Shinkansen 8-car consist

[Bdt]

Where is the best place to put the power car in an eight car train. I currently have it placed after car 1.

Edited July 5 by disturbman

[cteno4]

It can really go anywhere. You will usually find a diagram in the instructions to show you the prototypical formation of the cars the set was designed to run in. Usually the motor cars on most Japanese sets are near the middle of the train.

 

jeff

[Bdt]

Thanks I put it in the no# 4 spot on my Kato Nokomi with DCC, no issues at all.

[disturbman]

Like Jeff said, the manufacturers normally give you a consist drawing which tells you the orders of all the cars (which should correspond to the order in the case). You shouldn't have to guess/change the position of the motor car 🙂

[Kamome]

Most models usually have the coach numbers on them and you just put them in order of.  Kato tend to be pre-printed on shinkansen, sometimes with the addition of roof numbers but older models you sometimes had to add these as stickers.  Some Tomix models have dry rub decals or stickers to add coach numbers. 

 

On Kato 16 car formation, the single motor car is often in or around car 10, assumedly because it's roughly in the middle and the smaller windows hide the reduced interior detail better.

Tomix usually have 2 motors for their longer 16 car trains, one example car 6 and car 12.  8 cars sets like the 500 its in car 4 or 5 but their N700-8000 Kyushu 8 car set has the motor in car 2.

 

Conclusion, It doesn't really matter where the motor is but if you want to create a more realistic looking train, put the coaches in the order they were intended.

[cteno4]

I cheat many times and put small stickers or paint pen the car numbers on the bottom of the car to easily keep them in order.

 

jeff