That's one solution for sure. I bet the hobby shop had a sale on plastic couplers to encourage this behaviour! :)

After a runaway due to a dip in the track caused uncoupling and a runaway down the 3% grade into my staging yard, I installed LOTS of foam at the base of the grade.  I also put up stiff cardboard along the sides of the grade to keep everything on the roadbed and off the floor.  The foam should theoretically cushion the blow if anything comes off the track. 

And I did fix the dip in the trackage shortly after the runaway.  No trouble since (so far at least). 

Marc Simpson

I don't have a problem with runaway the pusher engine stops that from happening I have everything set up right weight,wheels,track,curves I'm just having trouble with couplers and by the way the coal cars I use are Bachmann silver series they came new with plastic couplers I bought six new ez mate couplers for my engines

Hi all,

Troy should be able to avoid the downgrade pile up with his one bank locomotive on the rear of his trains heading upgrade. The advice on metal knuckles is good and has been verified by multiple posters here. 

Even the real railways have trouble on grades, and when things come unstuck with couplers they can do most spectacularly Here's a quote from an NTSB report from the past for a coupler parting incident near Nacco Wyoming in 1996, 

About 2:00 a.m., on January 31, 1996, a Union Pacific Railroad unit coal train CNAIM004-30 separated between the fourth and fifth locomotive units while the train was ascending a 1-percent grade. The train’s automatic air brake system did not hold the train in place and the fifth locomotive unit and all 114 cars began an uncontrolled downhill movement. A helper locomotive en route to assist the unit train was warned of the runaway train by radio, and the crew abandoned their train.

About 2:05 a.m. the runaway train struck the helper locomotive and pushed it about 1 mile to the east switch at Nacco, Wyoming, where a general derailment of the two helper locomotive units and 66 loaded coal cars occurred. Propane gas tanks used in switch heating service were punctured during the derailment. No fire resulted. No injuries were reported on either train. Damages totaled $8,199,246. The temperature at the time of the accident was -35 ° F and dropping.

The full report can be read at http://www.ntsb.gov/investigations/AccidentReports/Reports/RAB9806.pdf 

Our model trains do not have air brakes to hold them on a grade should something let go. The couplers in this incident were loaded up to beyond 90% of their design strength before the wheel-slip on the last loco that caused them to let go. I don't know what the maximum design load is on metal Kadee's, but I'll bet a few people on here are pushing it, so a banker on the back end makes good insurance. 

"We'd certainly like to know who starts these rumors. We have no intentions
of discontinuing the #5 coupler or the phosphor bronze centering spring.
Although the tooling for the spring is wearing out, the introduction of our
whisker couplers has reduced the amount of springs we have to produce which
adds some longevity to the tooling.

Sam Clarke
Kadee Quality Products"

Well, Sam Clarke I read that on a site selling your couplers nearly a year ago. It also mentioned the fact that your tooling is wearing out for the bronze spring. I thought it was the kadee site, but I must have been incorrect if you are planning to update the tooling that is wearing out. If it does become worn out and no replacement is planned I do not see how adding longevity to the tooling will insure their continued production in anything but the short term. 

Sorry for the misunderstanding. Since I have used both of them for some time I really like the whisker couplers as the shanks seem a bit thicker and have less vertical play in them in some of the installations I have done. I have also bought some used equipment that has the bronze springs that do not center the couplers any longer, no telling how old they are or if it is the result of damage other than normal wear.

If they stop making either I will use which ever one they do make. As far as I am concerned the only word needed for couplers is kadee.

"We were having a discussion the other day about this type of event and solutions were everything from air jets to slow the cars to a run-away track that switches the cut into a big tub filled with soft insulation."

Probably the most  reliable and efficient solution would be to design the layout so everything is within reach of the operators as they follow their trains around the layout........DaveB  

Can't imagine a valid reason for replacing an installed 5 with a 148, unless it's a problematic installation. Seems like an unneeded effort. There are a few brands of engines and cars out there with coupler boxes that are too big or too small, but those are special cases.  If I do need to make a shim, sheet styrene can be hole-punched and trimmed to fit -- the shim should go the full length and width of the box.

..............you should name your next cat Entropy Bubble as that seems to mean nearly the same thing.  Funny how cats and trains don't play well together.  My cat passed on prior to me getting into sound.  The dog, another story.  He would bark at the locomotives running on my work bench and actually jumped up and knocked it off the rollers once.  Had to move everything away from the edge.  I now have a layout with some track done and he's reaching 12 and doesn't hear too well anymore so I can run them w/o listening to him barking.  Layout is too high for him to reach.

Thread drift, anyone..............sorry.

Peter

I don't have kadees on now my cars all have Ez mate couplers that's what the cars came with new ( Bachmann silver series coal cars)the #148 would be easier to install.

 another club, not mine, and not me.  Now if a particular #5 fails for whatever reason, then sure, it would get replaced with a #148.  And I am only buying #148s now.  A series of cars came with Bachmann EZ mate couplers.  I replaced all 40 cars with #148s.  (I used the ez mates with the MBA, as the boys will never run very many cars together.)

Well, we have quite a few years left in this cat (He is only 7).  Our Cocker Spanial is 3.  We lost our previous cockers at 11.5 and 7 to a nasty immune disorder - 7 years apart).  Our previous cat made it to 12 and liver failure.