Body Mounted Couplers On Rivarossi Heavyweight Passenger Cars 01-13-16-w/Addendum & Music

In this IMPROVED video, I will correct what I thought was such a great idea ... that being ... the attaching of Kadee #505 Coupler Conversion Bolster for Six-Wheel Passenger Trucks, to the trucks themselves. While it was a quantum leap improvement over the McHenry plastic couplers, recent research proved to me that couplers are NOT attached to the trucks ... but are in fact attached to the underside of the ends of the Passenger Car body.
As I learned, truck mounted couplers can create more problems than needed. So, in an effort to correct the problems, and create a more correct coupler effect, I present this video, into creating just that. Enjoy the ride!
This video now contains an addendum to the original content. It corrects a minor error, and show how to improve the truck frames!
Music: "Train Song"- WCPM by Mitch Coodley (BMI)
"In The Mood" - The Jazz Ambassadors

[@sklecanda]

Hello John, Based on your video you must use 22" radius curves or larger. The #451 Coupler conversion kit is a body mounted PIVOTING Coupler assembly, to allow rolling stock to operate on 18" or tighter radius track. That is why there is a eccentric centering bushing and spring is in the kit. The only part of the Coupler kit that is suppose to be secured with the screw and stationary, is the centering bushing. This will allow the entire gearbox housing to pivot for tighter radius turns, then return straight with the assistance of the spring. The included shims should be placed under the centering bushing (if needed) only to aid in clearance between the gearbox and body, so the entire Coupler assembly does not bind and become stationary. There should have been a detailed instruction sheet included with the kit. If not, the instructions are available on Kadee's website.

[@MikesProjectsandHobbiesMC]

Yeah I noticed that too, read my comment above. He made his cars worse than they were.

[@joevidal7616]

Thanks for sticking with this project until it was resolved John, I appreciate your candor and honesty, now I can tackle my 4 dozen or so cars.

[@LordRusty5]

Thanks Joe, it's like I say ... I'm learning these things along with the viewer. True, I did at least one if not two cars ahead of time, but each one is a project in and of itself. That's why I believe in showing what worked and what, if anything, didn't. Glad you liked the video!

[@Philippesdad1]

Thanks for the instructional video, John. I went through almost the same process, and made the same discovery .... about the only thing I do in addition, is to put a light dusting of graphite in the journals while reassembling the truck. That improves the rolling characteristic by leaps and bounds.

[@LordRusty5]

Believe it or not, I made that very same discovery myself, a little while after the fact! The rolling of the wheels is SO much smoother and "freer"! Sorry I only made this discovery after I made the video. But ... live and learn!

[@russellloomis4376]

Hi John thanks for sharing this video it was very informative. When I replace the horn hooks I used Mchenry couplers which was a direct replacement. Unfortunately they're not very good once I added weight to the cars. Some day I'll be switching them out and doing this method again thanks for sharing.👍

[@AlexStaddon]

I've done this on my British Pullman-gangway knuckle-coupler-fitted stock, and it works fine (granted I've had to carve out slots in the buffer beam/headstock and retract the buffers), but it works and looks so much better, with hardly any derailments. Your videos are so informative and well-formatted; I was going to comment on the possibility of the coupler dipping but then the addendum popped up and the problem was corrected; my fault for not waiting to see it! Anyway, fantastic, as always. Keep up the good work! - Alexandra

[@LordRusty5]

Well done! Yes ... each car requires whatever it takes to complete the work needed to make them run better; track better; couple better, etc. Even cars from the same maker, may need a slightly different approach because of the undercarriage details molded on some cars ... most especially with Passenger Cars! It's best that we just do what we need to do to make these things work. And when they work well ... it's the greatest feeling in Model Railroading. Only the shims are glued to the underside of the car body.

[@TheStarforce2]

@@LordRusty5 the shit part is, the darn walthers trucks on the walthers car dont even work right out of the box. I have the 20th century limited and on basicly all (because I got fed up and just did it to all to save issues later) I had to file off some of the plastic brake and air equipment details that are on the top of the trucks, there's no washer on the screw that pins the truck to the cars so we needed to play with screw tightness on a couple of them. Sadly, what mth does better on their trucks..little to no issue with my daylight, they went with cheap plastic couplers and you wind up braking off the plastic air line connections because they are right above the screw heads so to remove coupler screw it breaks those. You'd think for what you pay for either brand they'd get their shit right.

