What Coupling System Do Hornby Currently Use?

This is a question that has come up a few times now, and there is a really quick answer : they use two, Lima-style D-ring couplings that are moulded onto the rolling stock (loco, wagon, carriage, etc.) and NEM pocket couplings with reasonably standard tension lock couplings inserted.

The Hornby Railroad (cheaper) range have the D-ring couplings, and the Hornby non-Railroad ranges have the NEM couplings. If in doubt, simply use the product code to search the Hornby shop. If the product has NEM couplings, it will say so under 'Special Features'.

However, there are a few points that I suspect lurk behind the original question. The first related to compatibility.

The old Lima style D-rings are moulded onto the rolling stock, so that they are part of the chassis. This means that changing them to NEM couplings, whilst doable, is a messy process.

You'd be better off buying the more expensive, and slightly more attractive (neither are actually prototypical) models with NEM couplings if that's your goal. Of course, there's a caveat.

That caveat is that Hornby actually sell packs of NEM compatible D-ring couplings. These enable you to buy up Railroad (cheaper) wagons and carriages and then couple them to Hornby non-Railroad locomotives, by taking out the tension lock couplings and replacing them with the D-ring ones.

That's part of the beauty of NEM couplings - you can change the actual couplings for others. This becomes necessary, even if you've splashed out on non-Railroad stock, if you use Brian Kirby style magnetic uncoupling.

The reason is that the Hornby tension lock couplings are made of ferrous material, unlike the Bachmann ones (for example) which are not. If you have ferrous tension lock couplings, then the Brian Kirby approach doesn't work, as the magnets affect the coupling directly.

But that's the beauty of the NEM couplings - if you really don't like them, you can always swap them for some Kadee knuckle couplings, which are generally thought of as being more prototypical, and provide excellent delayed action magnetic uncoupling/coupling which is very versatile.

So, that's pretty much everything I now about the current coupling system that Hornby uses in both the high-end and Railroad product ranges.

Converting Rapido to NEM Couplings

I've been getting a few N guage questions recently, and top of the list is "how do I convert Rapido couplings to NEM?" Now, many readers might not even know what Rapido or NEM couplings are, let alone why you'd want to change from one to the other.

So, this article should help to answer a few of the more pertinent N scale coupling questions, as well as address the theme of changing from one type to the other, along with some helpful resources.

The key difference between NEM and non-NEM couplings is that NEM provides for a pocket that can be used to change the couplings - in other words, if you have rolling stock that is compliant with the NEM standards, you are free to change the couplings for those that are also NEM compliant.

That includes Kadee (now Micro-Trains), Dapol, Graham Farish, and Bachmann, amongst others.

Non-NEM couplings are usually moulded to the rolling stock, and as such cannot be changed - Rapido couplings fall into this category.

A Quick Note on Standards

Here in Europe, we have a body that was set up to standardise many aspects of railway modelling, from track widths to coupling heights, wheel sizes and bogie placement. The only downside is that most of the documents are only available in French or German.

Officially called MOROP, the list of standards is impressive, across the gauges. The set of standards that deals with N scale coupling pockets  is called NEM 355. While this document is in German, a Danish web site has provided a great overview of the pertinent points of the N scale NEM standards.

For those who want a bit of a potted history of couplings, from Rapido, to NEM and including standard knuckle as well as automatic and magnetic variations, it can be found on the N Scale Division web site.

Rapido Couplings & Moulded Couplings

Rapido couplings had been the standard for many years, despite not looking especially good, and not really allowing for the close-coupling that modellers demanded. They worked, and were also avaiabile across a wide variety of rolling stock, having been licensed to manufacturers, which boosted their penetration.

Otehr manufacturers (especially in Europe) used proprietaty moulded couplings, and to this day, if you buy Peco or Dapol rolling stock kits, it is common to find that they have moulded proprietary couplings; and older ready to run models also have this restriction.

Subsequently, many people have found it desirable to convert their Rapido and propriertary moulded couplings to NEM pockets to allow them to use more modern couplings such as magnetic couplings from companies like Micro-Trains.

Converting Rapido to NEM Couplings

To do this, you are going to have to use a knife to remove the old couplings, and then obtain a NEM kit to replace the old moulded coupling in its entirety. Some advice : practice on a wagon that has little value to you, as the first time that you do this, it may well go very wrong!

On the Model Rail Forum, there is a guide to replacing couplings with NEM pockets, complete with pictures, done far better than I could, and is well worth a look.

The key points to remember are that:

• you need to remove the old coupling carefully
• the new pocket needs to be at the right height
• the couplings also need to be NEM compliant

To help get these right, there are a couploe fo useful products on the market.

Buyer's Guide to NEM Pockets & Couplings

Dapol make both a pack of 20 pockets, as well as a smaller kit. The smaller kit contains 5 pockets, but also a tool to help you get the height just right. Called the NSPARE9 kit, I would recommend it for anyone converting to NEM.

As for couplings, despite being a fan of Kadee magnetic auto-couplings for HO/OO gauge, I actually prefer these Graham Farish couplings for N scale. For those who want to see a general overview of available products, the Gaugemaster web site has a great variety.

Hopefully with this information in hand, converting your old couplings to the NEM standard should be a less daunting prospect!

Inglenook Kadee Magnet Placement Advice

Many of us, especially those of us with a shelf switching layout, have an Inglenook. Kadee magnet auto-coupling/decoupling makes operating an Inglenook much easier (when it works) but is a real pain when it doesn't, or if the magnets are put in the wrong place.


