So, about those Japanese model locomotives you're importing to the UK...

[railsquid]

You'll need a licence for those, if you're living in 1964 that is.

 

[Welshbloke]

Ahh, the wonders of protectionism...

 

Naturally the government of the day was desperate to export, but evidently didn't feel that anyone else should be able to do so. Such attitudes (and arrogance on the part of British suppliers) would explain why Farish were producing some utterly shocking locos well into the 1990s while their Japanese and European competition had left them standing. Seriously, the very first Kato steamers from the '60s look on a par with the stuff Grafar were still shoving out (even post-Bachmann takeover) until Dapol gave them a much-needed boot up the backside.

[westfalen]

It's not as if there were, or are even today, British model manufacturers making Japanese locos that would have their business affected by imports.  It looks more like a case of you can't get this product locally so you've got no choice but to pay us import duty if you want it, governments all over the world, of all persuasions, have always liked easy ways to make money from their citizens.

[Welshbloke]

TBH I think the fact that the models "just work" is a major reason for the appeal of Japanese N to the British market. I can remember when Kato first became fairly easy to get hold of in the late 1990s, my brother asked for a 700 Series "Nozomi" eight car set one Christmas and also had a pair of the Channel Tunnel Bo-Bo-Bo electric locos (I forget who made the bodywork, but they used Kato chassis). They were light years ahead of anything available in British N at the time. That Shinkansen still runs perfectly, but none of my Farish locos bought around the same time do.

 

After wrestling with crude-looking engines which don't even run reliably your interest in modelling the local scene isn't likely to last long. Even easier to get a Japanese layout right now, with Youtube providing videos of most trains along with plenty of scenery and buildings to inspire yours.

[railsquid]

It's not as if there were, or are even today, British model manufacturers making Japanese locos that would have their business affected by imports.  It looks more like a case of you can't get this product locally so you've got no choice but to pay us import duty if you want it, governments all over the world, of all persuasions, have always liked easy ways to make money from their citizens.

 

The mid 1960s in the UK at least was an era of semi-permanent monetary crisis and pretty draconian controls on foreign exchange, so I'd see this in that context rather than a simple money-grab. Google "The U.K. exchange control: a short history" for some background...

[railsquid]

TBH I think the fact that the models "just work" is a major reason for the appeal of Japanese N to the British market. I can remember when Kato first became fairly easy to get hold of in the late 1990s, my brother asked for a 700 Series "Nozomi" eight car set one Christmas and also had a pair of the Channel Tunnel Bo-Bo-Bo electric locos (I forget who made the bodywork, but they used Kato chassis). They were light years ahead of anything available in British N at the time. That Shinkansen still runs perfectly, but none of my Farish locos bought around the same time do.

 

After wrestling with crude-looking engines which don't even run reliably your interest in modelling the local scene isn't likely to last long. Even easier to get a Japanese layout right now, with Youtube providing videos of most trains along with plenty of scenery and buildings to inspire yours.

 

Having only known 70s/80s Lima and Hornby, I was massively impressed even by the Kato KOKUDEN unit. Coincidentally the first Kato loco I bought was faulty (lights didn't work, very rough motor) and I didn't realise that was anything other than normal until I got another loco (the dud one was sent back and the replacement is fine).

[kvp]

When i was little, the available model trains were mostly Piko H0 and Berliner TT Bahn. They were rather crude models, but very reliable and mostly kid safe. (this is what we call playtime now) This means my first TT set i got when i was 2 years old is in a battered but still running condition. (ok, my father bought it for himself, but i played with it most of the time) Sadly the layout for them was accidentally destroyed by the workers during a renovation many years ago. It was a preprinted mat with glued on static grass, very similar to what Tomix started selling now, just a german country/small town setting with a twice around single track loop. The trains were mostly maintenance free, so you only had to get the dirt off the wheels once in a while. Tomix train collection items are around the same level of detail and reliability and many of them are also kid safe.

[Welshbloke]

The funny part is, Bachmann Farish still haven't really caught up.

 

Take the Kato 165 Series. I know it's not their latest standard of tooling but it has scale-ish couplers, directional lighting, a motor which doesn't stick up above the windows and if you want to fit interior lighting then it's a simple job involving clipping parts together. Price is about £60 from a UK stockist (so comparing like with like, no "if you don't get stung for VAT").

 

Meanwhile Farish's best comparable offering is probably a class 170 DMU. Three car, don't think it has lights, no clip-in option to fit interior lights, the centre car is full of motor (so the windows are black, while the two driving cars are tinted but see-through), Rapido couplers internally, and the list price is about £160! Ok, you can buy it for around £100 but that's still an extra £40 for a lower standard model.

 

They're even trying to sell the old Poole-era Farish 158s for £140, or a street price around £90 (admittedly with a new motor, which still fills one coach). These have clear plastic bodyshells with the livery simply tampo printed onto it, which has never looked right to me. I think it's the lack of definition around doors and windows, where the real thing has frames and gaps.

 

In real terms, at present you can have a seven car 111 Series in Shonan colours from Kato for an extra £8 or so over a three car Class 170 from Farish. Both from UK-based sellers, and that 111 Series is a great leap forward again thanks to close couplers and the ability to switch the lights off at either end if you want to run it in multiple.

