Triang Converter Wagon

 Meanwhile, back on the model railway - a recent acquisition: a Triang-Hornby converter wagon.

These were introduced when Lines Brothers, owners of Triang Railways, bought out Meccano and its Hornby Dublo system, (thereby creating Triang-Hornby), in order to allow the rolling stock of both systems to be run together, despite their incompatible couplings.  In the above photo, the green CCT on the left, fitted with Triang couplings, is coupled to the Triang coupler end of the converter wagon, while the cattle wagon on the left, fitted with Dublo couplings (despite, perversely, being a Triang-Hornby wagon), is coupled to the Dublo coupler end.

A view of the converter wagon from above shows its coupling arrangement more clearly:

 

Anyway, I purchased the converter wagon so as to allow the locos I have with Dublo anf Trix couplings, (Trix used a version of the Dublo coupling, slightly smaller and more compact), to haul the majority of my goods stock, which have the Triang style of couplings.  It is much easier than changing the couplings on the locos, which are riveted on and would have to be drilled out.  I already have several rakes of Trix coaches, some with Triang, others with Trix couplers at one end, so now my Trix and Dublo locos can operate both goods and passenger traffic.  

Here's a brief (and not very good) video of my Trix Standard Class 5 hauling a freight train consisting of wagons with both types of coupling.  The first wagon has Trix couplings, the second has Dublo couplings, with the converter wagon running third to connect to the rest of the stock, which all have Triang couplings.  (As ever, as soon as the video started recording, everything went wrong, with derailments and stallings galore, so the video had to be pieced together from multiple takes). 

I'm now looking at creating a couple more converter wagons from some cheap old Trix wagons I've picked up the local toy and train fair.  One has been fitted with very wonky Triang couplings, one of which will be replaced with a spare Trix coupling I have, while the other wagon is missing a coupler at one end, so will receive the Triang coupler removed from the first one.

Today's tribulations while filming the video have convinced me that when I finally expand the layout, I'm going to have to rip up and re-lay the existing trackwork on the parts that I'd hoped I could retain.  There's always something, isn't there?