First off, what exactly is an Inglenook? Figure 1 shows the basic layout (adapted, with many thanks, from the Model Railways Shunting Puzzle Web Site) and can be adapted to any scale, with a couple of points (switches) and 7 or so bits of track.

Figure 1: Basic Inglenook

The operating fun to be had with the Inglenook relies on being able to pull wagons off trains (rakes) which are parked on the ends of the Inglenook, and swapping them with others, in a kind of Towers of Hanoi style puzzle.


While decoupling using the paintbrush-with-a-loop-of-wire-on-the-end solution is all well and good, for the ultimate in operating action, many enthusiasts like to implement some kind of automatic decoupling solution. Kadee manufacture such a solution, using magnets and knuckle couplers to provide a reliable shunting experience.


Due to the way that they work, on an Inglebook, Kadee magnet based auto-decouplers  are a great solution for one simple reason : delayed decoupling. For layouts using electromagnetic decoupling (in my opinion, the next best thing to Kadee's solution), magnets are needed at each place where a wagon (truck) can be uncoupled.


Wagons can be uncoupled  from other wagons, or from the loco (shunter), and Figure 2 shows where the placements should be (or could be) for an Inglenook using only electromagnetic automatic decoupling.

Figure 2: Inglenook Magnet Placement

There are other places that magnets might be appropriate or desirable, but Figure 2 serves to illustrate the point - 3 separate magnets, with three separate buttons, are required to be able to spot trucks (wagons) on each of the three sidings of the Inglenook. 


Kadee magnet based uncoupling changes this, as seen in Figure 3.

Figure 3: Inglenook Kadee Magnet Placement

The reason only a single magnet is required is that once decoupling has been activated the remaining rake (train, or wagon) can be shunted into place, and remains decoupled. When the loco pulls away, the decoupled wagon or rake is left in place - delayed decoupling.


There is a drawback, however. In order to decouple a relatively long rake, the track in front (to the left of) the magnet needs to be long enough to accommodate it. However, if this proves to be a problem, more magnets can be added on the sidings themselves, this allowing decoupling with some, or most, of the train over the points.

Adding Symoba NEM Pockets & Kadee Couplings to Hornby Railroad Class 06

Following on from my experiment to convert the Hornby Railroad Class 06 to DCC, I'd been happily running it around an oval layout at a highly non-prototypical (or is that protoatypical?) speed when I realised that to actually do shunting with my Bachmann and Piko wagons in any kind of meaningful way, it would need further modification.

Since reading Model Rail's NEM coupler test report, I've gone a bit Kadee mad, fitting them to almost everything in sight. Okay, due to limited funds, I do generally just fit them to one example of each wagon, but that's an easy process, and easy to reverse.

Which brings me to the Railroad Class 06, which, unlike my more expensive HO Piko loco, doesn't have NEM pockets. For the uninitiated, NEM pockets are little boxes that hold the coupling, and which make it easy to interchange couplings as you wish.

The Class 06, however, has a Lima style D ring. Luckily, it's in plastic.


Clearly, if I was going to Kadee-ify the Class 06, I'd first have to get rid of the Lima D rings (oh, yes, front and back) and replace them with something capable of taking the Kadees.


(For those wondering, I use Kadee rather than the clever Brian Kirby 'BK' magnetic uncoupling solution on my inglenook-inspired shunting layout because I take advantage of the delayed uncoupling feature. More on that another time.)


It turns out that Symoba made the exact pieces that I needed : a NEM pocket and adapter to hold it. The NEM socket was cheap. The adapter, because of the little springs inside it to handle cornering, and the engineering of the whole thing was not quite so cheap!


At this point, a photo would be useful, but again, I didn't take any, so you'll have to take a look at the official Symoba web site. When I do another hatchet-job on a Railroad, I'll post up the photos. Promise.


Back to the conversion. Take a knife, and remove the D-rings. Prise out the little bobbing arm thingy, and take a deep breath.


At this point, I thought it would be an easy enough job : just cut enough of the chassis away to accommodate the mounting plate for the adapter, and glue it in place, plastic to plastic.


Wrong!


In fact, you have to cut the chassis right back to the metal underside, otherwise you can't get the NEM pocket high enough up the sprung mounting pole to meet the height of the other couplings on the rolling stock. 

I tried every which way, swore, sweated, and then un-glued the mounting plate to give it another go. Cutting back to the metal does the job, on the Class 06, but I can't vouch for other locos. Either way, the sprung pole is long enough that it doesn't really matter how far into the chassis area the adapter is mounted.


And that's it. I got a piece of rail, put a NEM/Kadee-ified wagon on it, and used that to measure the height of the pocket, which slides onto the mounting pole. That's a tight fit, so be sure to only push it up the pole gradually, as going the other way might just tear the mounting plate away from the chassis of the loco.

Now, the running tally of the cost of the Class 06 is as follows:

• Loco : £20
• DCC chip : £11
• NEM pockets : £1
• NEM adapters : £6
• Total : £38

The closest thing to that would be Bachmann's admittedly excellent Class 03 (or Class 08's) which are around £50-54, and would need a DCC chip fitting, for a total of, at most £65. They are better runners, allegedly, but I'll find that out when I get myself one at the Folkestone MRC2011 Exhibition in October.