Transport Canada, if what has been stated about their disallowing automatic couplers is true, is generations out of step with the US FRA. The lame excuse of "doing what the US does" is untrue. In fact it's ridiculous:
[
WABCO N-Type[edit]
WABCO Model N-2 on a SEPTA
Silverliner II
The WABCO N-Type coupler was first developed for the prototype
Pittsburgh Skybus system with the initial model N-1 as applied only to the three Skybus cars. The updated model N-2 with a larger 4-inch (102 mm) gathering range was first applied to the new "Airporter" rapid transit cars on the
Cleveland Rapid Transit line. The model N-2 used lightweight draft gear slung below the center sill, to allow for the wide swings required to go around sharp curves. This made the N-2 unsuitable for main line railroad use so an updated version N-2-A was developed for that market. The first of these were fitted in 1968 to the
UAC TurboTrain with 228 electrical contacts and the
Budd Metropolitan EMUwith 138 contacts. Starting in the 1970s the N-2-A was fitted to the entire
SEPTA Silverliner family of MU's, the
NJT Arrow series of MU's and the
Metro-North/
LIRR M series of MU railcars. The N-2 was also used by the
PATCO Speedline, but was replaced due to issues with the electrical contacts. Later WABCO would create a new model N-3 for the
BART system with a 6-by-4-inch (152 mm × 102 mm) gathering range which required a rectangular funnel.
The WABCO N-type is sometimes referred to as the
pin and cup coupler or
spear coupler.]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Railway_coupling
Here's a forum post on exactly this coupler, written six years ago, but illustrating how far back modern automatic couplers for US heavy rail go :
[...][Joe, you're right on all points (except at WABCO, when these things were first developed, we called 'em "horse-cocks"!). Generically, they are WABCO N-type couplers. The N-type was first designed for the Westinghouse Electric Corporation (no connection to WABCO since 1910) "Skybus", the predecessor to the airport transits serving in Atlanta, Orlando, SFO, Pittsburgh, Houston, Denver, etc.; this was the N-1, and it was only used on the 3 prototype Skybuses that ran on the South Park (Pittsburgh) Test Track in the 1960's. However, at that time Cleveland Transit System (CTS) was designing the Airporter cars, and they needed a coupler to substitute for the WABCO K-1 that they had used on their first and second series of transit cars (WABCO had no other customers for the K-1, so it had become too expensive to produce), and the WABCO H-2-C couplers, used by NYCTA and others, were considered too heavy and too costly. So WABCO designed the N-2, with a better "gathering range" (4") than the N-1 (2-1/2") -- that is, the "funnel" is 8" wide, so the couplers can be misaligned by up to 4" in any direction, and still couple, and a new electric portion that contained 78 contacts, much more than the 22 contacts available with the H type couplers. The N-2 is a transit coupler, using a lightweight "radial" draft gear slung below the center sill, to allow for the wide swings required to go around sharp curves, so it is not suitable for mainline use. The N-2-A was designed for this purpose: a long-shank version, with 228 (!!) electric contacts for the United Aircraft TurboTrains, and a standard shank version, with "only" 138 contacts, for the NYMTA M-1 and M-1a cars. Then, at about the same time, the N-3 was designed for San Francisco's BART test cars; BART, just to be different, insisted on a 6" horizontal, 4" vertical, gathering range, so the "funnel" had to be rectangular instead of circular. The only major differences between the "transit" and "mainline" versions, besides the shank, is the material: transit couplers are cast in ductile iron, while mainline couplers are cast steel.
The N-type mechanical/pneumatic portions were very successful, but the electric portions, known as the FL type, were not. Without going into a lot of detail, they were a brilliant design, but the contacts they depended upon came from an outside supplier who could not maintain close enough tolerances, and a plastics supplier who did not realize that car-washing fluids would damage the plastic contact housings. The result was far too many contact failures, which caused PATCO to get disgusted and replace all their couplers with Ohio Brass Tomlinson couplers. Eventually, WABCO designed a new series of button-contact electric portions, with the help of Ohio Brass designs (in the messy world of industrial mergers/takeovers, Ohio Brass had been bought out by a Swedish company, which later bought a share of WABCO, and transferred all O-B manufacturing to WABCO's Spartanburg, SC plant; later still, of course, WABCO bought out the Swedes and became independent once more -- but they retained ownership of all the O-B designs and patents). So nowadays, whether a customer wants an N-type coupler or a Tomlinson, they get it from WABCO.
As you say, the N-2-A's used by SEPTA are very similar to the ones used on NYMTA M-1 through M-6 cars, but for later cars, NYMTA specified a heavier "spear" (WABCO calls them "probes"), due to a problem of bent ones caused by missed couplings; in WABCO's opinion, the problem was caused by poorly-maintained coupler centering devices which, had they been working properly, would have prevented damage by keeping the couplers properly aligned; but when a customer the size and importance of NYMTA says "jump!", the proper answer is "yessir, how high?" -- so M-7 and M-8 cars have larger-section "spears".
Filmteknik, looks can be deceiving -- the N-2-A may *look* weaker than the Tomlinson, but in fact it is a lot stronger. The original Metroliners (and, IIRC, the first series of Jersey Arrows) had a Tomlinson-style coupler (IIRC, made by Waugh) that had to be nearly twice the size and weight of the Tomlinson transit couplers (and the N-2-A) to meet the mainline strength requirements (not sure if they were spelled out by the ICC, or who, but there was no FRA in 1966-69). They were also very unreliable, and ended up being replaced by conventional knuckle couplers and jumper cables.
Roger Lewis (airbrakegeezer)]
http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?4,2350777
Here's a Youtube vid on how readily these couple, and the newest couplers on the market are a gen ahead of this even. These are trainees (pardon the pun) in the vid, so not skilled in mating speed and distance, or this would have gone a lot faster.
(Following edited for accuracy: *used* until the Deux Montagnes line was completely overhauled in the nineties and HV AC lines installed, and Bombardier MR-90s used, which used a sophisticated variation of the knuckle coupler, still researching the details, but point stands, Canada has had fully automatic couplers, including HEP and brake lines, on main-line rolling stock):
Montreal's AMT use the same trains (Nippon Sharyo built) as the South Shore, and ostensibly the same couplers, so automatic couplers *ARE* being used in Canada on mainline heavy rail corridors, Tomlinson or something much more modern (I'm still digging to confirm type):
(From the same forum quoted prior on couplers for SEPTA trains)
[...][Currently, Metra Electric and NICTD/South Shore MU cars use Tomlinsons, as did the original IC suburban MUs. The late, great Chicago, Aurora & Elgin also used Tomlinsons on their steel interurban cars (but not the wood cars). Indiana Railroad (the interurban) and Key System were also significant users back in the day.
Did a web search to find a close-up photo of a Tomlinson coupler and found a good one here:
http://www.keyrailpix.org/gallery2/v/WRM/tomlinson.jpg.html
I am taking the liberty of attaching the image in case the link doesn't work. Apologies if that causes anyone any heartburn.
NZ
![](http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/attachments/thumbs/367000/tomlinson.jpg)
[...]
http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?2,1963593
Any experience/knowledge about the European-style couplers, and if it could be practical to couple EMU consists just before peak, and uncouple post-peak?