I've started to install MTL905's on my locomotives as I go through them and when I can get couplers. But I'm wondering how many people use MTL905's on their rolling stock. Do you shim or lower the car? And if you can post pics that would be great. Thanks in advance,
Not a direct answer to your question but I am waiting for the new BLMA trucks to come out and see how they work on lowering some rolling stock that come originally with MT trucks.
I do have some rolling stock with 905s. It happened out of necessity on some Atlas and Athearn tankers. The 905s ended up in the center of the height gauge. I liked the looks so I converted my MT bay window cab. I lowered the cab and the 905s are too low as a result. I filed as much material off of the mounting surface as possible but the coupler still sits too low. If your coupler sits too high you can shim it. If it sits too low and you have filed away all you can on the mounting surface I dont know what can be done. Jeff
Two Separate Issues Lowering rolling stock and using 905s can be two separate issues. I am a standard size N scale coupler user but I do lower some of my cars. Even so, I rarely body mount couplers even with the lowered frame. I could lower the car more if I body mounted. Car on the right is lowered; car on the left is not. I am glad to see some of the new N scale products with more prototypical car frame height. For some reason H0 scale does not seem to have this pervasive problem. Perhaps it is the H0 scale coupler system which generally body mounts couplers and then shims the frame to get the correct coupler height. Kadee is now coming out with the scale size coupler (Kadee 58) and that does not affect correct body height. So, for body mounted 905s in N scale, coupler height should be the same with a lowered body. (I think.)
Not all cars can be lowered without doing some surgery on the car itself like removing part of the floor as in some boxcars etc. I am not inclined to do that. However, I have decided that if I did go to body mounting couplers that I would cease my use of the MTL trucks/couplers and go with either the BLMA or the hundreds of Atlas trucks I have stashed away. If I used the Atlas truck I would clip the coupler pocket from the truck to body mount and go with a McHentry coupler. The problem is I have a lot of cars like the Atlas 90 ton hoppers that have no provision for body mounting a coupler so a method would have to be devised to do so.
I have used them to replace Rapido couplers without problem on rolling stock. There is no appreciable height difference (if at all) when replacing others with Z's.
I'm in the process of changing out the Accumates on my Atlas locos to 905's. I plan on changing over the rolling stock at some point, but locos and cabooses will be first. After all, those are the two things that most people spend time looking at. Cost is a consideration too, as 905's can get expensive if you've got a large fleet.
When you use MT Z scale #905's and mate them to any N scale coupler the #905 coupler must be centered exactly in the middle of the N scale knuckle of the N scale coupler for optimum success.
Olden Days of Body Mount Coupler Conversions Off topic, I suppose, but didn't someone or manufacturer make a body mount adapter for this purpose back in the old, old days?
I remember getting some for IM covered hoppers, but I can't remember who made them. This could be something MTL could do, remember when they made coupler conversion kits for locomotives.
