Just a quick update - have spent the past few modelling sessions converting a rake of Bachmann 16T mineral wagons to EM. The work required was surprisingly minor. Firstly, the wagon was disassembled to its constituent parts:

This included removing the brake gear, which was to be repositioned to line up with the wider EM wheelsets. The first job was to remove the stiffening ribs moulded on the inside faces of the W irons. This can be easily done by carving them away with a sharp scalpel.

Once this has been done, the new wheelsets can be fitted. The Gibson wheels I was using were on standard 26mm pinpoints and are a direct replacement for the Bachmann wheels. I didn't even fit pinpoint bearings as they seem to fit well into the chassis without any slop or problems. The converted wagons run fine through my EM pointwork, but I guess we'll see how things go. The next stage is to widen the slots in the chassis for the brake gear, filing them out right up to the solebar. In the photo below, the upper slot has been opened out, whilst the lower one is original.

Next, the brake gear mounting block needs filing down to remove the "lip" on the front face. The pic below shows it all....

The next job before wagon re-assembly is to fit your choice of couplings. In my case, I use 3 links, and like to fit them through the buffer beam and bend the shank of the coupling over behind the buffer beam as a "belt and braces" job in the event of glue failure. To allow this, the metal weight needs to be shortened by a few mm at one end, where it sits flush against the inside of the beam.

I use the Smiths 3 links, but usually cut the shank of the coupling hook down as shown (I don't bother with the springs etc which are supplied with the Smiths couplings.

Final job is then reassembly. Firstly, the door bangs are re-fitted with some cyano (they had to be removed to get the brakes out). The weight can also be glued in place, and the chassis re-fitted to the wagon body. Wheels in, and a quick run along the track to check clearances. The brakes can now be dropped into the enlarged slots in the chassis (the bigger slots and removed lip on the brakes means that they can now be inserted into the chassis from below). I then lined the brake shoes up with the wheels and fixed them in place with some solvent. Job done!!!

The only complication was on the wagons fitted with single sided brakes as there is a cross-shaft which I had to cut to remove but which was easy enough to replace with some 0.45mm brass wire. Of course, there is only one set of brake shoes to deal with, but the original coupling mounting bosses are removable on these chassis, and I had to fit some washers of 40thou styrene to enable the fixing screws for the chassis to do their job. You could, alternatively, just glue the chassis to the wagon body.

All in all, a pleasant way to spend a few hours, and a quick way to build up the wagon fleet. Just got to repaint and weather them now - will report back when this is done if anyone's interested.