[@MosriteCharlie]

The purpose of the extended coupler box is so you can install it on the trucks. for the body mount, you could just as easily install the ordinary wisker #148 box just closer to the car ends. The truck interference problem you have now goes away.

[@michaelmaehle1433]

Nice job and very informative! If I can make a suggestion: The Rivarossi cars have a slight gap at the roof line where the roof casting is slightly above the car body. You can eliminate the light seeping through that gap by putting a thin strip of black electrical tape on the inside of the roof casting at the car car joint. Just enough to keep light from seeping through.

[@rodolfomartinez2269]

Very good video. Thank you very much for all the experience provided.

[@jagc1969]

Very good video. In one of my previous comments I said that you only need some styrene and normal kadee couplers and that you don't really need a #451 coupler. Well, I was wrong. For some coaches , like the dome cars, you indeed need a #451 coupler. Sorry...

[@w.rustylane5650]

Thanks for posting. I have several Rivarossi heavy weights that I want to convert to body mounted kadee couplers. Now I know how to do it. Also thanks for the addendum. I have found that while converting my rolling stock to body mounted kadee couplers , I've had to modify several trucks after cutting off the talgo horn hooks.W Rusty Lane in eastern Tennessee (Witherington Place Railroad)

[@ZaksMuscleMotors]

I love the video, but I have to correct you on the box. It is in fact supposed to move. That’s the point of that spring. The front and back movement you are seeing is from the coupler shank in the pocket on the mounting shaft. I’m doing these on my 86ft Pullman Auto Box cars.

[@MosriteCharlie]

P.S. the plastic you find on bread loaves to secure the bag ends also makes good shims and you will never see the color once installed.

[@paulcramer453]

Thank you for the explanation. It Helps!

[@beaviskornholio2754]

Can you do a video on installing trucks with electrical contacts for passenger car lighting

[@jagc1969]

A very interesting and useful video indeed. Thanks for sharing.

[@drewzdrew27]

Your cars look great! Glad you could make it all work!

[@tomg3855]

Your video was very informative and I really love the Kadee products. I plan to purchase the tap set for my own collection. The only thing I think you left out of your video was the need to add extra weight. The Rivarossi "heavy weight" train cars are much too light for their size and length and tend to derail no matter what you do unless you add a little extra weight. In the future, please leave the horrible repeating music out of your next video. By the time your video was done I was ready to take that punch you were using to poke out my ear drums. A person can only stand to hear the same 3 lines of music a couple of times. After that it becomes a major torture which could be used in Guantanamo Bay to get the prisoners to talk. When the music did finally change it was almost too loud to hear what you were saying.

[@astridvallati4762]

Back in the 1970s, I had a lot of experience with Kadees on RR rolling stock, and found that close coupling was only successful if one used wide radius curves, and #8 or larger ( handlaid) turnouts.BTW, I used 3mm screws, not #2-56 USF screws.( in Italy in 70s) DocAV

[@crsrdash-840b5]

I love the Hudson 4-6-4. Is that a Franklin Mint version?

[@warrenholmar1129]

Looks fantastic nice job.

[@doyman]

What brand locomotive is that? Looks very nice.

[@herbertrodriquez6456]

I've modified a bunch of my AHM/ Rivarossi passenger cars with American ltd diaphrams for either streamline or heavyweight cars.

[@Twilight-ww6ub]

Do not invest the 45 minutes of time on this instructional video. This video shows the improper installation of the Kadee 451. Gearbox is supposed to “swing” just as it says on envelope. Also with this install there is nothing to prevent the spring for the self centering bushing to stay in place. It will pop out!

[@dundasjunctionmodelr.r-jam8267]

Great video, I guess this idea will work with ConCor Passenger cars too

[@whiteknightcat]

I hope so. I intend to try them out on some old Con-Cor Superliners that I began to convert many years ago before having to stop for a few decades.

[@retr0bits545]

I know it has been sometime but where did you get your vestibules at?

[@redbarnz]

At 2:09, are the wheels the same size? The set on the left seem like 36" and the one on the right is 33". Maybe it is the lighting....

[@scottjamable]

Hi is the coupler height perfect? And will this car work Ok on 22 radius? Thanks for the video.

[@LordRusty5]

Hey Scott ... As far as "perfect", I set the couplers to the correct height for all the cars in my consist, so I guess they are 'perfect' for my trains. I run on Kato HO Unitrack, and the curves are 22.5°. It is not recommended to run long passenger cars on anything much tighter than 22° track. My trains run just fine right now, and will run even better after they are properly weighted. That will come after I detail the crap out of them, with correct interiors, and plate glass windows! I will use the super-thin microscope slide covers for the window glass.

