# Aristo Heavyweight Passenger Car & Body Mount Kadee 907s



## Ted Doskaris (Oct 7, 2008)

Replacing Aristo Truck Mount couplers with Kadee 907 Centersets

The Aristo-Craft Heavyweight passenger car is factory equipped with truck mount Aristo knuckle couplers. Shown below are example cars having different factory coupler projections. The more the projection the farther distance the cars are from one another when coupled together. 










The factory couplers are done away with - being replaced with body mounted Kadee centerset type couplers. 
Described and illustrated here, body mount Kadee 907 centerset coupler assemblies are installed on an Aristo-Craft Heavyweight car (older Kadee 789 could be used, too). 
The mounting location is chosen so cars can operate down to an 8 foot diameter track circle whilst, also, being compatible for "mix and match" operation when coupled to Aristo Streamliner, Smoothside, and USA Trains passenger cars - providing those cars had been equipped with body mounted Kadee centerset coupler assemblies as described in their respective "vignettes".

See "vignettes" hosted for me by Greg E on his Web site: 
*Aristo Streamliner*
*Aristo Smoothside* (Appendix B of Aristo Streamliner vingette)
*USA Trains Passenger Car*


Shown below are cars having been equipped with body mounted Kadee 907 center set couplers with chosen coupler mounting location so as to be compatible when operated on 8 foot diameter track.










As shown above, note the distance spacing between coupled cars that resulted from the coupler box mounting location that was established so cars would not bind on 8 foot diameter track yet be as close as possible.

The illustration below shows how an installed coupler can freely move side to side with sufficient diaphragm clearance provided. 










A spacer plate is required for mounting couplers in order to attain proper coupler alignment with the Kadee 980 gauge.

Shown below is where two holes are to be drilled and tapped into the car floor for mounting the spacer plate. The truck coupler tang must be cut back as shown, too, so when the truck swivels, it won't hit the mounted Kadee coupler box.









Note that the example car is equipped with 3 axle trucks.
After holes are drilled, a # 2-56 tap is used for the long length 2-56 screws needed to mount the box with spacer:

Both older Kadee 789 and newer Kadee 907 assemblies will work, however, I chose to use the newer Kadee 907 coupler assembly as shown below. I found that coupler holding retention to be better with the Kadee 907 when operating a long heavy train on my layout with its grades and curves.










Illustrated below is the mounting of a Kadee 907 assembly.










Video:
SP 9 Car Daylight Train with mix & match cars on outdoor Layout





For more detail, including a spacer plate dimensional drawing, see vignette, "*Aristo Heavyweight Passenger Car & Body Mount Kadee 907s*", hosted for me my Greg E. on his Web site.

-Ted


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## Dick413 (Jan 7, 2008)

Thanks for posting Ted when you post here i can print a copy and go down cellar to work on it. on Greg's site it says he has a copyright
thanks


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

If anyone needs a copy of one of my web pages, I can pdf and send it. I'm mainly protecting the 650 pages on my web site from people copying the pictures and using them commercially.

There's another point, I'm constantly updating and improving the information on my site, and I've had more than one instance of telling people to check a particular page and them saying the info was not there only to find they copied the web page 5 years ago, and did not have the latest.

Greg


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## Scottychaos (Jan 2, 2008)

Excellent write-up Ted! thanks! 
im going to body-mount Kadees on my Aristo heavyweights too, your post will be very useful.

Scot


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## Ted Doskaris (Oct 7, 2008)

Thank you Dick & Scot,

It's gratifying to have the feed back and know folks can use the info. and to make my efforts worthwhile.

Much appreciated,
-Ted


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## bdp3wsy (Mar 14, 2008)

Ted, great write up and I also will be using this as a great guide one question though on the cars with 2 axel trucks is there any difference to the process? Thanks Jake


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## Ted Doskaris (Oct 7, 2008)

bdp3wsy said:


> Ted, great write up and I also will be using this as a great guide one question though on the cars with 2 axel trucks is there any difference to the process? Thanks Jake


Jake,

The 2 axle truck is somewhat shorter in length than the 3 axle truck, so the only difference I can see is the amount of coupler tang that would need to be cut off would be less - or maybe none. You can determine this after mounting the Kadee box and see if the tang would hit it when pivoting the truck.

EDIT:
I just compared a Heavyweight 2 axle truck to the 3 axle truck.
I looks like the same amount of tang trimming has to be done. Even though the truck is shorter, when mounted to body, the location of the front of the truck that faces Kadee box is virtually in the same spot as the front of the 3 axle truck. So "the process" is the same.

-Ted


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