Have you thought of knuckle couplers? they might be pricey but they look really good, can be operated by magnets or just by a dental pick! Also, some Bachmann wagons are coming ready fitted with them. Just my 2 pennies

Lloyd

By 'knuckle couplers' do you mean Kaydee's - I had considered these, and as you say they are expensive - and you do have to get the height spot on when fitting them...I didn't know however that they could be operated with a dental pick!!

Regards

Sigtech

Hi Sigtech.

I have had experience with both dinghams and kadees. As far as height goes, dinghams, knuckle couplers and indeed any coupler need to be set up accurately to get accurate coupling, so there is no real argument there for either of the two.

On to the couplings. Previously I had fitted both hooks of the dinghams to each end of the locomotive. If you are operating fixed rakes, then both ends of the rake get a loop coupler and problem solved. Although if you want to double head you are going to have to fit three links onto both ends of a locomotive so that they can couple up to each other. The problems come when you are trying to break up and make up goods formations. When this is the case you basically need loops on both ends of all your goods stock and the reliability goes down a bit. Also getting the delayed uncoupling to work in my opinion is a bit of a pain in the arse. It is do-able however but you need to have good technique with the soldering iron for it to work. Finally if you go down this route the brass needs to be polished to a high sheen almost to get rid of any friction as it becomes really difficult for it to work. The advantage's over the kadees however is the magnetic system is much more straight forward, and frankly they look awesome too by far the most realistic automatic coupler for 4mm.

Kadees loose the looks that dingham provide but frankly I feel that once set up they negate the dingham issues. Note that dingham couplers also have the potential to buffer lock on tight curves that don't have a transition curve when propelling. Food for thought.

Also worth looking at (Sorry to muddy the waters ) are Alex Jackson, Sprat and winkle and D&G couplers. All these offer a delayed uncoupling service.

If you are not worried about delayed uncoupling there is another option and that is to fit an iron arm to the back of the tension lock uncoupler. This means that the tension lock uncoupler can be operated with magnets.  Have a look at automatic magnetic uncoupling for shunting layouts on youtube.

Hope that was helpful.

Owen

Hi Owen, and thanks for all that useful info - it sounds as if I need to rethink my stratergy! I didn't realize Dinghams would buffer lock on a propelling move!, and my curves are 22  to 24 inch radius...,maybe the idea of fitting the iron arm on the back of the tension lock is a more realistic option.

As I said in my blog, without exception all my stock is fitted with them, so it should be much cheaper and easier to achieve. Reckon I will need 11 magnetic uncouplers for Sproston.- will take a look at these videos on youtube later. Thanks once again.

Regards

Steve.

Sigtech.

On second thoughts, make that 15 magnetic uncouplers...!!LOL