No clue what it can be and why it's open

[JR East]

Hello

 

Looking to the video 

 

 

AT 08:55 you can see that :

 

 

 

I've no clue what that is and why it's open. 

 

As I'm sure I've the best knowledge base here, I'm confident I'll have the best response

 

Many thanks, 

 

JM. 

[bill937ca]

There is a projecting step on the E3 Shinkansen, most probably because the E3 is narrower than other stock on the lines it runs on. This would eliminate any gaps at platforms.

 

Photo on Wikipedia.

A movable step that fills the gap between the Shinkansen platform and the car body ( L52 formation)

https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/新幹線E3系電車#/media/ファイル:E3_step.jpg

 

https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/新幹線E3系電車

Edited November 20, 2022 by bill937ca

[katoftw]

Mini shinkansen. Extra step to platform as train is narrower than regular shinkansens. Looks like it is just stuck open/up.

Edited November 20, 2022 by katoftw

[bikkuri bahn]

Retractable gap filler for smaller rolling stock as others have said.  Both sides are activated when arriving at a station.  Why not activated on the platform side only?- likely a failsafe feature and cost saving. 

[200系]

As the good folks here already mentioned, these are retractable steps used by all mini-shinkansen series. That said, perhaps I can add a bit of shinkanology to the mix, even though the subject itself doesn't allow for too deep a dive, at least not unless diving deeper into the development and history of the mini-shinkansen, which would be a bit much.

 

As the Yamagata and Akita shinkansen services operate on re-gauged conventional lines, and as such are treated as such [note1], the rolling stock operating on these lines has to confirm with the conventional standards when it comes to the vehicle limit. This means the carbody is restricted to a maximum width of 2,950 mm, though because of limitations imposed by the standard platform width, this is limited to  2,800 mm up till 1,160 mm above the rail head, with a maximum height of 4,070 mm [note2].  As a result all mini-shinkansen series have a distinctive squeezed hem similar to other conventional stock. In contrast, the vehicle limit used on the shinkansen is much larger than the one used on the national (conventional) network, with a max width of 3,400 mm starting at 600mm above the railhead [note3] up till the maximum height of 4,500 mm. As a result, most shinkansen cars are built to a max width of 3,380 mm, with the only exceptions being the N700 series and E5 series (3,360 mm and 3,370 mm respectively) which have to account for the underside of the carbody tilting slightly outward because of the body tilt system. With the construction limit for the shinkansen being even wider, 3,650 mm at platform height, the resulting gap between the car and platform increases to almost half a meter, depending on the platform. In order to bridge this gap, the aforementioned steps were added.

 

The steps themselves operate automatically when operating on the Tōhoku Shinkansen, and seem to be speed based, being raised (with a satisfying clunk) when below a certain speed and being lowered when above a certain speed. As mentioned, they operate on both sides of the train irregardless of the actual location of the platform. For obvious reasons, the steps remain in the lowered position when running on the Yamagata or Akita Shinkansen. They have been fitted on all mini-shinkansen series since the 400 series prototype formation was delivered in 1990, including the 400 series (production formations), E3 series, E6 series and soon the E8 series. They are mounted slightly above platform height in order to allow for enough clearance on curved platforms.

 

In general, the fact that they have/had to operate on a conventional line means the 400 series, E3 series and E6 series are/were different in a lot of regards when compared to their "pureblood" sisters, with things like car length, bogie wheelbase, nose design, pantograph type and mounting car layout etc. being different, though individual differences depend on the series of course. In terms of layout they are more comparable to a limited express type using shinkansen technology rather than a shrunk version of a shinkansen, though the E6 series, and I assume the E8 series will be as well, is much closer to the latter [note4].

 

 

-> A combined Yamabiko/Komachi service, consisting of a 200 series K formation (K21~K31 sub-group, most likely formation K27 based on the car sub-types being used (god, I'm such a nerd...)) and E3 series 0 sub-type R formation (R2~R16 sub-group), departing Ōmiya in 1999. At ~00:20 you can see the steps being retracted. Note the visual difference between the cross section of the (much larger) 200 series and E3 series, as well as the squeezed hem which can be clearly seen on the E3 series.

Of course I didn't include this clip for personal reasons, but entirely because of objective reasons (god that combination of the sound produced by the Hitachi GTO-VVVF system combined with the DC traction motors + WN-Drive of the 200 series sounds so good...*ahum* nothing to see here😅)

(credit: Rail Channel [レールちゃんねる] (https://www.youtube.com/@Rail_Channel))

 

-> A combined Max-Yamabiko/Tsubasa service consisting of an unidentified E4 series formation combined with 400 series formation L3 arriving at Tōkyō station in 2010.