[@whiteknightcat]

This video shows the WRONG way to install the Kadee 451 coupler. The instructions specifically state the gear box must be installed on a smooth flat surface - the video shows it forced to fit on the existing center sill from which the rivets aren't even scraped off. "Prepare the surface for mounting. A smooth flat surface is required for mounting the gearbox to the cars frame." The entire purpose of the #451 coupler is to allow the gear box to swing slightly from side to side with longer cars and return to center via the centering spring. "The gearbox should move freely and snap back to the centerline." The procedure demonstrated in this video completely defeats the swinging feature of this particular coupler.

[@railroadbob55]

I'm sorry, but I have to agree. The music is too loud. Can't hear what you are saying.

[@MikesProjectsandHobbiesMC]

The body of your extended coupler box is supposed to move and swing left to right (pivot on the screw not tighten down like you have it. Im sure you figure that out by now. LOL Wait no you didn't, you actually said the bod is not supposed to pivot. Your dead wrong dude, the spring is a centering spring. The instructions cleary state " The gearbox should move freely and snap back to the centerline". Your rear trucks were lifting because you didn't setup the coupler box to pivot. If it doesn't pivot the weight on the coupler from the car ahead of it as it turns will lever the rear of the car off the track. My experience is putting body mounted couplers on passenger cars ruins them for anything but moving straight. Also why put on larger wheels? Larger wheels on cars that were not designed for them just causes clearance issues with coupler box. Im willing to bet everything you did made your cars worse huh? With the coupler not having the ability to swing wide left and right the tender or any car with short coupler is just going to toss them right off the rails to the outside of a turn. kadee.com/html/451ins.pdf

[@markmatteo2417]

What kind of diaphragms did you use here?

[@TheStarforce2]

do you have anything for removing the trucks and replacing with something like a walthers? I've got tons of riv cars, all need either metal wheels or new trucks, (new trucks for lighting) and couplers. I'm not even sure how to remove them without breaking them.

[@alcopower5710]

TheStarforce2 ......same here. It looked like the Walthers could not be used because the hole for mounting ache truck was centered and the Riv was offset

[@TheStarforce2]

@@alcopower5710 i look at my heavyweights and the trucks look centered though ive not checked my lightweights. I can always barrow trucks from my santafe cars to practice with and my heavy nyc car same.

[@alcopower5710]

TheStarforce2 ....at 34:45 the Walthers truck shows on offset mounting hole.

[@TheStarforce2]

@@alcopower5710 yea but mine do not look offset...they look centered. Maybe not all rivs are the same. These might be ahm age maybe things changed slighty but the riv trucks on these look centered. They are also 4 wheel trucks. Ive not gotten to my 6 wheel ones yet. I have rtr walthers santafe here with 4 wheel trucks so i can just take one off and test fit it.

[@alcopower5710]

TheStarforce2 .....sorry for the confusion. I’m only talking about the one that you have pictured with the other 2 pictured Riv trucks. Not your completed cars. Yes the light weights are different than the heavy weights. I’m having issues with my light weight cars only as they are 2 axle trucks.

[@tompica3884]

What was the kadee new wheel model number on the black steel wheels.

[@LordRusty5]

It shows it in the video ... at 1:39. Kadee #522, 36" Diameter, Code 110 "Standard" Wheels.

[@tompica3884]

John Bellucci thanks,got it

[@tompica3884]

Thanks again

[@jimfrancis]

Would've watched the entire vid but after 5-10 minutes of the same, too loud music, I hadda quit, sorry.

[@PrinceRupertBC]

What size of passenger wheel is?

[@Alphawolf2325]

How'd you get the nyc hudson in n scale?

[@LordRusty5]

Are you kidding me? Who said it was N-Scale? Did you watch the video? Did you not notice the size of the trucks, wheels and couplers used on the Rivarossi (not known for N-Scale) Heavyweight Passenger Cars? I can't understand how anyone who watched the whole video could make such an assumption ...

[@hankbob2000]

Hard to hear you over the music. Much too loud, obnoxious, and unnecessary!!!!

[@dobs78]

Just wondering, how will these preform on tighter curves? Thank you

[@whiteknightcat]

The whole point of the 451 coupler kit is to allow longer cars to operate on tighter curves. The problem with this video is that he installed them incorrectly, in such a way that the draft gear won't swing on sharper curves, thus defeating the whole purpose of the kit.