What did you do on your layout today? (N scale)

[gavino200]

Running the Tomix track cleaning car for the first time. The vacuum is surprisingly good. The scrubber is noisy. And it could really use a bigger fluid reservoir. I have to fill it up pretty often. Thinking of getting a Kadee car to make a little cleaning train.

 

Edited April 14, 2017 by gavino200

[Rmsinsd]

Rice paddies...

Working on my 18" x 36" Bandai layout; rice paddies, farmers, train shed, yard fences.

You buy 'em! Tomytec sells two, dry like mine, and flooded. It's basically tiny tufts of nylon on a brown paper backing, colored appropriately. I made the berms by laying down a bead of white glue and putting some foam dirt on it.

[IST]

You buy 'em! Tomytec sells two, dry like mine, and flooded. It's basically tiny tufts of nylon on a brown paper backing, colored appropriately. I made the berms by laying down a bead of white glue and putting some foam dirt on it.

 

Thanks. Yes, I know them, I used the other one on my T-trak modul, but yours looked different. Maybe because of the foam dirt what you mentioned.

[cteno4]

whoo hooo i got to vacuum, vacuum, vacuum! we went to the cherry blossom Sakura Matsuri last weekend. its now in a new location in large open parking areas near the ball park. unfortunately there is a fine grit/dirt/pollen mix that got on everything! I heard it happened last year but i was not there. got home and everything was coated. so been vacuuming all hte boxes, buildings, and trains. trains are the most time consuming to pull them out and clean them carefully. PITA... but had to be done.

 

jeff

[medusa]

"I don't know what "flashing" is. I'll reasearch it."

 

Sorry Gavino I was out for some time... "flash" is in plastic modeler's slang if molded plastic parts have some excess plastic in places where the gaps of the tools where during the moulding process.

 

Meanwhile I had time to inspect the bogie on H5-kei car No.8 closer. It was not the bogie but it's seat in the car bottom... had some tiny "bump" close to an edge. I gently scraped it off (was really micro-surgery). Ran the full H5 on a R315 test loop after that, both directions, both turning left & right, derailing problems gone.

 

Before scraping anything off, please compare how a healthy bogie / seat looks like. Guess it will cause other proplems if removing too much material. Do at own risk!

[gavino200]

"I don't know what "flashing" is. I'll reasearch it."

 

Sorry Gavino I was out for some time... "flash" is in plastic modeler's slang if molded plastic parts have some excess plastic in places where the gaps of the tools where during the moulding process.

 

Meanwhile I had time to inspect the bogie on H5-kei car No.8 closer. It was not the bogie but it's seat in the car bottom... had some tiny "bump" close to an edge. I gently scraped it off (was really micro-surgery). Ran the full H5 on a R315 test loop after that, both directions, both turning left & right, derailing problems gone.

 

Before scraping anything off, please compare how a healthy bogie / seat looks like. Guess it will cause other proplems if removing too much material. Do at own risk!

 

Ha, yes. Definitely micro work. I had to wear my loupes. I used some dental files that I got on ebay. I was worried that it would be too rough, but it works fine. What did you use?

 

Unfortunately, the motor in my E5 is dying, so it's sitting in the yard. I'm ordering two new motor units, to make it a double motor Shinkansen. I think the combination of 10 cars and an incline was just too much for it. 

Edited April 16, 2017 by gavino200

[medusa]

Yes, loupe on an mechanical arm but I use a lancet-like hobby cutter for this kind of work. Very sharp, use with caution...

 

BTW, Where do you get single motor units for the H5/E5?

Edited April 16, 2017 by medusa

[gavino200]

Where do you get single motor units for the H5/E5?

 

Kato sells them as an ASSY part. I'm buying them from Narichi at Modeltrainsplus. You also, need the power bogies. They're sold separately. The shell from the other pantograph car fits the motor car perfectly.

 

If it works out, I'll buy a second motor unit for the Komachi too. It also struggles a bit on the hill.

Edited April 16, 2017 by gavino200

[gavino200]

 

 

This is the listing on Hobbysearch with the part numbers. They're sold out at HS.

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10179460

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10179466

[gavino200]

I just heard from Narichi this morning. He's not able to get them :(

[medusa]

Maybe a H5 motor unit is an option. H5 appeared later than E5, so maybe spare parts are still available. And as we all know about Kato, both probably have the same moulds.

[gavino200]

Maybe a H5 motor unit is an option. H5 appeared later than E5, so maybe spare parts are still available. And as we all know about Kato, both probably have the same moulds.

 

Good call. I think they're identical.

[bill937ca]

Slowly getting back to running trains.For the first time in a couple of months I ran a couple of trains.  I am slowly creating a temporary 60 x 30 inch layout with a three track station so I can run a few trains every now and then.

