MT Coupler Pins -- What's the trick

Rick, the easiest way I've found is to remove the coupler from the engine, hold it upside down on a flat surface like a table, and push the trip pin back into the coupler. Put the coupler back into the engine, and check the height with your new gauge.

 

I always have a piece of plywood around to use with MTL couplers. Put the coupler head on the (soft) plywood and then push in the pin like Terry described, holding the pin with pliers. When the pin comes out on the upper side of the coupler head (the one with the knuckle), it is in place.
The whole assembly of MTL couplers needs some kind of feeling of how these things come together. It works better when you are calm and not upset.

 

I agree on the techniques already mentioned.....but on a side note, unless you are doing magnetic uncoupling, there's no reason for the pin to be there.....the couplers work fine without the pin and without them you lose the hassles of the pins snagging on things. When my pins fall out, I have a small bottle I drop them into....I save them in case I ever go to magnetic uncoupling, in which case I'll stick them back in.

 

Try filing the top end of the pin to narrow it a little bit. And if you put a little spit on it that will help. A little water always helps tight parts fit together easier.

 

Pay attention to the fact that the pin is rectangular, and that it forms a particular offset angle to the coupler head when viewed from below. If you don't match that angle when you push it in, you may crack the coupler head. Look at other couplers.

I brace the coupler head on the top against a hard edge; plywood, edge of the workbench, whatever, grasp the pin in needlenose pliers from the sides with the tip of the pliers pointed in the direction of the push. Grab it hard. Set the angle, and push it into the head from the bottom. It will self-set to the depth if you are pushing against something. Do not put any stress on the coupler shank itself or it will break.

I use MT exclusively and almost exclusively truck mounts, and they just work excellently in magnetic uncoupling. There are tricks to getting it right, but gee, its not THAT hard.

 

Any hopes of letting us in on some of the tricks? I've spent about two years on and off trying to get MT couplers to work reliably and I've only got fairly reasonable operation with body mounted MT couplers using a home built electro-magnet. I've also tried truck mount couplers - both MT and McHenry - and every magnet which MT supply with very poor operation in all cases.

I've got a switching layout under construction where the work is at a dead stop until I can find some combination which works reliably.

Jim.

 

When you say poor operation - what do you mean?

There are three critical areas to MT's:

1) setting the pin height properly so that it doesn't hook track and obstructions, yet not too high
2) Not uncoupling - usually because the magnet isn't set quite right, wrong magnet, etc.
3) False uncoupling - the trick there is that for some inexplicable reason, MT supplies magnets that are about four times longer than what you really want and need snapped much shorter (I score with a glass cutter and snap in a vise). Combine far shorter magnets with a drag spring or two on cabooses and the problem pretty much goes away. I also tend to 'bend in' the thumb of the coupler just a hair.

What I like about the truck mounts is that they keep the couplers centered much better and they keep the trip pin in a more constant plane to the railhead.

I have one, original, Kadee electromagnet in my yard throat, everything else is in-track magnets, painted to match the ties. I place a stained wooden tie next to them so I can precisely spot the uncoupling sweet spot. Check this view out:



To precisely spot over magnets that short, you have to have good, reliable, creeping power. If you have old stuff that you can't control, rabbit starts, etc., it simply isn't going to work. But nearly all new stuff has excellent performance anymore, and most throttles can tick motors over slowly.

 

Here's an alternative. Throw the Mt coupler away BUT KEEP THE BOX!!! Then mount a McHenry coupler in its place using the same box. I am changing out all my MT couplers on my engines with McHenry's and when I break a coupler on a piece of rolling stock I replace it with a McHenry. Some people may think the spring is an issue but I secure one end with a tiny drop of epoxy and the issue disappears. What I like about the McHenry is that the pivot point for the knuckle is in the coupler head and not somewhere back in the coupler box. I believe I do lose the delayed uncoupling feature of the MT's but I never used it anyway so no loss really. For uncoupling I use a Rix tool supercharged with a couple of super magnets.

 

Pull all the 'trip em up' pins out...and throw thm in a corner in the (S)crap yard !! Manual uncoupling...when and where I want it...:tb-tongue:


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Inkaneer - any pictures or further description of your modded Rix uncoupling tool?

 

Nice! Screen saver material.

Off topic, though, I guess. My bad.

Good idea on the ties. I have used electrical cabinets to mark some things.

 

I usually insert then off-axis and give 'em a twist into the right position. Not hard to do, and I don't think I've ever had an MT uncoupling pin drop out on me...

As for Accumates...that's an ENTIRELY different story...

 

I note from your picture that you use the track magnets on top of the ties - my preference is for the magnets to be hidden under the ties.

I've got the MT coupler installation tools and I set the heights and trip pins using them.

I've tried various magnets under the ties including the official MT ones with quite poor rates of success, in that the couplers don't release properly on first attempt but require several back and forth shunts until they eventually part.

If I increase the magnetic field when using magnets other than the MT ones, then truck mounted couplers tend to get pulled down as well as apart, and will derail the truck.

I use the 1015 coupler to replace the Atlas Accumate couplings and when this coupling works, the coupler head moves too far and when you want to push the uncoupled stock the coupler heads miss each other and push on the body of the stock. I've found I can glue a small piece of brass angle on the coupler to limit its movement to stop this.

With my home built electro-magnet I get the best performance with MT couplers but that is certainly not perfect and I have to really make sure the 1015s are well burnished and lubricated to ensure a fair level of operation. McHenry couplers seem to work better.

The basic problem I seem to get is that the MT couplers don't open sufficiently to allow them to part easily. This may not be a problem if you are cutting off many cars which have a certain amount of rolling resistance to allow the coupler heads to pull through and uncouple. But on a small switching layout where you want to cut only one or two cars, then there is sufficient resistance in the partially opened coupling heads to pull the cars off the magnet when they close again. When I have tried increasing the magnetic force to overcome this problem, then I get the problems with the truck mounted couplers being pulled down as well as across, or the excess lateral movement of the body mounted couplers. McHenry couplers seem to work much better than the average MT1015

I think I've spent too much time over the past two years trying to get a combination which works well. I remember trying the original Kadee N scale couplers about forty years ago and I didn't proceed with fitting them then because of uncertain action (I've still got the original packet and couplings). I had hoped that things might have improved in the interim. I suspect that my best way forward is to use my home built electro-magnets and put McHenry couplers in 1015 boxes as someone else has suggested. The McHenrys seem to give the most reliable operation.

Jim.