I'm fairly new to 1:20.3 scale, and garden railroading. So far I have a mix of Bachmann equipment both locomotives and rolling stock. I am aware of the differences in coupler heights between the Big Hauler and early 1;20.3 stock and the newer Fn3, 1:20.3 stock. I am also aware of the drop shank couplers available in the newer stock to lower the couplers to the older coupler height.
Looking at the NMRA Standard, S-2, Couplers, http://nmra.org/sites/default/files/standards/sandrp/pdf/s-2_2010.09.pdf, the height shown for Fn3, knuckle couplers is 1.125" +/- 0.063". The newer equipment's couplers meet this standard. The older equipment does not meet the standard. It's too low.
I would like to raise the couplers on my older equipment, a three truck Shay, and some Big Hauler stuff to the higher standard. Is there a reasonable way to do this? I'm particularly interested in raising the Shay's couplers as it is in fact an Fn3 model.
Thank You,
David
David:
At first I was confused by your post. I had to lower the couplers on my 2 truck Shay to couple with 1:20.3 cars with body mounted couplers. I just went to the Bachmann site and looked at the drawings for the three truck shay. I now see how they attach the truck mounted couplers.
If you want to keep the truck mounted couplers, you can probably use Kadee #831s on the Shay. I use those on all my 1:22.5/24 truck mounted couplers. This brings the couplers to body mount height.
Or you can add a body mount to the Shay, like I did. I the link below is a post from me showing how I used the coupler pocket on the Shay and mounted the Bachmann stepdown coupler. This mates with all my Big Hauler, LGB, USAt, Delton, and AristroCraft 1:22.5/24 cars with truck mounted couplers. This also mates with 1:20.3 freight and passenger cars from Bachmmann and Accucraft.
http://www.bachmanntrains.com/home-usa/board/index.php/topic,28064.0.html
Chuck