I have been getting so many questions about other couplers; I am thinking this needs to be addressed. Many people just assume that just because we make couplers, we made all the OEM couplers ever produced. Not true, we only make Kadee® Magne-Matic® Knuckle Couplers. We have not made, and do not make, hook & loop, horn hook (X2f), or any other proprietary coupler that you may have on old locomotives or rolling stock, whether it is HO, O, or Large Scale. If you are looking for old non-Kadee couplers, contact the manufacturer of the loco or car. If the manufacturer no longer exists, you are limited to the used parts market if you insist on keeping the original couplers; otherwise, you will need to upgrade to Kadee® Magne-Matic® knuckle couplers.

Also please don’t confuse the Chinese knockoff knuckle couplers with Kadee® Magne-Matic® knuckle couplers. There are many ways to tell if your equipment has a Chinese knockoff knuckle coupler. If you are having uncoupling problems, you have Chinese knockoff knuckle couplers on your equipment. Most Chinese knockoff knuckle couplers have slick plastic knuckles that deform and stretch with minimal car load and slip apart, causing uncoupling. Most Chinese knuckle couplers have plastic centering systems that fatigue and fail shortly after starting to use it, preventing the couplers from re-centering. The plastic centering springs can fail within hours if the train is stopped on a curve. Chinese knuckle couplers only function on the most basic toy-like level, opening and closing the knuckle over an uncoupling magnet.

Kadee® Magne-Matic® knuckle couplers feature truly hands-free operation that allows for coupling, uncoupling, delayed uncoupling and “spotting” cars on your layout. Kadee® couplers’ design features high quality and durable materials that are what make Kadee® couplers the industry standard.

Kadee® Magne-Matic® knuckle couplers mount and operate at NMRA standard coupler height, NOT proprietary large-scale manufacturers’ coupler height. Kadee® couplers must be mounted using a Kadee® coupler height gauge for the scale being modeled to ensure correct operation.

There are a couple of easy solutions for making multiple brands of large-scale equipment operate together. There is a budget solution, which we call a transition car. Were you converting one end of the brand “A” car to Kadee® couplers (using the coupler conversion guide on our website), but leaving the proprietary coupler on the other end, then do the same thing for brand “B”, “C” & “D”, and so on. Then the two Kadee® couplers work together, and you can run all of the brand “A” cars together, all the brand B cars together, and so on. This method doesn’t allow much custom arranging cars, but it does allow brands to run together.

Of course, the best option is to replace all couplers with Kadee® Magne-Matic® knuckle couplers. This way, you can arrange the cars in any configuration you want for a fully custom layout. You also get the hands-free operational benefits of replacing your couplers with Kadee® Magne-Matic® knuckle couplers.

Coupler Conversions can be found at www.kadee.com/convpl

Flyers & handouts can be found at www.kadee.com/flyers