The new unistrut thread

[kenrinc]

Spent the weekend outfitting my trailer with unitstrut/superstrut. I'm using the strut as track and it's bolted through the floor to the frame of the trailer. Now what I need is some ideas for locking everything down. I need to lock my locomotive down as well as a boxcar and gondola. I've seen some obvious ones like the toggle clamps that Greg Lewis showed although those only seemed to work with flatcars. I'm thinking something that locks the axles down. Any tips would be appreciated.

Ken-

[chooch]

From your pictures, I also use the Wider edged Unistrut bolted through my trailer floor but in the "upright", like on the Non hole sides. The Unistrut only goes in the Center Line of any equipment. Made steel hooks a few inches long to go in the holes, the other hook end threaded. The thread ends are meant to go through a short piece of chain link attached to my safety hook(s).
I then put a washer and nut on the hook and crank it tight to pull against the ends of any equipment.

NOTE. That is a lot of work fitting the hook to this and that and wrenching everything together tight. And many times the hook and chain get so it`s at a tough angle to work on. That`s for one way for info of what I have and how it works. I`m Not Real Happy.

Now I am thinking of still using the hooks But, making some kind upper attachment that will fit / Clamp over the Coupler shank. I think that would be more direct and simple. Oh, and right now I have No track on the floor for equipment to sit on. That has been OK but, I think I will just add some "wheel " guides as the floor is wood and I have had some things jump OFF the rails with just the small flange we have.

Hope this helps a bit.
chooch

[Chris Hollands]

you have the unistrut in place ,so why not get the spring nuts that suit your unstrut profile and make large angle plates that push up against the ends of what ever your carrying then bolt them down ,make the angle plates to suit your couplers or what ever you want ,simple and quick to put in place .
You may have to secure your unstrut to the floor a bit more to take the forces.

Look up unistrut online they have some pretty neat stuff that may suit or adapt.

[FLSTEAM]

I have used unistrut for years and like it. Here are a couple of pictures inside my trailer. You can see I have used strut to build the complete second deck with stock strut fixtures i.e. 90's. 45's and spring nuts.

The floor of the trailer is fitted with 1/2 x 1" flat bar for rail and "E" track for hold down. You can see I can throw a clamp anywhere I need one. Slick..........

John B.

[kenrinc]

Thanks. The whole reason for moving to the unistrut was to not have to strap it down with the holding straps. I'd like to go with something a bit more robust if possible. My equipment is such that it was difficult to tie stuff down without ruining the finish on the cars, straps digging into the car body and also compressing the truck springs and engine chassis spring rigging. John: what prevents the cars from moving fore and aft?

I'm experimenting now with some 1.5" tubing that hold the car via the coupler pockets but don't particularly like that idea since I have to remove the couplers (PITA).

Ken-

[FLSTEAM]

I'm experimenting now with some 1.5" tubing that hold the car via the coupler pockets but don't particularly like that idea since I have to remove the couplers (PITA).

Equipment on the floor is connected to front bumper stops bolted to the floor. The engine connects with a draw bar and pin thru the coupler pocket. The Caboose bumper has a working coupler that couples to the caboose. Straps with the problems you indicated are used to hold down the equipment. The upper rack has wheel chocks in front and "J" bolts are used to hold down the car on one axle at each end. Those J bolts can be seen laying on the caboose in the second picture. I will get a picture of the front of the trailer.

John B

[chooch]

Kenrinc says it well, the problems with strap, paint damage and spring compression.
To my previous post using threaded hooks, chain and Unistrut being a PITA yes but, I`ll add that I attached hook and chain at an "Angle" on each car end that would be PULLING against the car. Now, this was Tight but a Rocking motion would still be there and if you had a Narrow rack(s) you might still get damage.
With a wood floor, why I suggest wheel "guides" rather than rails is I have had a couple little side way movement especially on an Upper level rack. Guides could be a simple wood strip or angle iron 1/2 to 3/4 high put against the wheel. I would do this depending on the type of equipment--cars or locomotive gears, side rods and ??
IF I worried about Flange floor gouges, marks etc., then maybe strips of commercial (1/8t thick)x 1 foot square floor tiles you see in most all type buildings.

Jay hooks. I mentioned elsewhere but repeat. A "Jay" hook on just one truck axle could / might cause the other axle to Lift due to Spring compression and cause the truck to swivel some and foul up a good tie down, maybe some serious damage
I had no damage but noticed later a car did get come off an upper rail and get out of line with ONE Jay hook on the truck.
On my upper level racks I have a part wood floor with a HAT section / Jay hook tie down arrangement if interested for as a post.
chooch

AHA!!! I noticed your Jay hook John B.





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[Harlock]

OK, I finally got my pictures together of my unistrut hold down system.

After spending years looking at what everyone else had, I figured out what I didn't like and set out to eliminate all of the annoying elements:

1. No touching car bodies - most of mine are made out of wood. No rubbing, scratching or taking off of paint.

2. No removing of couplers - it's annoying and takes too long, so that means no brackets that insert into the coupler pocket / frame beam.

3. No straps! Straps are OK for one car. When you have a bunch to load it annoys you and everyone else while you fiddle with them.

4. It needs to be fast. No major operations. Get it done and get out of the way for the next guy in line to use the lift.

5. It needs to hold the trucks securely so they do not bounce when the trailer does.

6. The brackets need to be easy to fabricate because there are a lot of them, and the materials need to be reasonable.

The answer are brackets that gently but very firmly cup down on the outer axle on each truck. The car spring rigging is allowed to spring naturally.

