Most likely. Takes a firm set to the jawline, enough to discourage one D ten T’s.
I suppose if your track is low, might be an issue.
Mine isn’t!
“I remember one person who came and ran, we all watched in awe as he lifted each car to uncouple…because he was used to Kadees…”
That was, what, 14 years ago? Glad to see you’re still getting mileage out of that. Besides, it works! 
On my dad’s railroad (100% Kadee) operators either use the “lift and separate” method, or the uncoupling rods dad made from 3’ long garden stakes with a brass blade attached to the end. (Essentially a 3’ long flat-headed screwdriver.) It does take a bit of coordination to insert the blade from standing above it, but it is–admittedly–a bit more elegant than lifting the cars.
On my railroad, I’m about 50/50 Kadee/Accucraft 1:32. As much as I like the prototypical looks and operation of the Accucraft couplers, they’re sprung such that it takes a bit of a collision sometimes to get the pins to drop. Given I’ve spent a great deal of time fine-tuning my locos to just c-r-a-w-l through the yard if so desired, I find myself preferring the Kadees for slow-speed coupling. Nothing more fun than just creeping up on a car, and got it. As for uncoupling, the Accucraft couplers are controlled by prototypical lift bars. That works to separate the Accucraft from Accucraft, and Accucraft from Kadee. Kadee/Kadee still requires the “lift and separate” method. I used to carry a screwdriver around with me, but I got tired of forgetting where I put it. One big drawback of the cutlevers–groundcover. If you’ve got it near the track, it will reach out and uncouple your train as it passes.
Getting back to Bart’s question about the operating schematic, the timing is quite good, as I’ve just been revisiting it after my trip back east to operate on my dad’s railroad. (See thread under "Operations.) While there, he and I got talking about industries and reasons for cars to move from point to point. The upshot is that I came home and am now in the process of adding two additional spurs to my railroad to support two additional industries. I’ll have more on my blog about that once I get some photos taken.
The matrix I built is based on two three things; all the cars I have available to operate on the railroad, the locations to be serviced and how often a car would be left there, and the capacities of the various sidings. An older version of the matrix can be seen here:
http://1stclass.mylargescale.com/eastbroadtop/TRRConstruction/TRRfreightmovement.htm
I’ve augmented this matrix with a variation of the colored tab on car system my dad uses to keep track of which cars go where. I found having to carry a clipboard or switch list around with me all the time to be incredibly tedious, so I made little flags that hang off of the brakewheel of each car that tell me where each car goes. I begin each session by setting the cars out where they were at the end of the previous session (indicated by the flags still hanging from the brake wheel. Once placed where they need to go, I pull the flags off of each car and consult “the matrix.” New flags are hung on each car according to the next “day” on the matrix. (i.e, if I had just finished Tuesday’s moves last ops session, I’d move to Wednesday.) At that point, I can put down the switch list, and just operate with the cars on the train. Each town has its own color, and each location has its own letter. (i.e, a red flag with “F” on it would go to the freight depot at Blacklog.) Not every car moves every time, and some sidings don’t see a car for a few rotations. With 7 “cycles,” it keeps things interesting. Once all the cars are spotted, I pull the flags and repeat the process if time permits. It takes me between 1.5 and 2 hours to switch my railroad.
My railroad is set up for a single operator. Trains originate on one end, move to the other, then return. I don’t have passing sidings where two trains can pass headed opposite directions. All of my sidings have freight depots on them where cars would be spotted.
Between all of my sidings, I have a total siding capacity of 25 cars, spread through 13 possible destinations. Certain industries (like my coal delivery trestles) can only handle 1 car at a time. Others, like my Blacklog Interchange track (where cars to and from the EBT are spotted) can hold up to 3. I usually operate with 14 cars (the number of cars that fit in my outside storage shed), though the matrix is set up for 19 cars total, which is the most I can fit without exceeding a siding’s capacity at some point. I bring out the extra cars when I’m looking for a particular challenge, as the extra cars tend to throw enough of a wrench into the works where I have to do some kind of unusual move to get things where they need to go.
