Adapting True-Scale couplers to 1015 boxes?

[Missaberoad]

Over the past couple months Ive been experimenting with MT True-scale couplers, and have reached the point where I am happy enough with their performance to convert my fleet.

[ Guests cannot view attachments ]

I've hit a stumbling block when it comes to converting cars with integral coupler boxes. I could remove the existing box and use either Micro-trains or Jason's coupler boxes, but would prefer to use the existing box if at all possible.

My question is does anyone have any ideas or a method they would be willing to share for retrofitting a TSC into a 1015 style box? If the method is relatively non destructive and allows the cars to be converted back to "stock" all the better.

Thanks in advance for any help or ideas...

[C855B]

Not of immediate help for your needs, but a conversion is on my short list for the Photon. As Jason will attest, it is a little tricky because of the double-purpose spring action - centering and coupler closure - of the spring whiskers. I'm prioritizing it due to the number of covered hoppers in my fleet that don't have easy solutions. Concern is also how "universal" it might or might not be.

Then there's the elephant in the room: if a conversion was easy to design, MTL would have already done it.

[garethashenden]

I’ve been working on this problem with my Photon. Here’s the current solution, it need more refinement and there are some situations where the end needs to be different that I haven’t gotten to yet. In principle this slides onto the post inside a 1015 and provides its own post for a TSC with the whiskers cut off. I think I designed it to use short shank couplers, but I can’t remember. I haven’t spent much time on it recently.

[Missaberoad]

Thanks for the replies, looks like I'm going to have to do a bit more digging and put my thinking cap on to find a solution...

@garethashenden nice adaptor, that is definitely a clean solution, do you find coupling is affected with the whiskers gone?
I've been able to get the long extension couplers to couple at realistic speeds and maintaing that feature is important.
I still need to try Jason's pockets (sitting in bubble wrap still) so I haven't experimented with removing them...

Mike I agree that if it were simple it would have been done! Interested to hear of your progress when you get to that point.

😊 Hopefully a conversion is among the ideas @Shipsure would like to put into production if/when the line is expanded...