Renumbering duplicate stock - worth it or not?

[ED75-775]

OK, I don't know if this has been posted before (and I haven't had time to hunt through all the forum threads)...

 

A while back a contact in Tokyo accidentally sold me a pair of Kato Tora 45000 gondolas instead of the Wara 1 boxcars I was expecting. He quickly fixed things up and sent the correct wagons over at a discounted price... but I was now the proud owner of two sets of Toras, having brought one in Kyoto earlier that year. Whoops! I decided to hang onto them in the time being, they look nice behind my C11 anyway.

 

I do like them and they're almost too nice to get rid of, so is there any way I can renumber them, and would it be worthwhile in the first place? Or am I best to cut my losses and either tolerate the duplication or chuck the second set online for sale?

 

Any help gratefully accepted!

[roadstar_na6]

I personally don‘t really care about it, I have a train that consists of 10 cars with two different numbers 😄 It‘s barely noticeable and I guess only some crazy rivetcounters would get offended by it.

 

Also applying new decals won‘t ever look as good as the printed ones from the factory I guess.

[ED75-775]

1 hour ago, roadstar_na6 said:

I personally don‘t really care about it, I have a train that consists of 10 cars with two different numbers 😄 It‘s barely noticeable and I guess only some crazy rivetcounters would get offended by it.

Yep, I tend toward that kind of rivet counting pedantry at times... I'm still learning how not to let it take over my focus.😒

Fair enough though, if these numbers are pad-printed on then they'll be more of a nuisance to replace than anything. And being N scale, unless you're really up close and personal, who's going to notice? So, time to stop worrying and start playing again I think.

[railsquid]

1 hour ago, ED75-775 said:

I do like them and they're almost too nice to get rid of, so is there any way I can renumber them, and would it be worthwhile in the first place? O

 

There seem to be a fair few third-party accessory producers who provide alternative numbers and other decals, even some for ToRas (image, linked from this page ), though not always easy to find (this set is sold out) or obtain, especially from abroad.

 

Not something I'd lose sleep over, unless you want to produce convincing close-up images showing multiple wagons.

[Cat]

Should you want to do something about it, weathering is the easiest fix to obscure different parts of the numbering on different cars.

[Martijn Meerts]

For N-scale, I try not to buy items with the same numbers, but when I do get duplicate numbers, I don't re-number them. It's not really worth the effort for me, since I'll be the only one who knows about it. Also, having done a lot of Dutch / German modelling, 'incorrect' numbers is a given 🙂

 

For my H0 on the other hand, most rolling stock are kits and come with number sheets or you can buy number sheets for them. That project is also all about detail, so I definitely don't want duplicates there.

 

 

[ED75-775]

23 hours ago, railsquid said:

There seem to be a fair few third-party accessory producers who provide alternative numbers and other decals, even some for ToRas (image, linked from this page ), though not always easy to find (this set is sold out) or obtain, especially from abroad.

Thanks for the suggestion! If my pedantry gets the better of me and I can find some this would be a good option. I foresee a day crawling around different train stores in Akihabara and maybe even further afield next year...

 

4 hours ago, Martijn Meerts said:

For N-scale, I try not to buy items with the same numbers, but when I do get duplicate numbers, I don't re-number them. It's not really worth the effort for me, since I'll be the only one who knows about it. Also, having done a lot of Dutch / German modelling, 'incorrect' numbers is a given 🙂

 

For my H0 on the other hand, most rolling stock are kits and come with number sheets or you can buy number sheets for them. That project is also all about detail, so I definitely don't want duplicates there.

Martijn, I hear ya! Duplicates in larger scales can be painfully obvious. I prefer not to have them on my H0 layout, it doesn't look realistic at all.

[Das Steinkopf]

Sadly my OCD extends way further than any of you would shudder to think, I am pretty much the pedant extraordinaire, I have ensured my fleet has no duplicate numbers and I have been lucky enough to purchase some Tomix models that had alternate car number decal sheets, I have renumbered KoKi 107's, 106's and 50000's as well as TaKi 1000's. With the TaKi 1000's I renumbered 9 of the Japan Oil Terminal cars so I could have a dozen to fill the case the 2 car limited edition set came in, the Japan Oil Transport cars I renumbered Tomix and Kato cars, the later I have 15 of to put behind my EH200. I also have this obsession with containers as well, I have a rule that I don't buy multiples of container sets, I have broken this rule recently though as I have brought a number of the more commonly used Tomix and Kato containers such as 19D's and UR19A's that will be permanently fixed to the pad of the freight depot I am in the process of building, due to the fact they will be in stacks 2 high I will do some slight renumbering only where it is visible. 

Edited June 8, 2020 by Das Steinkopf

[cteno4]

Really is all in what you enjoy with the hobby! In this case you can give ocd a creative outlet! 
 

Cheers

 

jeff

[nah00]

For my Japanese stuff I try to avoid dupe numbers but it's not a hard and fast rule. I did try to weed out some of the duplicates I had simply because they were starting to crowd out new stuff I had on my layout. I did renumber my Takis from Tomix and have a sheet to renumber my Koki 107s, just have to get around it. It'd be nice to get a sheet for Koki 200s too, especially with Tomix rereleasing them.  

 I did avoid it with my North American stock though but honestly I mostly bought hopper cars and tank cars so it's easy to get different numbers. 

[Drunkenclam]

As others said. It's up to you. I'm not bothered and probably wouldn't do it. Unless it was being photographed for publication (no chance of that) Then I might make an effort to avoid others finger pointing.

[Sheffie]

I wouldn’t try to replace any digits. Just remove the last digit from one car. Boom. They’re different, and you can tell that without needing a magnifying glass