Earwicker

Some progress on this.

Lights and backboard installed.

So I'm doing a little planning. The layout will be 2200 by 600 (the max size that will fit in the hobby room and safely make it out) and have an attached lighting rig. It will be all one piece (no setting up, rail and wiring joins etc.) and sat on castors so it can easily be moved around. This is likely to go to only one yearly show so it only needs to portable enough to fit in a covered trailer on the back of the car to take the short trip to the venue. The rest of the time it will be a piece of furniture in our house. I'm still thinking about the ideal height of the track and the lighting rig (which will hang out over the layout gantry style and have a fascia on the front). Probably quite a high track height for comfortable viewing for me. Still deciding whether it will be a single or double track line.

Ten months later, progress is happening. Today I picked up the timber and installed it in the hobby room. Construction of the base board/frame will happen in the workshop. Bonus Star Wars build also.

Stay tuned for more!

I'm back! I didn't forget about this, rather I had a whole bunch of things to deal with during our winter. My plan is to tackle this in the next six months during my leave from university teaching. I have done a bit of background planning on the materials I will need and when I get a bit of time I will take a trip to Bunnings (the big hardware chain in this part of the globe) and grab what I need. I'll also be getting enough for two American outline HO freemo modules I'll also be building, because I've decided to join in the group that runs here. Really looking forward to getting back into rail modelling because it's been about a year since I last did any.

 

Excellent choice of location! And depending on which era you model you'll have an wide choice of interesting trains to run.

 

Incidentally, I've always thought the station and yard at Fukaura looked remarkably like something designed by a railway modeller. Talk about compact! And with so many features in a small space, and the hillside right behind it as a natural backdrop - almost too good to be true.

That is incredible and would make an ideal layout. One of the big appeals of Japan to me is the relatively compactness of some aspects of the prototype; that's an excellent example! Since I'm really only dipping my toes with this layout I'll be aiming for the flavour of the place only, rather than prototypical accuracy. But we'll see if the bug bites. 

Hi all, I've made a little progress in the past couple of weeks. First up, I freed up the space in the hobby room by selling the previous layout. I've also been making preliminary plans. I did a mock up of the dimensions of the layout to give me an idea of the space I have, but more importantly, to establish whether the layout will make it down the hallway when I want to move it. The whole layout will be on castors. You can sort of see the track plan: it is intentionally very simple because I want to concentrate on scenery and also keep it manageable. The setting is vaguely based on the Gono Line between Fukaura and Todoroki station, so it will involve a rocky foreshore, a single line of track and some small simple buildings. Next up is buying the timber for the benchwork which will probably be a few weeks at the earliest.

There's always been a lot of Japanese HO models in 1/80th and 1/87th scale available. Apart from Tenshodo RTR brass you also had similar RTR products from manufacturers like Endo, Imon, KTM, Toby & Miyazawa, plastic/diecast models from Kato, MicroAce and Tomix, and kits from Adachi, EchoModel, Endo, HobbyModel, Modemo, World Kogei and others. But until the internet became commonplace not much of it was seen or sold outside of Japan.

 

Not only has online shopping made buying Japanese models easy, there have been many additions to existing ranges, and new manufacturers have entered the market. Kato, MA and Tomix have all added new models to their range as well as reissuing older items. New entrants such as Aclass, Dentetsu Workshop, Neko Publishing, and Tramway offer both RTR and kits. Even Bachmann have made models for the Japanese market through their affiliate Kairyu.

 

For anyone thinking of modelling the late Showa/transition era of the JNR in HO, now is a great time to get started.

 

All the best,

 

Mark.

Hi Mark, I know next to nothing about the Japanese model rail scene at this stage (other than I find it appealing) but the HO stuff seemed very expensive (but very nice). We went to a number of stores and the gap in pricing between HO and N seemed completely out of step with prices in NZ and the US. I've settled on N, though HO has been my preferred scale for a few years now (I did build a large US layout with Kato N scale gear about 6 years ago). N suits the space and intentions I currently have. More on this soon once I get my thoughts in order.

