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What I am finding is that compared to what I have seen in Japan, we are pretty boring here.

"Oh, yes, the Lawson's that has a Mount Fuji . . . " 😀 Rich K.

Great, but none of which in the context of the EF66 models

https://jnsforum.com/community/search/?q="Kato vs tomix"&updated_after=any&sortby=relevancy&search_and_or=or Lots of Kato vs Tomix chatter been had.

I've been thinking of adding an EF66 to the fleet, what are the main differences between the Kato and Tomix models? I find this offering from Tomix interesting, anyone else has experience with it? https://www.plazajapan.com/4543736983880/

Oh man Chad, I get tired just looking at all the work done! Almost there and into the home stretch hopefully here! Looking wonderful. jeff

Haven't done an update in a while. We are actually way past where these pics are for the most part. The only recent ones are the tile ones at the end. Most of the painting is done and has been done. STill some cut-in at the ceiling, a few really high up last few feet in some halls and a bathroom, and some closets still need to be done. Most all the lights and outlets and switches are in. Jiust a few random ones here and there not. Garage doors were installed -- not sure when and if it was before the last update. Kitchen cabinet boxes were installed between eb and yesterday. The countertops were installed in February. The wall cabinets in the last couple weeks with the final stuff yesterday. Two showers were tiled (but not yet grouted) and the Ofuro (Japanese bath) room floor was tiled and grouted (no pic after grouting though) but the wall not tiled yet. Solar panels were installed in February but just came online a few weeks ago (bureaucratic snafus) and are generating. They're only half of what was planned at the moment due to cost increases in everything else. But it is still 18 panels. I'm tiling the kitchen backsplash today and tomorrow and we'll start putting LVP down asap as well. Most of these pics are older and I need to go around and take a bunch more.

That's kind of cool. Kind of like "desk toy" style for train nerds. (I'm a big fan of "desk toys". They're a little big to have a ot on your desk but a couple for decoration would be cool. I'll have to look for them next time I'm in Japan. (Supposed to be this summer but with our building project its postponed) Or something to put on a shelf in the train room for decoration. Maybe I could sneak some onto a table in the living room or something (when we have a living room)

A Lawson in the view of Mt. Fuji. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/apr/26/fujikawaguchiko-town-japan-block-mount-fuji-view-overcrowding

Great work so far! I'm very excited to see the track plan and the layout develop 🙂

Forgot to attached images.

I'd kind of say they are a sort of O scale, B train shorty. Here’s some behind my HO stuff at Stage One. Sadly the Koki are just a moulded plastic with no articulation whatsoever. They come with a separately fitted handrail that actually is stowed on a underside moulding when purchased. The containers are all steel tin plate with a push lid, like a biscuit tin. They do have a wealth of options in terms of livery across JR Freight and mainstream couriers and hauliers as well as some JNR and larger international shipping companies. They also stack on top of each other very neatly. A recess in the lid matches the footprint on the base. They even sell truck trailers to load them on too. Range availability seems to differ across the ¥100 stores. Some Daiso have little to nothing while others have many container options. Likewise, some Seria stores carry them while others don't. The ones I have are just combination of when I've come across them or new container options in various stores.

Well that didnt work! The aforementioned and screenshot might have been a good idea but for two things. The connecting tubes were too tiny to sit sturdy in the connecting pipes, and the cardan shaft receiving end in the black drive unit connected to the motor would not fit as the shaft was not long enough to hold the inner connecting shaft. However what did work was , simply taking the black motor end thingies, we will call it, off the original broken motor and placing on the new ones, even though the shafts were a bit too small, a quick test revealed there was enough play allowed for it to work, so to help I glued the black motor end thingies giving a tiny bit more length, set back slightly, but not enough to notget a proper purchase, and Voila, Its working nice and smooth and at high speed. I will post pictures later which will explain most of my lack of technical understanding for the relevant parts. IT saved me having to wait and search and buy a used engine from an old train that at the lowest i found for £30 and thats with no guarantees, and selling as faulty with an engine thats losing power. I have in essence , just had to pay £6. So okay, this time for my troubles and convaluted way of going about it, I actually spent, £15 for the stainless steel piping and other experimental motors, but now i will buy a few of the compatible short shafted, type, until such time Tomix might release the original. i think it will hold up as long as i dont make it run high scale speeds of 350mph haha. My concern then would be the cardan shafts, they would not be easy to replace. Will post pics later. And a working video when i put the thing fully together

Yeah, simple sticks are simple but since the post was written a while ago I have used the gas struts and they are like magic being able to just tilt and work underneath or on top. The hard part is to get the correct force with the struts. Initially they were perfect but adding the control panel at the front has put just a little more weight on a long lever arm so they are balanced but more weight will put them on the edge of equilibrium. Even that is not so bad as the ball ends of the gas struts unclip with screwdriver encouragement so I could go up in force level a little if I really do need it. I will post a bit more info when I have some working pix to show how it is going. So far the pine frame is easily coping with the forces involved.

