A draw bar between ore cars?

Now that is very neat, Gary! :thumbs_up:

 

At the time,I had well over 200 of these hoppers & the cost to MT the lot was too much.So a cheaper alternative was found,alot of drilling & hand taping 00-90 screws from the MT 10 packs of body mount couplers in conjunction with brass square bar stock,etched to ME track weathering stuff (cant remember name) & again,a lot of intricate drilling.
I made 5 car sets with the MT body mount (again I cant remember the number......) & never had a breakage or problem with them yet.Even backed a 120 cars through a twisty branch line + 5-6 points on a grade,very happy with it & time well spent.

 

Jason,

you make me think.... should i use copper, brass or plastic for the drawbar....

 

Seb, since I made these a while ago, I went downstairs to measure the drawbars and they were made from .040 x .125" styrene stock cut to length. (I narrowed the visible center portion to ~.080", but that is probably unnecessary for your application where close-coupling makes them hard to see.)

The holes were roughly .075" (maybe a #48 bit?). I was worried about stressing the plastic when I drilled the holes but that turned out not to be a problem. Just punch a starter divot on the centerline and go at it slowly with a hand drill.

I looked at an Accumate box and the same specs should work there too. There might be an issue with getting the drawbar over the post, given the way the clip tabs on the box cover work, but it's probably ok.

If you have decent tools for metal working, I would recommend using brass or aluminum stock like Jason used, but I'm satisfied with the strength of the plastic drawbars.

Regards,
Gary

 

Agree with Gary on the plastic.
I only went with brass because of the long trains involved & the Roundhouse hoppers do weigh a fair bit plus I used the Roundhouse metal wheels,so 120 + hoppers is quiet abit of weight for 6 or 8 loco's not to mention draw bar pull!
If your only going to run small consists,then Gary's method would be easier & better for you.
Show us your results when you decide.

 

I used the cut Rapido coupler technique on a few cars. It works really well and cost less than putting MTL wheels on all cars.

 

These sugarbeet cars have them also. 3 cars is the longest I've done on 40' cars like these.

 

Well...

I'm going to try the styrene strip (like Gary) method tonight. If it works i'll post pictures!

the final project is to have 9 four ore cars sets, yes 36 ore cars...:thumbs_up:

 

Hey. This looks like an effective technique... is it possible to get a fuller visual picture of how you did the drawbar for these cars?