Mrs bubbles and myself spent a couple of weeks in Japan in November visiting our son Luke who is working in Kyoto, we found it a lovely country with the Japanese people being both helpful and extremely respectful a great country to visit and model. I have put many of our railway related pictures on my Flickr stream, see below, many more still to add.

 

Looking forward to up dates  Earwicker.

Great pictures. Are a number of those from the Kyoto museum? We visited Kyoto but for some reason never made it to the museum. 

I occasionally watch the Japanese but English-language, NHK channel on FreeSat, which has a monthly railway programme, Japan Railway Journal, showing the current and preserved scene. You may find that an additional source of info and inspiration. It is rarely less than fascinating.

Thanks, I've watched a few episodes on Youtube. It's great. One of the striking things about Japan for me was how prevalent rail is in Japanese culture.

My wife and I recently traveled to Japan and rode the rails on a JR pass. While there I absolutely fell in love with the Japanese rail scene and also saw its immense potential for a layout. I also bought some locos and rolling stock (at Poppondetta at Shinjuku Station and also in the Aeon Mall at Kyoto near the station there: both awesome stores who didn't seem to mind my complete lack of Japanese!). So I have decided to build a layout and I've begun planning for it. It will be n scale and set in a somewhat fictitious spot on the coast of central Japan south of Tokyo. My two most recent layouts are here: http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/118161-apple-springs-canyon/&do=findComment&comment=2547730 and http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/94537-ho-layout-canyon-diablo/#entry1733527 so this is obviously going to be something quite different. I'm hoping to build something that is self-contained and has a bit of scope for artistic expression. More to come!

A new room for all the hobbies, including the layout. 

My wife and I also just returned from a trip to Europe and Japan, where I made some purchases. I sense a change in scale and prototype in my future.

Thanks for the comments. I haven't done anything on this in a while because of work and my shoddy health, but things are looking up so hopefully I get back into it during our summer. The good news is that due to moving house I now have a dedicated hobby room with space to set this up permanently. Can't wait!

Very nice! You've got that desert wasteland look down perfectly, at least to my eye!

Thanks. There are still bits that I'm dissatisfied and frustrated with but hopefully the next thing will be better. I'm hoping to finish these at the beginning of our summer down here (the winter has been miserable in NZ) and then I might start another single module after that, and maybe also a storage module. We are also moving house in the new year and I'm determined to find a place with a room for the layout.

A little more progress.

A quick update. I've been distracted by work and health issues but I've returned to the modules, adding more scenic details. I'll change the colour of the road on this module I think with a bit more gravel and dust pigments. The whole thing needs some weathering to tie it together. Next is a whole lot of rolling stock weathering before I show this in October.

I fear this is going to be a very frustrating tour for your lads. Who am I kidding, bring on the Crusaders on the weekend.

More density of the foliage with added tufts. This cactus scene is just a bit of fun.

The week from hell. I made my way to this place twice in the same week:

Btu still managed to have some fun with the layout:

While it is a nice-looking kit, the converted container mobile office really feels out of place for the late '70s. 

I agree actually. Thanks for the details too. I'll see if I can carry through with the trailer home idea, but honestly I'm also tempted to go a little more generic with these modules given that all sorts of crazy combinations of rolling stock is likely to be run on them (both due to my own divergent interests and to the likely other participants). We will see.

I love that loading dock. Very cool. Might have to nick that idea!

I remember similar structures from my childhood on the farm in the 70s so it thought it would work in this context.

I've been putting in lots of work, but not a huge amount to show for it. Nevertheless, spring has sprung on Desert View in the form of flowering bushes. It looks quite subtle in the pictures but gives a really nice variation in the colours in person.

Also, the other night with a nice glass of Shiraz in hand, I happily ran trains for about an hour.

Thanks guys. JMRI sounds like a real option.

Lots of work today. Surfaced the wreckers diorama area with plaster, painted it, added dirt, static grass and some weathering. And then weathered the buildings and placed them. I also finally found a worthwhile use for the ironing board.

I'm working on various details for the wreckers scene now. I tried to change the ugly glossy plastic tuck into something a bit more presentable. I also painted up some drums for the back. The container shed is a Walthers kit. More to come.