Tomytec
Compact Unitrack
was going to post something “soon”, and soon came sooner than expected. I went to a model train show today, and having Kato’s new compact track on the brain after working on my Unitrack pages last night, couldn’t resist picking some up. I bought a CV1 “Compact Oval” set, along with two R150 switches and a small pack of 150mm (6”) curves. This builds an oval with a short-cut inner curve that fits snugly on one end of my coffee table, with plenty of room for the Kato power pack.
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Two Trams
A “tram” is a light rail vehicle. The word is British English; American’s still say “trolley” even though our light rail systems haven’t used trolley poles in decades. But it’s a word also used by the Japanese (who often borrow foreign words, either for marketing reasons or just because they like the sound).
The Toyama Light Rail line, a company jointly owned by the Toyama city government and some other investors, operates light rail vehicles over a former freight railway running between the city center and the waterfront. This is officially known as the Toyamakō Line, but the locals know it as “Portram” (for Port Tram), and the vehicles introduced in 2006 have come to be known by that name. There are seven of them, all of basically the same design but in different colors. A separate railway operates a city-center ring using similar vehicles, known as the Centram (“Central Tram”, I presume).
Tomytec, the parent company of Tomix, has been making models of these as part of their Railway Collection series since about 2009. These are intended to be collectibles for display, and they’re just empty shells. They cost around US$15 - US$20. But Tomytec also makes a motor unit that replaces the underbody, the TM-LRT01, which goes for around US$30. So for under $50, you can have an operating model. They’re not as nice as Kato’s Portram models, which sell for about US$85 in Japan, but they’re still quite good models.
I had been thinking about getting one of these, just to see how they compared with the Portram (I have one of Kato’s Centram models), but hadn’t gotten around to it. Then, while I was wondering what I’d run on my One Point Five Meter Line layout, I saw this new pair of them and decided that a model tram with a replaceable motor was the perfect thing for a layout that may do a lot of running back and forth. I ordered the pair, and two of the motors (thankfully those were available; they often sell out and can’t be found for months on end).
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The Toyama Light Rail line, a company jointly owned by the Toyama city government and some other investors, operates light rail vehicles over a former freight railway running between the city center and the waterfront. This is officially known as the Toyamakō Line, but the locals know it as “Portram” (for Port Tram), and the vehicles introduced in 2006 have come to be known by that name. There are seven of them, all of basically the same design but in different colors. A separate railway operates a city-center ring using similar vehicles, known as the Centram (“Central Tram”, I presume).
Tomytec, the parent company of Tomix, has been making models of these as part of their Railway Collection series since about 2009. These are intended to be collectibles for display, and they’re just empty shells. They cost around US$15 - US$20. But Tomytec also makes a motor unit that replaces the underbody, the TM-LRT01, which goes for around US$30. So for under $50, you can have an operating model. They’re not as nice as Kato’s Portram models, which sell for about US$85 in Japan, but they’re still quite good models.
I had been thinking about getting one of these, just to see how they compared with the Portram (I have one of Kato’s Centram models), but hadn’t gotten around to it. Then, while I was wondering what I’d run on my One Point Five Meter Line layout, I saw this new pair of them and decided that a model tram with a replaceable motor was the perfect thing for a layout that may do a lot of running back and forth. I ordered the pair, and two of the motors (thankfully those were available; they often sell out and can’t be found for months on end).
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More Hilltop Work
25 July 2013 23:44 Filed in: Construction,Scenery
Work has progressed. I finally finished getting the backdrop photo attached to the backdrop, and the latter attached to the layout table. This was not without a lot of awkward contortionism to get the darn thing bolted in place. Perhaps I would have been better off disconnecting the whole return loop end from the rest of the layout, so I could turn it and work somewhere other than in a two-inch slot up against a concrete wall. But while that’s possible by design, it’s REALLY hard in practice, and I decided I didn’t need to do it. And in the end I didn’t, although I’m not sure I actually saved any real time.
The backdrop looks pretty good, even in person. It has just the right level of detail, and the sizes are acceptable (perhaps a bit too large, but I don’t think they’ll be too obtrusive). The faded/hazy color and low-resolution of detail looks just right.
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The backdrop looks pretty good, even in person. It has just the right level of detail, and the sizes are acceptable (perhaps a bit too large, but I don’t think they’ll be too obtrusive). The faded/hazy color and low-resolution of detail looks just right.
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Mocking Up the Hilltop
It’s very pink, but with a bit of imagination you can see the forested hill rising behind the houses, which will have a small Shinto shrine tucked in amongst the trees, with a stairway down to street level, a very typically Japanese scene. This mock-up was part of my final refinement of the design for the Hilltop Scene. I’m not quite done, but I’m beginning to accept that I have a sound idea for what I want to do.
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Bus Models for Japan
07 April 2013 23:48 Filed in: Other Models
Jerry’s recent post on Quintopia about cars and the arrival of my order for four N-scale Tomytec bus models have me thinking about road vehicles.
One of the hardest parts of modeling a contemporary model railroad is the lack of contemporary road vehicles. By far the majority of what is available seem to be things not seen on roadways for half a century. And an urban railroad needs a LOT of model vehicles to look even slightly realistic. And they can’t all look exactly alike either.
