Here is the first coupling successfully applied to the first wagon I built – a platform wagon on rugga chassis. A few things I’ve learned:
- The springs are very easy not only to lose but to damage, you need to be very careful.
- The lubricant ‘grease-em’ is proper weird stuff, like silver sparkling dust. seems to work though
- You don’t need to overtighten the screws when mounting them as otherwise the coupling fails to work correctly
- My they are fiddly to put together, but once you get a system together, it’s fine.
Pick the springs up with a scalpel. If you jab the point into the coils at one end, you can slot the other into the coupling, then compress to push the scalpel-held end in. Release the pressure and withdraw the blade. Easy-ish with practice!
ReplyDeleteThe lubricant is graphite. You could always sharpen a pencil over it - but the wood shavings would not help! Be liberal with it.
I have a simple jig from plasticard to hold the couplings during assembly. Note the draft box can be either way up relative to the coupling arms. I assemble the coupling upside-down in the draft box so the wire tail is upward.
With these tips I can assemble a pair of couplings in 10-15 minutes.