 

I really cannot understand how they justify these prices. They blame increased production costs but Kato surely have those too, and they're still making more advanced models for lower prices. I can't believe that the Japanese market is that much bigger than the UK one either.

[railsquid]

I can't believe that the Japanese market is that much bigger than the UK one either.

 

Japan has twice the population for a start, and N is the dominant scale here, so you're easily looking at an order of magnitude larger for N compared to the UK with all the economies of scale that brings.

[kvp]

For comparable quality products, we can see the Graham Farish 4CEP and the Arnold Brighton Belle. The 4CEP has a small single bogie motor, hidden behind the equipment room doors, inset windows and NEM coupler pockets for short/normal/close couplers. It's also DCC ready and has end lights. The 5BEL comes with a similar motor arrangement, power kinematic close couplers for single decoder operation and head/tail/interior lighting preinstalled. The body is highly detailed (a bit too detailed as it's very fragile). Also DCC ready, with a single decoder for the whole consist. Many newly tooled Graham Farish coaches have the same level of detail, including etched metal railings and modern close couplers.

 

On the other end, we have the newly released pad printed clear shells with unreplacable long rapidos, also from Graham Farish. So they could do better, but don't have the money (and market size) to do so for every product they offer. I have lots of early 70-ies maerklin Z scale rolling stock and their quality is comparable to modern day Tomytec train collection kits, so the technology was available in Europe and Japan 40 years ago, but some british manufactuers never had the market or money or will to use them up until the recent aquisitions. At least they are trying, but this is a rather hit and miss thing for their current product lines.

[ToniBabelony]

Japan has twice the population for a start, and N is the dominant scale here, so you're easily looking at an order of magnitude larger for N compared to the UK with all the economies of scale that brings.

 

The Japanese model train market is gigantic. I don't know if this is true and/or still holds up, but I remember from years ago someone did market research on this and concluded that the Japanese model train market was larger than all the global model train markets combined. A recent article by Tokyo Business Today (http://toyokeizai.net/articles/-/88613) pointed out that the sales of the Glacier Express trains have a 50/50 ratio on the European and Japanese market. Considering the European market consists of several countries and Japan being only one country, the sales of a foreign train (not the popular type) in Japan balancing out European sales says something about the size of the Japanese market I think. Consider also that the European market consists mainly of H0 gauge modellers.

 

That aside, when visiting a model train shop in Europe and one in Japan, you'll be more impressed by the sheer offerings in Japan. People also tend to line up for hours for new models (even I did), no matter how obscure.

[Martijn Meerts]

I think someone mentioned a while ago that Japan had around 9 million model railroaders, the majority of them doing N-scale. So yeah, Japanese models, especially the more popular one, see much larger production runs.

 

Another thing is, European manufacturers seem to really like their limited edition models (which aren't really limited, because they get another production run 2 years later, just with a different number and not in a fancy wooden box ;))

[kvp]

In the past maerklin did (and to an extent still does) this limited run idea, especially when they only make so many that they get preorders from a limited membership club and then they make sure they are completly unable to rerun the model. And then they are surprised that they can't even get back the  production costs for some models. At least those models are really limited edition ones, like from small series manufacturers, including the price, wich further drives down the number of buyers.

[railsquid]

The Japanese model train market is gigantic. I don't know if this is true and/or still holds up, but I remember from years ago someone did market research on this and concluded that the Japanese model train market was larger than all the global model train markets combined.

 

Here's an interesting 2008 article in Japanese from Toyo Keizai turned up by a quick Google search which says: "現在の日本の鉄道模型の市場規模は約１５０億円、そのうち７割の１１０億円程度がＮゲージだ（関水金属調べ）" -> "the current [2008] model railway market in Japan is about 150 oku yen  (15 billion yen or ca. 115 million Euro/88 million GBP)", of with about 70% is accounted for by N gauge (figures from Kato)". Definitely not peanuts.

[kvp]

And we have, let's see, around 5 larger companies covering most of the japanese N gauge market. There were more companies in a single EU member country before the takovers/bankrupcies a few years ago, mostly making the same products with no coordination between them. (often releasing the same model in the same scale, in the same paint around the same time)

[cteno4]

Here's an interesting 2008 article in Japanese from Toyo Keizai turned up by a quick Google search which says: "現在の日本の鉄道模型の市場規模は約１５０億円、そのうち７割の１１０億円程度がＮゲージだ（関水金属調べ）" -> "the current [2008] model railway market in Japan is about 150 oku yen  (15 billion yen or ca. 115 million Euro/88 million GBP)", of with about 70% is accounted for by N gauge (figures from Kato)". Definitely not peanuts.

Bill Robb had pulled up some of the numbers for Tomix and they were quite higher than this from what I remember.

 

Jeff

[bikkuri bahn]

...often releasing the same model in the same scale, in the same paint around the same time)

 

I notice (though to a lesser extent perhaps) that this occurs in the Japanese HO (1/80) market- typically Kato reissues an old series, and then a few months later Tenshodo issues a series of the same prototype, also plastic, but more expensive, with extra features such as sound, etc.  The Tenshodo stuff tends to sit on the shelves longer (JNR-era HO Kato and in some cases Tomix fly off the shelves) , based on observations of the bigger hobby retailers. Poorer cost performance and "late to the party" effect, I guess.