These steps were fitted to both passenger and crew doors as can be seen at the ~02:10 mark with the crew door steps being raised, while they are retracted at the 03:00 mark. (credit: Ayokoi (https://www.youtube.com/@ayokoi))

 

-> Combined Yamabiko/Komachi service, consisting of an E5 series formation coupled to an E3 series 0 sub-type formation (R18~R26 sub-group) arriving at Oyama station. (credit: Ayokoi (https://www.youtube.com/@ayokoi))

 

-> Split/merger procedures of E5 series and E6 series formations at Sendai station. The shot at 06:35 gives a great look at the deployment process on the E6 series. (credit: 鉄道だっちゃ!/It's railway! (https://www.youtube.com/@Tetsudo_daccha))

 

-> Close up view of the 400 series steps retracting after departure. (credit: Ilike209kei (https://www.youtube.com/@Ilike209kei))

 

Anyway, a hopefully interesting bit of shinkanology for those interested, though a bit rougher than I would've liked.

 

Cheers!

 

[note1] Though they are referred to as shinkansen in common parlance, the lines referred to as the Yamagata and Akita Shinkansen aren't classified as shinkansen but as conventional lines. Officially the Yamagata and Akita Shinkansen do not even exist as a separate line, with the conventional section of the Yamagata Shinkansen being classified as part of the Ōu mainline while the Akita Shinkansen operates on the Tazawako and Ōu mainline, though operationally the services running on the Tōhoku Shinkansen and Ōu mainline/Tazawako are referred to as either the Yamagata Shinkansen/Akita Shinkansen.

Interestingly, the same is true for the colloquial term, mini-shinkansen, which didn't originate with the opening of the Yamagata Shinkansen, but was actually coined during the last years of the National Railway era. The term was originally used for Kodama services operated between Hakata and Kokura on the Sanyō Shinkansen starting in 1985. These were intended for commuter traffic, and would be using 6-car formations composed of life extended 0 series, batch 10, cars which had reached their ~13 year service life and were originally intended to be scrapped. A number of these cars went through life extension between 1985 and 1986 and would be formed into 6 car R formations (Rokuryo or 6 car) for use on this service, which would be known as the mini-shinkansen. Though mostly unrelated, I thought it might be interesting to include the origin of the term free of charge😅.

 

[note2] The conventional vehicle limit to which the mini-shinkansen have to adhere, is the 1921 expanded vehicle limit introduced for the national railway (Ministry of Railways at that point in time) on the 14th of October, 1921, which as the name implies was an expansion of the 1919 vehicle limit. As this was an expansion of an existing limit, on some already existing lines obstacles like platforms, tunnels etc. couldn't be widened to accommodate the expanded 3,000 mm maximum width, which resulted in a 2,950 mm width being adopted by the national railway system. As existing platforms conformed to the 1919 limits, a squeezed hem structure was commonly used on cars which were to use the maximum vehicle limit. examples of these include the post-war, new-performance and later, suburban, ordinary express and limited express type electric multiple units. Commuter type EMUs were kept to a 2,800 mm up till the end of the National Railway era, with the (JR West) 207 series being the first commuter type train to make full use of the expanded vehicle limit. JR East would still use a 2,800 mm width for the 209 series, with the E231 series prototype and 209 series 500 sub-type cars introduced in 1998, being the first to use the 4-door widebody first introduced by the E217 series in 1994.

 

[note3] In addition to the larger vehicle limit, the limit used for the shinkansen is almost entirely rectangular allowing the shinkansen to make optimal usage of this limit. Not surprisingly, as the construction of the shinkansen allowed National Railway and RTRI engineers to establish the most efficient vehicle cross section unburdened by legacy infrastructure, which led to a large vehicle limit being chosen in order to increase capacity which was one of the primary drives behind the creation of the shinkansen. That being said, because of time constraints, difficulty in sourcing funding and because some infrastructure had already been built (the Nihonzaka Tunnel) the limit chosen is pretty much identical to the limit established for the pre-war/wartime Tōkyō-Shimonoseki Shinkansen project.

 

[note4] This is a bit of a simplification of course, but as the design of these trains has to content with some of the same limitations as those for limited express trains it isn't too far of either. As an example, aside from the cross section differences dictated by the different vehicle limits, these trains have to content with a tighter minimum radius for curves (160m on conventional lines vs 500m for the shinkansen (2500m+ for the actual high speed part of the shinkansen (~4000m for the Sanyō shinkansen and later)) resulting in shorter cars (20,500 mm/23,070~23,075 mm (end cars) vs 25,000 mm/25,150~27,000 mm for the traditional shinkansen) as well as a shorter bogie wheelbase (2,250 mm vs 2,500 mm) compared to traditional shinkansen. The same is true for the interior layout, which more closely resembles that of a limited express type.