As Jerry noted, Tomytec’s collections of cars, trucks, and busses (links are to Japanese pages) are a very good way of acquiring fairly detailed models in bulk at reasonable costs. A typical car collection bought from Japan runs US$67 before shipping and contains twelve boxes, each containing (typically) two vehicles. Even with shipping, that’s likely less than $5 per vehicle. Not as cheap as the low-quality Chinese models available off Ebay, which are suitable for filling in back streets, parking garages, and other places where the car is more glimpsed than seen. But a good price for a detailed model, and about a third of what European models go for.
Shipping from Japan isn’t cheap. I use EMS (express mail), and shipping my order of four busses cost me $15, about 50% of the cost of the busses themselves. But I’m impatient, and EMS gets the package to me in about five days. If you can wait weeks (or sometimes months), shipping SAL (standby air) will be a lot cheaper for small, lightweight, models like these. But it’s still going to be a significant part of the total cost. If you want to order these, see the websites of the Japan-based hobby stores listed on my Suppliers page for more specific information.
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One of the hardest parts of modeling a contemporary model railroad is the lack of contemporary road vehicles. By far the majority of what is available seem to be things not seen on roadways for half a century. And an urban railroad needs a LOT of model vehicles to look even slightly realistic. And they can’t all look exactly alike either.
As Jerry noted, Tomytec’s collections of cars, trucks, and busses (links are to Japanese pages) are a very good way of acquiring fairly detailed models in bulk at reasonable costs. A typical car collection bought from Japan runs US$67 before shipping and contains twelve boxes, each containing (typically) two vehicles. Even with shipping, that’s likely less than $5 per vehicle. Not as cheap as the low-quality Chinese models available off Ebay, which are suitable for filling in back streets, parking garages, and other places where the car is more glimpsed than seen. But a good price for a detailed model, and about a third of what European models go for.
Shipping from Japan isn’t cheap. I use EMS (express mail), and shipping my order of four busses cost me $15, about 50% of the cost of the busses themselves. But I’m impatient, and EMS gets the package to me in about five days. If you can wait weeks (or sometimes months), shipping SAL (standby air) will be a lot cheaper for small, lightweight, models like these. But it’s still going to be a significant part of the total cost. If you want to order these, see the websites of the Japan-based hobby stores listed on my Suppliers page for more specific information.
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Pylons
No, I’m not writing about the ones from the 70s TV series. These are the electrical kind, Kato kit 23-401, which is actually a Heljan-produced model, although apparently not one sold directly by that company. The kit contains material for three high-voltage electrical towers of a common design. In fact, they’re nearly identical to those in a photo of Shin-Yokohama described as owned by JR East (see my Electrical Reference Images page). List price from Kato USA is US$19, but I’ve seen them for less. Frankly, they’re overpriced for what you get. Read More...
The Longest Preorder
16 October 2011 22:21 Filed in: Other Models
If you get into buying Japanese trains, the preorder is inescapable. Many models are produced in production runs just large enough to fill initial orders, and often not re-produced for several years, if ever. Popular models can sell out before they even arrive in stores, and if you want to be sure of getting something, you need to work with that.
It’s not that bad a practice in general. You are committing to buying something (stores may not do business with you again if you back out of a preorder, and they’re generally not cancelable). But you don’t have to pay, not even a deposit, until it actually arrives in the store. I do almost all of my preorders through Hobby Search, and have overall been quite satisfied with them.
A typical new product will be opened for orders several months in advance of the planned delivery date, and preordering will close when that store’s initial allotment is accounted for, which can be days after the preorder opens, or not until the model ships. Some preorders are for shorter lead times, even as little as a few weeks. Most are generally within six months. But I had one order that took a year. That is it up above.
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It’s not that bad a practice in general. You are committing to buying something (stores may not do business with you again if you back out of a preorder, and they’re generally not cancelable). But you don’t have to pay, not even a deposit, until it actually arrives in the store. I do almost all of my preorders through Hobby Search, and have overall been quite satisfied with them.
A typical new product will be opened for orders several months in advance of the planned delivery date, and preordering will close when that store’s initial allotment is accounted for, which can be days after the preorder opens, or not until the model ships. Some preorders are for shorter lead times, even as little as a few weeks. Most are generally within six months. But I had one order that took a year. That is it up above.
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Tram Layout Installed
08 August 2011 23:07 Filed in: Construction,Trams
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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A Tomix Bus/Tram Coffee-Table Layout
I have a number of two-car articulated light-rail vehicles, aka., trams, mostly from the Tōkyū Setagaya Line of western Tōkyō. These, like the new Tomytec bus system, were bought to be used in Sumida Crossing’s Urban Station scene, as small details to make the station more than just a place to park trains. However, because the viaduct station is in the front of this scene, these would both be behind and below it, and largely out of sight. That’s bothered me for some time, but with the addition of the bus I really wanted to be able to run these where I could see them. And there really isn’t any place on the big layout suitable for that. And so, I’m building a small tram layout.
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April 2011 Status, Subway Station Planning and a Bus System
April sped by rather quickly, as least in part because I had some non-railroad distractions that took me away from the layout. Not much was done in concrete terms, but planning for the Riverside Crossing Subway Station made good progress. Mostly I acquired parts for some more power management wiring (PM42 circuit breakers, BDL168 occupancy detectors, and RX4 transponding sensors, as well as wire, terminal strips, and miscellaneous connectors). I also painted several sheets of cut-to-size plywood with primer, to which I’ll attach all the electronics and wiring. Then I’ll hang the plywood under the layout, where it can be easily wired to terminal strips, but remain far enough away from the track and bus wires to avoid interference with the transponding sensors. I’ll have more on this after I’ve built the first of these.
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