Large Scale Central

USA Trains 60 ft. Box Car & Body Mount Couplers

Reviews
#1

The modern USA Trains 60 foot Box Car and Body Mounting Knuckle Couplers

The USA Trains 60 foot box car has been offered for several years now in both single door and double door versions. These cars are high quality and come standard with a cleverly designed body mounted “cushion” draft gear box with plastic knuckle coupler.

USAT Cushion Coupler Box & Spacer

This draft gear box is intended to somewhat function like a prototype car having a cushioning action when cars are forced coupled together, etc. Like prototype draft gear boxes, the USAT draft gear box notably projects beyond the end of the car.

However, since the many locos and rolling stock I have are equipped with body mount Kadees with trip pins that can be uncoupled over a Kadee Track Magnet, I decided to body mount Kadee 906 centerset couplers on the USA Trains 60 foot cars, too. Shown below are three cars fitted with Kadee 906 coupler assemblies.

USAT 3 example 60 foot box cars On Outdoor Layout

USAT Factory Coupler Downward Tilt!

The factory knuckle coupler assembly comes standard with it mounted on a spacer to conform with the USA Trains “standard height of our products” having low to the railhead couplers, but the spacer can be removed so the coupler assembly can be mounted on the car floor for better compatibility with other brand products. However, there is an unsightly downward tilt to the coupler assembly - which is the same with or without spacer as illustrated below.

USAT Factory Knuckle Coupler & Spacer Assy

If choosing to convert the USAT 60 foot box cars to accept Kadee couplers, the ugly downward coupler tilt is also corrected as illustrated below.

Kadee 906 corrects USAT coupler assy downward tilt

Typically, prototype cushioned cars have a very pronounced and projected draft gear box, so this attribute is replicated like that done with the USA Trains factory coupler.

Example ATSF USAT 60 foot box car with Kadee 906

For far more detail and “how to’s”, see full article hosted for me by Greg E. on his Web site, title:
“USA Trains 60 foot Box Car Body Mount Factory vs. Kadee Knuckle Couplers”

-Ted

#2

Thanks Ted.

Great write up!

#3

Sean, thank you for the feedback.

Much appreciated,

-Ted

#4

Ted, with the new Kadee’s body mounted with they still work fine on a 5’ft radius, 10’ft diameter curve. I am assuming so since I think you have said that is your minimum on your layout. Thanks for another great how to article

#5

Pete,

Yes, the USAT 60 foot box cars work well down to 8 foot diameter, example picture below - which is shown near the last part of the full article.

USAT 60 foot boxcar operates OK down to 8 foot dia. track

-Ted

#6

Ted

With all this information I think you should look into starting a section in Articles giving links to all your work … just a thought.(http://largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-laughing.gif)

http://largescalecentral.com/articles

I mean if Devon can do it you should have no problems going it.

#7

Sean McGillicuddy said:

Ted

With all this information I think you should look into starting a section in Articles giving links to all your work … just a thought.(http://largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-laughing.gif)

Thank you Sean,

I did as you suggested.

http://www.largescalecentral.com/articles/174/ted-doskaris-vignettes-articles-links

-Ted

#8

I know you asked about an index to articles, and Ted responded.

Often people ask why you don’t just post all of this on such and such forum, why on Greg’s site:

  1. you cannot rely on forums, notice what happened to people’s pictures on MLS just recently (files are gone!)

  2. there is no way to really organize them to YOUR liking under articles

  3. in general forum topics move around as they get commented or old

  4. you cannot format a post completely to your preferences in a forum like a real web site

  5. you are not in control of comments in a forum, and they can dilute the impact or even turn into wars

  6. you cannot always go back and change and update the posts, and you certainly cannot re-order them arbitrarily

  7. there are no advertisements on my web site

  8. this information is easily found by Google, by anyone world wide, not just members of this forum

  9. I guarantee hosting on my site to his specifications until I pass away.

There is an extensive link to all of Ted’s pages, several different methods of finding information on my site. Even the search function works.

http://www.elmassian.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=626&Itemid=803

There’s more reasons, but here’s a few that come to mind… (http://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-cool.gif)

Greg

#9

Another issue is when uploading even 800 pixel wide, but tall, pictures in a given Forum can be displayed in a minuscule size. This has happened on MLS; hence, my pictures are on Greg’s server.

-Ted

#10

Thanks Ted, After I posted I did go to Gregs site and saw the answers to my questions. Only problem , and I am sure it is keyboard operator error, is some of the drop down menus drop off the screen and I cannot access them all. But , like i said before Thanks for all the great information you share with us. Keep it coming. Grreg, thanks for all your info too, it has helped me greatly

#11

The drop down menus suck, and I am working on a solution.

Please read this page on the other, easier ways to navigate the site.

http://www.elmassian.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=625&Itemid=801

Believe it or not, I am going to make a video showing the ways… eventually I will be able to fix the drop down menus, it is an issue with the web site software.

Greg

#12

Pete Lassen said:

Thanks Ted, After I posted I did go to Gregs site and saw the answers to my questions. Only problem , and I am sure it is keyboard operator error, is some of the drop down menus drop off the screen and I cannot access them all. But , like i said before Thanks for all the great information you share with us. Keep it coming. Grreg, thanks for all your info too, it has helped me greatly

Pete, thanks for your feedback.

Yea, I, too, find the Web site drop downs to be erratic, but with enough practice, I got use to dealing with it. I am sure Greg will eventually fix that behavior.

That said, at the end of my opening post, I did provide a direct clickable link to the full article, so no need to go to Greg’s site and fight with the LS drop down. (You have to hover over article title that is colored blue with cursor, then select / click it.) Let me know if that link does not work, but I did test it.

-Ted

#13

it did Ted, I went right to the page from there as always started looking around his site for more .

Pete