Prototypical type shunters pole for G3

unklian

Western Thunderer
I have been meaning to do this for a while. After fiddling with various tools and bits of bent wire, trying to couple up G3 three link couplings. You would have thought it would be easy at such a big scale .
So using this example from the museum at Wallingford, I made a proper coupling pole with a 'pigtail' hook. It's a fair bit over length because I don't have 1:22 scale hands, but the hook is only a bit oversize. I didn't make the hook quite as sharp as the prototype for obvious reasons too. Trails so far are promising although it only seems to work well from the side, as per prototype, this might prove awkward in some model situations. The knack is in twisting the pole to engage and disengage the hook from the end loop of the coupling chain. The hook is piano wire for strength, the ferrule is brass and the pole is a bamboo food skewer. And yes I did realise ( eventually ) that I made the other hook opposite handed dooh .....RIMG0194.JPG

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Yorkshire Dave

Western Thunderer
In 7mm scale the last link of the coupler on my vehicles is made from iron wire and I use a length of magnetised steel wire with sort of hook on the end. I just pick up the link and place it over the wagon hook - never actually used the hook on the wire though.
 

Spitfire2865

Western Thunderer
It appears you have missed the "barb" which keeps the link from sliding too far down the pole.w
You can just barely see it in the photo you posted.
I do like how you used a wooden stick and made it look the part.
Though the rest of my shunting pole looks far less accurate than yours, the other end of mine is bent to help close bottom drop doors. I didnt fancy making a ferrule like you have.
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Stoke5D

Western Thunderer
Having tried the real thing from time to time over the years, you are right to note that it's meant to be used from the side. That's important with the deft twist to release the link as it goes over the draw hook. It's also meant to be used from under the buffers, which I always found the hardest part, until I grew some suitable muscles. On a model we would approach the coupling from above of course.

I think these practical limitations are why model shunter's poles aren't exact replicas of the originals at the business end. There's quite a lot of info. on various Scale Four/P4 forums on what is best in (model) practice for this, that's probably also mostly relevant for G3.


Andrew
 

unklian

Western Thunderer
Thanks for all the hints and tips chaps. My idea was to see if a prototypical shape hook would be any good at all. I will have to add 'the barb' to the mkII, thank you Spitfire . I am afraid the magnet idea is probably out, for two reasons. First it would need fairly large magnet to lift G3 links, and second a lot of my couplings have non ferrous links, particularly the working screw couplings . I take the point about the 'angle of attack' not being the same as the real thing too. I will have to look into P4 coupling methods.
 
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