Later,
K
The “fun” I’ve been having recently is switching with either my Climax or 45-ton center cab diesel. Both of those locos have QSI Titan decoders installed, which allow for prototypical brake control. To stop the locomotive, I set the throttle to zero, but must use a function key to actually slow the locomotive. Just like the prototype, the longer I apply the function key, the more brake is applied and the faster the locomotive stops.
The downside is that I’m doing this with Airwire throttles, that don’t have a “stop NOW” feature that works with the QSI decoders. So–yeah–the engineer has had to explain more than a few mangled shipments. It’s a learning curve to be sure… (On the other hand, I’ve no trouble getting the Accucraft pins to drop with some of those “hard” couplings.)
Later,
K
I’ll look into being able to have an emergency stop function mapped to a function key Kevin.
Also, new firmware will allow you to use the brake w/o shutting the throttle off completely, but it will work like a real train, i.e. like you have it set, with throttle open.
Greg
Kevin, not having an “Oh, sh!t,” button is truly prototypical, isn’t it? If you are operating by yourself, you shouldn’t have to worry about running into another locomotive, should you?
Kevin Strong said:
“I remember one person who came and ran, we all watched in awe as he lifted each car to uncouple…because he was used to Kadees…”
That was, what, 14 years ago? Glad to see you’re still getting mileage out of that. Besides, it works!
Later,
K
We have gotten unbelievable mileage out of that.
We’ve hired students at the actor’s guild to come out for filming.
We’ve done it on blue background, edited in the Titanic in the background.
Once we did it with two old steam engines crashing head-on in the background.
Did a sepia-tone version one, several in regular black and white.
We’re preparing to do one now depicting a brake app failure.
Sort of a cross between Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin is the vision we have for the actor to play the part…
You didn’t know?
TOC
Steve Featherkile said:
Kevin, not having an “Oh, sh!t,” button is truly prototypical, isn’t it? If you are operating by yourself, you shouldn’t have to worry about running into another locomotive, should you?
Sort of reminds me of an old song. “And nobody would play with Puff, so Puff played…”
I certainly hope this new app and braking can measure load and calculate with frequent updates for the operating window of the “train”.
I know, first hand, what happens in a light engine when you big hole it.
Watched it.
Everybody in the cab is face planted against the end windows.
Of course, you could ignore that, and let a light engine take the requisite 100X the length of the train to stop…
For Craig…West Seattle Freeway, old low level, tracks crossing to Harbor Island, 35-ish years ago…NW or SW, cab first, northbound…
Curmudgeon mcneely said:
I know, first hand, what happens in a light engine when you big hole it.
Watched it.
Everybody in the cab is face planted against the end windows.Of course, you could ignore that, and let a light engine take the requisite 100X the length of the train to stop…
For Craig…West Seattle Freeway, old low level, tracks crossing to Harbor Island, 35-ish years ago…NW or SW, cab first, northbound…
Yep 
Or when your conductor has been complaining all day about the work and he hops on to ride the tail end of a cut… Oops I forgot you were riding…
Close call. Family all in out 1968 429 T-bird, stopped at the flashing lights, everybody watching the NW/SW with a cab full of crew starting across the highway…I happened to look in the rear view mirror, and all I saw was 60MPH of dumptruck coming…I yelled to hang on, nailed the gas and lit 'em up as the headlights in the mirror went vertical…NW/SW big holed…I watched out the side windows as the tyres were attempting to hook up…the entire crew was faceplanted against the windows at this end of the cab…dumptruck went between me and the locomotive at 60…lowboy with a dozer on the back just missed the tail end of the Bird as it fishtailed by…I realized as it passed the dumptruck was up on the left wheels as he corrected around me…and off he went, fishtailing down the road. How it failed to flip is one of those cosmic things.
About this time, the tyres hooked up, and I went off after him. Pulled into the ferry line two cars behind him, got out, walked up to the cab, climbed up on the fuel tank step, and looked at him.
There were three guys in the cab, all white as a sheet, still hanging on with both hands.
He looked at me and asked…“how long were those lights flashing?”
I just climbed down and went back to the car.
I don’t know if the crew in the loco ever got their faces put back right or not…
