All of the passenger cars I'm looking at have Talgo style couplers. From reading threads I understand the problems and that many folks cut off the coupler and add Kadee gearboxes and couplers. My question is whether the geometry of the swiveling coupler and the independently swiveling truck are in line enough to allow a smooth transition around a curve. I can imagine a lot of side drag on the truck from pulling the coupler of the end of the car instead of the pivot point of the the truck (which I assume was the idea in the first place to have truck mounted couplers.) I have seen pictures of a long coupler in a very wide, triangular shaped gearbox, that moves the pivot point back towards the center of the truck quite a bit. I couldn't find these to buy, but could make them out of the cut off Talgo couplers and some styrene. Also, since these cars would not be cut and switched on a regular basis, would tow-bar style connections be the easiest way to solve the problem? I am planning on 36, 34, and 32 inch radii for my main line and #7 turnouts for most of my layout.
I can't imagine you having one bit of trouble with the geometry of body mount couplers. And yes, they are much better when backing and switching, even if you don't do it much.
thanks you have to wonder why they came up with the truck mounted couplers. I assume the problem is the long length moves up and down to much.
They do eliminate the geometry problems you spoke of. That's a big deal when you're trying to trick eighty-five footers into going around 18" radius curves.
a lot is down to making them go round ridiculously unrealistic curves i.e. trainsets truck mounted couplers are a thing of the past and thank goodness! the nearest is separate swinging couplers like you describe mounted to the car ends. even they have too much up/down movement for me. Body mount Kadee's is the only way!
