Janney coupler
Originally known as Janney couplers (the original patent name) they are almost always referred to as Knuckles in the US and Canada (regardless of their actual official model name, nowadays generally various AAR types in North America), but are also known as American, AAR, APT, ARA, MCB, Buckeye, tightlock (in the UK) or Centre Buffer Couplers.
In the UK, several versions of Janney couplers are fitted to a limited number of coaches, multiple units, wagons and locomotives.
Prior to the formation of the Association of American Railroads (AAR) these were known as Master Car Builder (MCB) couplers.
Knuckle couplers of the 1880s and 1890s had a chaotic mixture of proprietary internal components, but all had the standard MCB external contour, making them compatible.
That ended the market for knuckle couplers with proprietary components, excepting those exported from the US to other countries not complying with MCB standards.
Prior to this, there was a chaotic variety of constantly evolving and proprietary external contours and internal components.
Type H tightlock couplings used on passenger stock have a variation of the 10A contour that nearly eliminates slack during normal operation and minimizes the possibility of "telescoping" during a derailment.
Major Eli Janney, a Confederate veteran of the American Civil War, invented the semi-automatic knuckle coupler in 1868.
Knuckle couplers are used in the Americas, Africa, Asia-Pacific, UK, Belgium and Spain (narrow gauge railway only).
Among its features: Janney Type E double-shelf couplers are yet another variety, typical on North American hazardous material tank cars.
[18] The large bogie boxvans for car parts, used on the Victorian Railways, were fitted with gooseneck couplers for that reason.
Janney was a dry goods clerk and former Confederate Army officer from Alexandria, Virginia, who used his lunch hours to whittle from wood an alternative to the link and pin coupler.
[12][20] In 1893, satisfied that an automatic coupler could meet the demands of commercial railroad operations and, at the same time, be manipulated safely, the US Congress passed the Safety Appliance Act.
Standard, Adopted 1915 Arthur James Bazeley (1872-1937), railway couplings inventor/design engineer; was born in Bristol, England, in 1872, and worked for the Great Western Railway until the age of 34 when he immigrated to Cleveland, Ohio, in 1906, where he worked as a mechanical engineer for National Malleable Castings, Co., inventing and designing improvements in the function, strength, and durability of the (MCB/ARA/AAR/APTA) Janney, Knuckle, Alliance couplers and other coupling devices/draw gear for the evolving heavier demands by US railways, as well as, National Malleable Castings' international customers in the United Kingdom, India, and many other countries building and expanding their railway systems.
National Malleable purchased the Latrobe Steel & Coupler's plant in Melrose Park, Illinois, in 1909.
In 1923, when it had begun to supply the automobile industry, the company changed its name to National Malleable & Steel Castings.
Specifications as of March 1939 required that the fabrication casting material be of open hearth or electric furnace grade "B" steel with specific metallurgic requirements to insure proper tensile strength and reliability of the coupler and its moving parts.