 

 

 

[cteno4]

Damn sander, I wish the forum software still had the wiki built in as it would be great to file all these reports in wiki pages and index them!

 

thanks again, shinkanology rules! Perhaps you can start a cult!

 

cheers

 

jeff

[Martijn Meerts]

13 hours ago, cteno4 said:

Damn sander, I wish the forum software still had the wiki built in as it would be great to file all these reports in wiki pages and index them!

 

thanks again, shinkanology rules! Perhaps you can start a cult!

 

cheers

 

jeff

 

Actually, I think we still have access to the pages feature of the forum (it's currently disabled), which allows you to create wiki-style pages and add them to the forum. I started looking at it a long time ago, but there was some weirdness going on at the time. Might be an idea to pick that up again and see what's possible.

 

[Giugiaro]

Well, at least it would be nice to be able to bookmark individual posts. There were a couple of very usefully informed posts that I had to use the browser's tools to bookmark and save.

[JR East]

35 minutes ago, Giugiaro said:

Well, at least it would be nice to be able to bookmark individual posts. There were a couple of very usefully informed posts that I had to use the browser's tools to bookmark and save.

I totally agree. It's far more well explained than any other wikiepdia. 

 

Many thanks @200系, great explanations . Thumbs up !

[cteno4]

Would be nice to be able to have a private bookmark list with labels, but I’ve not seen that as a feature in our forum software (some features go poof with new versions). A lot of the features that have rolled out in new versions the last few years have been mainly social media type stuff (clubs, rankings etc) that have little to do with our little world and content which is our 800lb gorilla here—piles of content and not always a great ways to search for it some of the time. For now browser bookmarks are the solution.

 

jeff

[bill937ca]

What about a Wikipedia reference thread then?

[cteno4]

My wiki reference was to an internal wiki system the old forum software had that allowed you to create internal wiki pages very easily and integrate it into the post content. Sadly there was little interest from members to generate content at the time. There were questions on how we were going to handle the page management as well, and in the end with little interest we just let it go and good thing as we would have lost the content with the software change.

 

the work around we do is to have our reference topics where the originator of the topic starts out with a list or other content and then keeps editing it and adding to it as folks post new content in the topic. This way the first post sort of is a wiki page on the topic and folks don’t have to read thru dozens or more posts to find the info, but there is a public discussion on the information to allow folks to contribute or dispute content on the forest “wiki” post in the topic. It’s sort of a hybrid forum/wiki workaround. This is how topics like the suppliers or books reference topic works. It does require the originator of the topic (or a moderator) to do the updating of that first, master post, sort of like being a manager of a wiki page. We figured this way even if we went to a new forum platform the content would still be there as it would just be a regular forum topic in the data.

 

welcome to start topics like these on Wikipedia pages on various subjects, know you are always digging these up!

 

cheers,

 

jeff

[bill937ca]

I think I would start out by doing a Japanese Wikipedia thread with separate posts for the various Shinkansen trains. It easy to do because once you have one you have links at the bottom of the page for all the other articles.  I think I have some bookmarked. But we will see.

 

This way the maintenance rests with the Japanese originator who is closest to the porotype.  

 

Which forum would be best?

 

Maybe the another possibility would be a index page like this linking again to  Japanese Wikipedia link instead of Vienna tram links.

 

https://www.strassenbahnjournal.at/wiki/index.php?title=Hauptseite#Nachtverkehr

Edited November 22, 2022 by bill937ca

[cteno4]

With this it’s best for someone to take ownership and keep editing the first post in the topic to have a nice list like you linked too. Rest of posts are just new additions and discussion and originator of the topic keeps editing the first post with any updates from other posts in the topic. This way there is a very neat list in the first post of the topic and folks don’t have to root thru all the posts in the topic to find them. 
 

but I suppose you could have several posts at the top that are updated, but you need to make sure to make enough placeholder posts at the top at the beginning as we can’t insert any in at any place, we can only delete posts!

 

could just be one post with several lists in it like the book one. Important thing is a nice list in one place and not strewn out all over in a topic(s).
 

i keep this one up on Japanese train refs in English (yours was the most recent additions!)

 

 

Gavin had a bunch and we have one for dealers as well that staff keeps up.

 

jeff

[Martijn Meerts]

Before we go too far off-topic: 

 

 

[Sacto1985]

In short, due to the smaller loading gauge of the Yamagata and Akita Shinkansen tracks the 400 (now retired), E3 (slowing retiring) and E6 train sets have to be physically narrower. The upcoming E8 train sets that will replace the E3's on the Yamagata Shinkansen will also be built this way.