Freight trains aren’t a major part of the Japanese railroading scene. With most of its industry on the coast, bulk freight largely travels by ship. And with the improved highways of the 1960’s and later, smaller freight had almost all moved to truck. Before its breakup, the Japan National Railway had already closed the bulk of its freight yards in 1985, leaving only a small quantity of mixed trains operating, in addition to unit trains of containers, oil, limestone and other bulk products. And most of those trains ran between port facilities or private sidings although there remain to this day a small number of freight yards (which are somehow different from the “freight marshaling yards” that were closed). Read More...

Tags: Kawai, Freight

Railroading in Tōkyō isn’t just huge railway stations and double-track commuter lines bringing people into the city from hours away, there are a number of much smaller railways, serving neighborhoods, industrial areas, or what have you. The photo above (from flickr, photographer: haribote) shows one of these, the Keisei-Kanamachi Line, (see also Japanese wikipedia) a mostly single-track line running 2.5 km through a residential neighborhood of Katsushika City, one of Tōkyō’s 23 special wards (which formed the original city of Tōkyō). The line runs due north from where it meets the Keisei Main Line at Keisei-Takasago station. The last station is adjacent to JR East’s Kanamachi Station on the Jōban Line.
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Tags: Freight, Micro Ace, Greenmax, Kato, Commuter

As I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, I’ve been waiting for a new saw to continue work on the Expressway. It arrived this week, and while I haven’t done much with it yet, what I have done is living up to my expectations. The saw, shown above as I was unpacking it, is a Byrnes saw. This is made by a modeler, for modelers, and intended for accuracy, as well as the ability to cut small pieces of wood or plastic (with the right blade, thin aluminum, brass or other soft metals would probably be fair game also). It’s not cheap, but it’s worth the money, at least to me.

The top is machined from a chunk of aluminum 10” x 12”, and the base appears to be aluminum also (as are the bulk of the accessories). Several options are available: I added the extension to the rip fence (above to right of blade) that makes it about 1/2” thick instead of just a few mm (this is removable) and added the extended-length arm to the miter (seen taped down above). I also added the metric version of the micrometer (right corner) that can be used to advance the fence for cutting precise-width strips of material, and I bound the “Rip Taper Jig” which is another accessory for holding things at a specific angle for cutting.
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Tags: Tools

My tram layout moved to it’s semi-permanent home today. I finally gave up any hope of doing more work on the scenery any time soon, so after finishing the backdrop I moved it into the living room and wired up the tram track. The bus roadway is mostly in place, but I’m still waiting on the additional bus set (now due in late August) to add the final 140mm segment of that so I can actually run busses.
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Tags: Modemo, Greenmax, Backdrops, Tram, Tram Layout, Tomix, Tomytec