I have a set of Atlas modern commuter cars. They are nice but have a big gap between cars. I would like to close up the gap. But also be able to run them on 11" curves. Has anyone done something like this? I know Kato has the kinematic couplers for the Daylight cars, but they only work on those cars. My Japanese trains also have a different coupler which does something similar where it gives more room when the train goes around a curve.
If you want operating couplers, check out the M/T passenger car trucks. the way the coupler attaches to the trucks allows for some adjustment of length so you might be able to close them up some. You could also try Unimate non operating couplers. they come in short, medium and long shanks. Not sure which one might work for those cars and that radius but worth looking at. Good luck and look forward to hearing/seeing what solution you come up with.
You may find some helpful information here: N scale close coupling alternatives | TrainBoard.com - The Internet's Original Are your cars' couplers truck mount or body mount?
I had seen the MT passenger trucks @BNSF FAN . Unfortunately they aren't compatible with lighting pickups in the car. Thanks for sharing that post @NorsemanJack . I will have to check out the MT Z scale. The tricky part is that I have a smaller layout so I need to still run on 11in curves. The couplers are truck mounted right now. Not opposed to making them body mounted.
I'm using the short Unimate couplers on my old IHC, Lima Atlas and Model Power heavyweight cars. Very close coupling. I'm running on an Ntrak layout with minimum of 27-28 inch curves. They do go through #4 switches It has been a while since I ran on 11 inch curves. However, keep in mind that with that sharp of a curve you may find body mounted couplers interfering with your trucks/wheels.
I'm thinking about getting some Tomix 0373 TN couplers. They seem similar to the ones on my Narita Express that has close coupling and handles the small curves.
My vote would be unimates if they fit. They don’t come uncoupled very easily unlike other brands and may work better on tight radius curves over body mounted couplers. My 2 cents.
I'm very excited. Just did a test fit and trial run with the Tomix 0373 couplers. They reduce the gap from 1cm to almost nothing. They were even able to run on 9" 3/4 radius track. The down side is they are very difficult to couple up to non Tomix knuckle couplers. I was hoping to be able to replace all the coupler, but I will probably leave a MT on either end now. Now I need to tap and drill some holes and fabricate some shims to do the final mounting.
The 0373 are really amazing. As they move further off center they get more length. So the car is coupled closes when on the straight and gets more space when it goes around a curve. I'll have to take some more photos once I get them mounted again. All the Japanese trains I have gotten have a similar action. The only two American models I have seen try to do sometging similar to this are the Bachmann Acela and Kato Southern Pacific Daylight. The Acela is no were near as good since it needs 19 in radii. Not sure how the Daylight couplers are for radii.
Got the conversion done. Had to do it twice. The first time I mounted the couplers I did it too close and couldn't get them to couple on the track. Here is a comparison of the original and modified coupling and one of them going around a curve. Also posted a short clip of them running https://imgur.com/a/06UP2LG
Not familiar with those cars. Out of the box the couplers are about 14mm wide for the mounting plate. The actual coupler box is only 11mm wide, so you could trim it down if you don't mind losing the screw holes. It is 10.7mm deep. Can't really shorten that dimension. I found it harder than doing a conversion to a MT 1015 body mounted coupler. One factor was the tight tolerances. With them MT 1015 I just line the coupler box up with the end of the car and I am good to go since I'm concerned about the inter-car distance. With this conversion I wanted the cars as close as possible so it took me a few tries to get the right depth where the cars had enough space to push together to engage the couplers, but not too much space. The Tomix 0703 also had two mounting holes instead of one. So not only to do you have to find the right depth, you have to get two holes at that depth in alignment. Another factor was the larger mounting area. The Atlas modern commuter cars I was converting had a flat area, then a slightly sloped area between the end of the car and the truck. While there was enough flat space to mount a MT 1015 coupler on the flat area, the Tomix 0373 ended up partially on the sloped area. I had made a template to try and layout the mounting holes for the final mounting. In hindsight it might have just been easier to glue the couplers, then drill the mounting holes with the couplers in place. I had just used a drop of hot glue on each car and put two connected couplers in place with the cars almost touching when I did a test fit. This worked well, and I towards the end of the project I was regretting not just using that for all the spacing since.
