onto proper buffer beam hooks, which would then take the hauling strain.

[Mountain]

If small neo magnets were planted in or behind the buffer beam and three link couplings were made of iron they would almost be self coupling onto proper buffer beam hooks, which would then take the hauling strain.

I have seen that done and it worked. A small magnet on the end of the 3 link which attaches to a metal plate glued under or into the opposing wagons bufferbeam.

[Bufferstop]

For me the most important element is the gap between wagons/coaches when being hauled. The advent of the NEM pocket was a retrograde step in 00. Up to that point small tensionlocks with their buffering bars in line with the buffer faces were acceptably spaced, with NEM pockets almost in line with buffers and the entire coupler sticking out the image was in no way prototypical, and horror of horrors have you seen an N gauge train fitted with working knuckle couplers, the gap between wagons will almost allow a wagon body to be inserted in the gaps. I'll accept the giant shunters pole for places rarely used and magnetic uncoupling at the regular spots, which is only one step away from using it all the time, if it comes to that then 3-links, flexible or rigid are the obvious next step. If you dive in there with the giant pole what's the point in using something which only "looks almost like a three link" Now I wonder if there's enough weight in the metal for a miniature "instanta" to work?

[Bigmet]

For me the most important element is the gap between wagons/coaches when being hauled...

This must be less of a problem on post steam traction layouts with largely bogie vehicles, for which close coupling mechanisms are now available? It's the steam period dominance of 4W wagons that needs dealing with.

... 3-links, flexible or rigid are the obvious next step...

Don't forget knuckle couplers such as represented by Kadee. Introduced into UK service by 1895, it's been around a long time. For me this is the optimum RTR product, an autocoupler that looks much like a prototype coupler

...Now I wonder if there's enough weight in the metal for a miniature "instanta" to work?

If prepared to jiggle it with a shunter's pole to the close position it will stay that way. Now, something I have never got a clear picture of: how common was the 'Instanter' in the fifties and early sixties? I have to say that my opinion is 'rarity'. The loose coupled was three link, the vacuum braked was screw link, I don't think we even knew the term 'Instanter'. As kids - mostly watching the ECML traffic -we were accustomed to looking at detail stuff in the passing freights (the fitted only if moving slowly!) spotting the old split spoked wheels, older axleboxes and buffers, wooden underframes, what was left of PO and company liveries emerging from underneath peeling BR paint, and the like.

[Mountain]

For me the most important element is the gap between wagons/coaches when being hauled. The advent of the NEM pocket was a retrograde step in 00. Up to that point small tensionlocks with their buffering bars in line with the buffer faces were acceptably spaced, with NEM pockets almost in line with buffers and the entire coupler sticking out the image was in no way prototypical, and horror of horrors have you seen an N gauge train fitted with working knuckle couplers, the gap between wagons will almost allow a wagon body to be inserted in the gaps. I'll accept the giant shunters pole for places rarely used and magnetic uncoupling at the regular spots, which is only one step away from using it all the time, if it comes to that then 3-links, flexible or rigid are the obvious next step. If you dive in there with the giant pole what's the point in using something which only "looks almost like a three link" Now I wonder if there's enough weight in the metal for a miniature "instanta" to work?

Is one of the reasons why when I tried N gauge I decided not to go any further as to me the standard N gauge coupling was much too large, and I was not overly impressed with the running and track cleaning that I had to do. When I tried H0e it was a similar story. Supurb mechanisms compared to N, but still prone to dirt on wheels and the need to regularly clean the track. 00 needs cleaning but one can get away with leaving it for a bit longer. 0 gauge and upwards I found rarely did one bother. I have seen G scale locos run on brown tarnished track which absolutely amazed me they ran at all! I know that no way would 00 run on track like that!

But back to couplings. I know it sounds daft but the big metal D couplings used in the late 70's by Hornby actually were less noticable in use than the small Airfix couplings, as somehow the dull metal didn't catch the eye as much as black plastic does, as black plastic draws the eye in towards it while dull metal does not. Yes, I agree gaps between vehicles are another issue. Obviously one needs to avoid bufferlocking on 1st radius curves. (4th radius curves are way too sharp if scaled up to prototype preportions so I don't see why some criticize 1st radius as is all a compromize designed to fit our railways in our homes, so we may as well make most models go round them, after all, we are not even running the correct gauge for the scale).
The issue is where each item of rolling stock has not been individually checked to see the point when the coupling face distance is just at the right point. It would also help iff all manufacturers decided to use the same coupling widths as well! (Most do today).
But for me the gap between vehicles reached a peak when they started fitting nem pockets. Never seen such a wide gap between vehicles! Even the wide D couplings were far closer coupled! Whoever decided to mount the nem pockets so far out or fitted couplings to them that had such long necks? Never was a fan of nem coupling pockets as it added far too much horizontal flex. Couplings worked way better before nem pockets came along! Probably thr best I came across were Mainline as they worked out the correct distances and had no vertical flex. If they used simpler hooks without the springs they would be ideal. One screw directly to the wagon and the two tabs aligned (Similar to the idea Hornby had) and that is all one needed.
But tension locks were to me a bit of an undesirable compromize. They work but as I would often be told in school "Must do better", and as good as kadees are to represent buckeye type couplings used on coaches, to me, when I see them on wagons they don't look right. (Though they are excellent in their operation from what I have seen, and will turn on 18 inch wide layouts! Very impressive when I saw these used on 0-16.5 layouts! Just not that budget friendly when one is attempting to keep the costs down). But back to 00.
I did try Sprat & Winkle and found them to work ok. The wire between buffers can be positions so that it is half hidden in an n shape as long as the wire itself is in such a position to prevent buffers from catching if pushed trough sharp curves. 4 wheeled stock are easy enough to convert. A bit tricky on bogie stock where counter balance weights need to be adapted and hooks gently bent to allow them to work.

[pete12345]

But tension locks were to me a bit of an undesirable compromize. They work but as I would often be told in school "Must do better", and as good as kadees are to represent buckeye type couplings used on coaches, to me, when I see them on wagons they don't look right. (Though they are excellent in their operation from what I have seen, and will turn on 18 inch wide layouts! Very impressive when I saw these used on 0-16.5 layouts! Just not that budget friendly when one is attempting to keep the costs down). But back to 00.

I do wonder if a dual coupling system would be worthwhile. Fit Kadees to coaches and three-link chains to wagons. As there is room above the Kadee to install a functional coupling hook, anything that could conceivably need coupling to either type would get the hook (no chain) as well as the Kadee. To couple a dual-fitted vehicle to a 3-link, use the coupling chain on the other vehicle. Two Kadees obviously couple together. In some respects this is more prototypical for UK stock.

[Bigmet]

That's a variation on what I do.

Coach sets are internally coupled using rigid bar couplers of Roco and magnetic type.
'End coaches' have Kadee, as do passenger locos, for ease of auto coupling and uncoupling

Wagons are currently largely on remounted Bach tension locks for closest possible coupling.
Freight traction has tension lock, and there are Kadee/TL convertor wagons available for passenger allocated locos.

Change is afoot on wagons, the fitted stock will move to magnetic coupling, with Kadee on 'End wagons'.

A few very special wagons and locos have three links.

[Mountain]

Be good to see pictures of how you managed to fit more than one type, as I find it interesting.
I don't know why but I do find couplings interesting.

[Bigmet]

Be good to see pictures of how you managed to fit more than one type, as I find it interesting...

The (NEM) coupler pocket is the answer in OO. I have five different RTR autocoupler designs mounted in these; two on trial, so it will come down to a total of 4 in a few months. There's only one coupler type fitted per vehicle end at any one time.