I hear ya. But the two biggest bugaboos to backing long trains remains poor track and improperly weighted cars. You can place sharp curves as well as #4 switches under the poor track category.
I dusted off my CC heavyweights last night and went to work on the truck/coupler problem. I dislike the MT passenger car trucks with couplers, they seem to come uncoupled quite often and just give me fits. I converted one to the WOT 6 axle trucks, it works well and you get 36" wheels out of the deal, but they tend to make some noise. I did a wee bit of dremel work on one car last night, removed the bolster and installed some MT heavyweight trucks (36" wheels) on a car and it worked out really well. I've installed Gold Metal steps on most of the cars and body mount couplers, so that has already been done. The newer MT trucks work well and even with the offset bolster, give enough room to swing and look decent. As far as couplers go, I started using accumate couplers on the CC heavyweights. I just hack them off of accumate trucks that I've replaced with MT ones and glue them onto shims on the bottom of the cars. They work well and don't slinky. The cars look decent, but are a far cry from the newer MT or WOT offerings. If it weren't for the Lark paint scheme on them, I would probably just toss them or offer them up on feebay.
My most recent home layout (now in storage) included a Union Station feature with 4 tracks which required the train to be driven in locomotive first and backed out onto the mainline. So that is why I backed "long" trains. As I recall from a few trips on Amtrak to Chicago, IL, that is very similar to what is done on the Chicago to St. Louis line. In the freight yard, I had a similar situation where I backed trains into the yard and up the ladder. Thus the practice of backing trains smoothly is of ongoing interest to me. I want to know how to improve the process.
for heavyweight steps check out https://www.shapeways.com/product/E...-prr-steps-for-lima-mp-cars?optionId=59600682 as i understand, they will include ones made for con-cor shortly not my site or products, they are from John LeMerise who posts on TWR and Facebook fwiw.... sincerely Gary
Finished 5 cars last night. Pulled the old trucks off, sanded off the bolster and installed the newer MT passenger trucks. All but one baggage car look and track nicely. I have a bit of work to do on the baggage car tonight, it sits to low and I have to install another shim on the new bolster. I will also pick up some more trucks to finish out the remaining cars. The shapeways steps look promising. I ran out of gold medal steps and as a substitute, cut the steps off of an old atlas caboose. They fit perfectly and blend right in with the GMM steps. That is another option.
Went camping over the weekend, so no trains. Finished up the rest of the heavyweights last night. I spent some time working on coupler and truck height to look decent and run on my door layout with its tighter curves. All-in-all, the truck conversion works out well. The accumate couplers also work well and clear the end of the trucks so they swing appropriately. They work much better than the MT couplers that come with their original 6 wheel passenger trucks. I have one diner that needs some tweeking on a coupler. It has some droop to it that causes uncoupling when paired with a couple of specific cars. All I have left to do is some painting to cover styrene shims and they will be done and ready for heavyweight service.