A cordless drill with a 9/16 socket set to a reasonable torque clutch (I use position 12 on an 18V Ryobi) attaches the clamp to the sprung unistrut nuts in seconds. The bolts are just the right length.

The brackets must be pre-loaded so they are not flat on the unistrut when resting on the axle, so that the downforce will go to the axle. I'll get into some detail in a following post.

[Harlock]

Another style is for cars or locomotives with link and pin pockets.

The only strap I use for any of my equipment is for this locomotive because it has a high center of gravity. The strap braces the stack for side to side tipping motion. The brackets hold it back and forth and lightly in compression. With the chloe, it just had two similar brackets with light compression and it was perfect.

Note that this bracket is just sitting on my engine stand - I don't have any pictures of it in place in my truck.

[Harlock]

Now for some fabrication info.

Fabrication:

The radiused part is a steel water pipe nipple cut in half lengthwise. Very easy on a suitable metal bandsaw. If you look for black iron pipe nipples at the hardware store, they are actually steel these days. Find one with an ID that matches your axle or a little bigger if you have a funny axle diameter. You don't want to use galvanized pipe because you have to grind off the coating before welding, otherwise toxic fumes will result!

Pre-loading: important!

The brackets must be pre-loaded so that they don't rest flat on the track when they are cupping the axles. You won't get a firm grip and as the wheel wears you'll lose a little height. The way I set this up was to place shims underneath the bracket while I had it clamped in place for welding. You can see the shim strips in the photos here.

First step is to weld all the half rounds on to the reach bar. If you have enough clamps, set it up so you can do a bunch all at once.

At first I cut a matching radius in the reach bars to match the half round, but that was a pain in the ass. Instead I used the bandsaw to simply cut a notch and then fill it in with weld material.

Next the main bottom piece for the bracket is attached to a small piece of unistrut track, drill the holes for the bolts first. Always make the holes a little larger than spec for the drill size, because you will need the wiggle room when they are in use. Try to make your track gauge as consistent as possible, but it will always vary and things won't always be perfectly parallel.

Then the rest of the pieces are clamped on top and welded in place with a truck to provide the proper height setting. This is where you use the shims to lift it up a bit, you can see the shim strips between the bottom and the uni on the inside end of the bottom piece.

I have two different radii for two different truck types on my equipment. (the older Steve Easlon trucks had larger axles) and different length reach bars - the solid deck cars have a longer reach than the log cars so that you can access the bolts with a drill. The part that clamps to the track should not be underneath the car body, should be under the coupler basically.

hopefully all of this will provide some inspiration. It is working out well so far for me. The cars are very firmly held, even with the sometimes long reach they do not move. The weight of the car keeps the other end of the truck from bouncing. When both ends of the car are bracketed in, it's like it's attached to the trailer.

In all of these pictures you're looking at 2 1/2" scale trucks. For 1 1/2" scale everything can be a lot smaller. My bottom piece is a 3 X 1 1/2" square tube, and the top stuff is 2 X 1 I think.

[kenrinc]

Thanks for all the replies. John, appreciate the helpful followup on your setup. This was similar to what I had done. I had a system where I had cut wood blocks that fit exactly between the rails and the bottom frame of my Loco. I would then strap both ends and had a system where I used a piece of 1.25" sq tubing slid through the upper frame of the loco and used some all thread to bolt it to threaded inserts in the plywood "carrier" I was using.

Mike, I was doodling this afternoon on a scrap piece of paper and came damn close to what you came up with! I was on the same wavelength . Neat idea. It is of course absolutely imperative that the trucks are attached to the equipment or the bodies could lift up off the trucks. My boxcar trucks are clevis pinned but the gondola is carriage bolts because I used to transport it without the trucks since it's a made of wood. Easy fix though and with this system would be well worth doing.

I'm assuming 1.25" x 2" tubing, maybe 1/8" wall? Looks like a hacksaw blade for a shim. Might be something to do this weekend....

Ken-

[Harlock]

Mike, I was doodling this afternoon on a scrap piece of paper and came damn close to what you came up with! I was on the same wavelength . Neat idea. It is of course absolutely imperative that the trucks are attached to the equipment or the bodies could lift up off the trucks.

Absolutely yes, if you hit a big enough bump the truck pin could leave the hole and not come back down on it. All my stuff is "R" clipped in / clevis pinned. Fortunately with a 2-axle trailer that's a very rare situation.

I'm assuming 1.25" x 2" tubing, maybe 1/8" wall? Looks like a hacksaw blade for a shim. Might be something to do this weekend....

Ken-

The tubing pictured is all 1/8" wall, the large stuff is 3" X 1 1/2", smaller tube (reach arm) is 1X2. If you have 1 1/2" scale equipment, you could use all 1 X 2. Also figure out how the heights will add up so you don't have to cut anything special for height, just trim to length and stack.

Your biggest design hurdle will be making sure you clear coupler pockets, low hanging couplers etc. They need to be low profile, just high enough to reach the trucks. Make sure you can get them in and out easily.

On one car that was built before this whole system was devised, I had to make a special low profile bracket with a less than half round radius on the axle clamp so that it would make it up and over the axle without the reach bar hitting the bottom of a dual coupler pocket (a 1 1/2" pocket mounted below the 2 1/2" pocket)

The shims were machinist shim strips in my case, but a bandsaw blade would work fine, yes. I think I built it up to .03 or so. It could be a little more without harm.

The odd size rectangle tubing all came from Patton's steel. They are all over SoCal. hopefully you have a horizontal saw or access to one, you'll make quick work out of it.

-M