I'm surprised some of our shapeways designers haven't made body mount coupler boxes for McHenry or other like couplers.
The bigger surprise is that the McHenry or Athearn people did not come out with a coupler box themselves. The McHenry could have been a really big deal if it wasn't so big and if they made it with a "T" shank. As it is the McHenry uses a shank the same length as the MT and Accumates. So one has to sacrifice an MT or Accumate coupler just to get the coupler box for the McHenry. Not a lot of people will do that. If Athearn would correct those two deficiencies then McHenry's would be a dominate player in the replacement coupler market. A "T" shank McHenry would fit in any truck that a Rapido coupler would and that is a lot of trucks. In addition it would make possible close coupling of ABBA consists with the ability to uncouple the units without removing them from the rails.
This is what I've been hoping for. I've still got over 100 pieces of rolling stock that still have rapido coupler trucks and would love to switch them over to an operable knuckle style coupler. I've tried making my own body mounted boxes out of Evertgreen styrene but the rectangular tube walls are too thick and interfere with the trucks. I've also tried to conceive of a way to attach a box to the old rapido truck but as of yet cannot find a way that is useable or aesthetically pleasing. I could just buy a bunch of MT trucks in bulk but would like to find a cheaper way if I could. Brian
Do you have actual sizes for what you want as a box? I would be easy to draw you up something if you know what you want. The box will realisticaly need to have 1mm thick walls as this is a Shapeways etc. limnit. I could then get "Shipyards" to set it up in their shop.
Therein lies the problem me thinks. The box walls I imagine would need to be thin. Somewhere around .5 mm in order to fit correctly if the box is to be body mounted. Probably the same thickness if one were to design a 2 piece box that would snap into a Rapido coupler truck. Brian