[gavino200]

Finally started gluing down track, and inadvertently solved a derailment issue that has been bugging me for ages. Turns out I had some longitudinal torsion issues. A slight twist. I was so focused on vertical unevenness and track joiners that I totally missed it. 

 

Few things make me happier than solving a derailment issue.

[ToniBabelony]

Yay! Improvement material arrived! :D

 

 

EDIT forgot to add the work-in-progress:

 

 

P.s. yeah, I didn't  bother with getting the bogie replacements and just got them directly from a shoddy power unit xD

Edited April 17, 2017 by Kabutoni

[JR 500系]

Greenmax coreless motor! Nice ~ Oh now I see the 3-holes for the tomytec bogies ~  :P

[ToniBabelony]

Greenmax coreless motor! Nice ~ Oh now I see the 3-holes for the tomytec bogies ~  :P

 

It's soooooo smoooooth :3~

 

I've replaced one where the motor was kind of toast anyway (cheap 2nd hander) and it's a world of difference. I still can't believe Greenmax has managed to produce such an amazing power unit.

[JR 500系]

Indeed... my only issue with it is that there are almost close to nothing on the coreless base, not even some small seats.... It also tends to be TOO smooth that even the slightest twit on the power knob drives the train forward, which often means I have to twit my constant lighting (CL) knob down to make the train sit on the platform stationary... Twitting down the CL means a lower lighted up interior, in some older trains, they don't even light up...

 

Other than that, it's almost a perfect motor for running, especially on slow speeds. Is it just me or does it also sound a lot less noisy than the MA motors?

[ToniBabelony]

To me, the motors are almost silent. I also don't intend to run them with CL interior lights at the moment or mixed with any other material at the same time, so every time I'd have to run these, it's just a matter of adjusting the CL knob if available on a certain layout. Because I keep my coreless fleet simple I think this won't be an issue anyway. As for the interior, I'm thinking of creating seats myself with either 3D printing or cutter plotter from paper (probably the latter as it's cheaper and more reliable), but that will be a project for later when I have more units that need interiors.

 

P.s. I might get lucky and find interiors for coreless motors in spare parts offerings at local GM stores.

Edited April 17, 2017 by Kabutoni

[kvp]

If the starting voltage of the coreless motor is really so low and it's not safe to run the set continously on full throttle, you might want to avoid running it with anything that has a pwm drive. This includes Tomix CL and other pwm controllers, the japanese ttrak atc system and pretty much anything with pulse power. The Kato N/H0, Lego 9V, Minitrix N and Maerklin Z and Fremo N analog wall adapter throttles are safe though as all of them are smooth linear ones.

[medusa]

Sounds like this kind of motor unit is the ideal choice for my analog cab-style controller...

[ToniBabelony]

If the starting voltage of the coreless motor is really so low and it's not safe to run the set continously on full throttle, you might want to avoid running it with anything that has a pwm drive. This includes Tomix CL and other pwm controllers, the japanese ttrak atc system and pretty much anything with pulse power. The Kato N/H0, Lego 9V, Minitrix N and Maerklin Z and Fremo N analog wall adapter throttles are safe though as all of them are smooth linear ones.

 

The Tomix CL system is luckily a standalone/isolated/galapagos standard which can be avoided. The T-Trak Network (not T-Trak) system has coreless motor trams running on them constantly, but because of the frequent start-stop procedures, there is at least not much time for the motors to develop heat and cause damage. Tomix themselves are also releasing coreless motor trains (like the recent C11 steamer), but I don't know what impact that has in any way for either the existence of the CL system in general, or coreless motors themselves.

[kvp]

High voltage coreless motors are ok. Low voltage motors with safety circuits are also safe (Kato). Only low voltage coreless motors are in danger and only when allowed to overheat. The same damage could happen as with any standard decoderless motor run on DCC with zero stretching.

 

ps: The Tomix CL system is just a nicer PWM system. Rokuhan uses the same technology. All DCC decoders are also PWM based. Pulse power/pwm is not as rare as one would think.

[IST]

After last week ballasting, it looks OK to me:

 

But I worked on another modul that will have a small cemetery, like this:

 

I used the fence made by Coromant:

 

Then added some grass (I mean: a lot) inside the fence:

 

After a few minutes it looked this way:

 

So I could use the GrassMaster on the remaining part of the modul (with some masking of the cemetery). I wanted to have 2 different colour grass:

 

I waited again a few minutes and collected unnecessary grass:

 

And added 2 trees which were made as one piece (not glued yet):

 

In the next episode ( :) ) I will:

- add some flowers outside the fence,

- add one or two trees,

- add small bushes,

- maybe put one people in the cemetery.

It won't be the most detailed modul ever, but I quite like it. Not a common theme and the hand made double tree (made by another club member) is my favourite one. I think this type of moduls became my style and I am happy with it. :)

[ianlaw]

The tree looks great. Here's a shot I took some years ago, for further inspiration... Keep up the good work.