Any good locos

[Brett2005]

Hey guys im an american who wants to dive into the japanese n scale market, any recommendations that are $200 or below

[bill937ca]

Try Kato Japanese prototype locomotives.  Here is a source, but his prices may not be the lowest.

 

https://www.ebay.com/sch/m.html?_ssn=plazajapan&LH_PrefLoc=2&_from=R40&_trksid=p2499338.m570.l1311.R1.TR10.TRC0.A0.H0.Xkato+locomotive.TRS0&_nkw=kato+locomotive&_sacat=0

 

Japanese prototype locomotives will generally be less direct from Japan.

 

Hobby Search is another source:

 

https://www.1999.co.jp/eng/list/1703/0/1

 

https://www.1999.co.jp/eng/list/1704/0/1

 

https://www.1999.co.jp/eng/list/1705/0/1

[chadbag]

21 minutes ago, Brett2005 said:

Hey guys im an american who wants to dive into the japanese n scale market, any recommendations that are $200 or below

 

Are you looking at Steam?  Diesel or Electric for Freight or passenger?  EMU or DMU commuter? Bullet train?

 

$200 can easily buy a few locomotives.   KATO and Tomix are the main vendors and both make good stuff.    You'll find, I think, that on a comparative basis Japanese n-scale is relatively  inexpensive.   As long as you don't use stupid extortionist vendors 

[cteno4]

Welcome Brett,

 

you are in luck i think almost all japanese locos are under $200! in fact that will easily get you a lot of nice 8 car passenger trains with motor units!

 

What are you most interesting in doing? freight, passenger, commuter? theres a lot to do with japanese trains! many of the passenger trains are multiple motor units so few locomotive pulled trains. Freight tends to be smaller and more restricted to containers and tankers and a small smattering of gondolas these days. Not the big huge freight trains of the us.

 

jeff

[cteno4]

yes its a great bang for the buck and do ask and compare prices as there are a few vendors on the web and ebay that will charge 2-4x the price tring to get folks that think Japanese stuff is rare or hard to get. 

 

the suppliers forum will give you some good options for buying. there are several options and most are easy, speak english, use cc or paypal and excellent service.

 

model trains plus, hobby search, ami ami all have good english web sites and good prices. plazajapan on ebay is a long time seller of japanese trains at reasonable prices using ebay if you prefer. amazon.co.jp (and rarely amazon.com) also has some options to buy thru amazon at reasonable prices. you can put the site into english mode so most of the navigational stuff is in english. so many options. you will find the service is really good and folks seldom have issues, mostly shipping sometimes, but sal and ems shipping works well to the us. sal is cheap, but no insurance and tracking (unless you used registered sal for $4 more) and takes 2-4 weeks. ems is like express mail here and usually 4-5 days but 2-4x the price of sal but gets you tracking and insurance and trains faster. dhl is also an option that is very fast, but expensive, with many vendors and what amazon.jp uses.

 

fell free to ask questions and prowl some of the forums, i think youll find a lot of good info to help get you started!

 

jeff

[Kiha66]

Welcome Brett!  

Luckily Japanese N scale is very affordable, so $200 will get you far.  On top of that many form members here (myself included) easily go a bit overboard in purchases, so good used stock can be found fairly cheaply from time to time.  Lots of good knowledge on the forum so when you find your interest there is lots of help with finding what you need.

 

-Sam

Edited January 4, 2019 by Kiha66

[Brett2005]

im mainly looking for steam engines and electric locos

[cteno4]

what are you planning on pulling?

 

jeff

[chadbag]

Just a note if you do use Amazon.co.jp (which is a good source, along with Ami Ami, Hobby Source, ModelTrainsPlus -- all of which I have used):  Make sure the items you buy on Amazon.co.jp are actually being sold by Amazon.  If it is a marketplace vendor, not Amazon, then they most likely won't ship to the US or if they do the shipping will be extravagant.   But stuff sold and shipped by Amazon is sent DHL, at very attractive shipping prices to the US (much cheaper than anything but SAL and sometimes approaching that price), and for me takes 2-4 days.  (There are exceptions where some stuff is expensive to ship -- I think it is because of data entry errors into their system on size and weight of an item).  

 

Ami Ami also offers DHL amongst others and while I have not had Ami Ami ship with DHL yet, they did send me an estimated price for something using DHL and it was VERY reasonable -- so much so that they got a pre-order from me.

 

Hobby Search has gotten their fair share of my dollars and they offer good service.  ModelTrainsPlus also offers excellent service.

[Welshbloke]

You could do a lot worse than look at this pack, if modern JRF container operations appeal:

 

https://www.1999.co.jp/eng/m/10241008

 

The two container flats have different running numbers to the single ones Tomix also sell, so you won't have duplicates as you extend the train.

[JR 500系]

Welcome Brett!

 

As Jeff suggested, look into the suppliers section of the forum and you will be spoilt for choice for the wide range of suppliers out there that are each great in their own ways! $200 is certainly a comfortable budget to get some really nice looking locomotives and some cargo or passenger cars to haul along with it!