Nice inexpensive set of thin, flexible spudgers with handles. cheers jeff

Hi RS18U, I love my old RSD15 too !!

DF91 had just arrived today ,

hmm, subways are always fun!

Added some lights 3 different colour still pics

Subway station for Level 3 progressing nicely, I think. 🙂 ps.. Waiting for a bulk buy of track to arrive, then I can start looking at Level 2, which I haven't had an epiphany about yet, and the station on Level 3b, above the Underground station. If you can follow the schematic above, the tracks from the Underground station loop around climb a bit and become the Overground tracks. Actually.. just had a thought for Level 2... I have a lot of "olde west" 3D models I could use.... hmmm... possibilities. 😉

Found three 10 series sleeper coaches to finish off a full Nichinan formation. These 3 are coaches 1,2,3 in the formation that travel from Kyoto and were left at Oita, before the train continued on to Miyazaki with a single sleeper remaining until the train terminated at Miyakonojo. HO-513 and 514 were from the 2014 release and are courtesy of Rails of Sheffield thanks to an eBay discount promo. You can see that they originally cost ¥7500 and ¥7800 respectively in their time. The price paid was pretty much the same and are both new with all details and decals unused. Assumedly sitting on a shelf or in someone's collection for many years. Not sure why Rails have so many difficult to find items. Seems slightly odd ordering Japanese stock from a UK retailer to ship to Japan but these things have been either difficult to find or ridiculously expensive in Japan. The Orone 10, especially. HO-5015 was one of the same coaches released in 2019 with the only notable difference being that the A and B sleeper decals on the side of the coach are tampo printed rather than a dry rub decal. This one I found a lone example in Treasure Trains in Kokura. A very lucky find. The 10 series were plagued with issues and reasonably short lived but I’m quite fond of their styling. Seems some of the ones that weren’t scrapped went to Thailand and Egypt. Slightly less exciting but will still be happily received is the order placed for re-manufacturing of Tomix double coupler that I will finally be able to add to my Tenshodo Kumoru 145

The Tomix viaduct turnout piece was Tomix 3063 which is now terminated. https://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10009766 But replaced with Tomix 3068. https://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10072575 https://www.google.ca/search?sca_esv=97d9339925220834&sxsrf=ACQVn09QngvsbzIsnGszzemfZgN4AsL8rA:1714082851163&q=tomix+3063&uds=AMwkrPtxj9gxR_MVAq5deRmrR9HZQ0opYKHYT3ie82ECEkPTDV_KTQFplsG2xSn6yEVmi6-0gRzRgZYJXuVRVdU6eJkP-toRZY-g8Q2Uw09EVcd8FpxqdgZ-D20-5nx0QzlETmrMTbxVK1NzWkokck23JtEeQGOdQzsGjNe48f_KFvxO2VALkv4k8Kw3zHrrsyOIXDRv8YPECZdR7Gd9ePo0gs_RUlg_rvP0wTo-aprHboCvvInrr88-W1Os774byJH713rI34hJ6eS2929F61FbUaFmb_wRQmqrHmzxozWzqOjz6NEeszk&udm=2&prmd=sivmnbtz&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjU59WbsN6FAxX6k4kEHfufB1kQtKgLegQIDBAB&biw=1360&bih=607&dpr=1

Don't give me ideas, you can buy 360 action cameras and mount them on your head...

Here's how we did it (if I am understanding correctly what you are asking): The secret for us was using the single track viaduct straight pieces. This track arrangement also lets trains coming on or off the branch go directly to or from either station track. Rich K.

Streetview is great for getting scenery ideas and details. Just clunky and irritating now and then and a bit distorted on the views but still really useful! You get angles on things you never see when doing image searches as the useful angles to get the details are not usually the angles folsk take pictures of things! jeff