Tomytec 'Car-system'

[ToniBabelony]

A moment ago I dropped by a blog, posted earlier on the forum: http://www.jnsforum.com/index.php/topic,2633.msg26098.html#msg26098 where I came across an official Tomytec announcement: http://casco.blog.so-net.ne.jp/_images/blog/_a37/casco/IMGP0959.JPG

 

Self propelled, pathfinding busses? Hot damn! A new world opens for the modeller! I know the Faller Car System, but it's a bit expensive. However, Tomytec could also prove to be expensive as well. Anyways, I'm eagerly awaiting the progress on this promising system, as it looks like it'll be compatible with the Tomix Fine Track system. :3

 

I think Tomytec has some very nice surprises for us in the future!

[bill937ca]

Japanese buses do interesting maneuvers not seen in the West.

 

[Bernard]

Looking at the 2 photos on the Tomytec box, I see one version where you see the groves where the bus will follow, but in another photo, the grooves are hidden. Will you see the grooves if you work with this system? (It reminds me of the Aurora Model Motoring race cars back in the 60s with were a little larger than HO scale)

[KenS]

Self propelled, pathfinding busses? Hot damn! A new world opens for the modeller!

 

Seconded. I wonder if they'll have a motorized chassis that's compatible with their earlier bus collection vehicles, or if they'll also do at least trucks.  I'm really interested in this for the urban section of my layout. I'd been thinking about the Faller system, but something with Japanese-prototype vehicles would be much better (especially if it ends up being less expensive).

[disturbman]

Looking at the 2 photos on the Tomytec box, I see one version where you see the groves where the bus will follow, but in another photo, the grooves are hidden.

 

I think the grooves you are seeing are the rail from the new Tomix Tram system. You can then expand the platform by adding road plates to it... At least, that's what I understand from the given schematics.

[bill937ca]

Looking at the 2 photos on the Tomytec box, I see one version where you see the groves where the bus will follow, but in another photo, the grooves are hidden. Will you see the grooves if you work with this system? (It reminds me of the Aurora Model Motoring race cars back in the 60s with were a little larger than HO scale)

 

http://casco.blog.so-net.ne.jp/_images/blog/_a37/casco/IMGP0959.JPG

 

In this image you see the bus track on either side of the Tomix wide tram track. This may be why we haven't seen any switches or crossovers yet.  But we know more than we did a month ago.

[Mudkip Orange]

Japanese buses do interesting maneuvers not seen in the West.

 

I've designed driveways for firetrucks to make that maneuver, as an alternative to cul-de-sacs. We call them "hammerheads."

[cteno4]

one of the big problems with the system is you can only have one (or a few if you work it our right) busses on your roadway. for a city scene you end up with vacant streets. still think the faller system works best on a more deserted rural road in a place you can hide the turn arounds. that way it does not look odd there are no other vehicles on the roadway. also if you are doing a city scene with these and have a bunch of stationary vehicles around the faller roadway its odd that only one (or a few vehicles) are moving.

 

just something to think on.

 

cheers

 

jeff

[bill937ca]

You could do something like this with the buses coming out of the underground terminal and vanishing under Shinkansen tracks (to a hidden entrance back into the tunnel). Layouts are usually much more compact than the real world.

 

 

 

 

With Japanese roads and traffic volumes there are a lot of ways to think outside the box.

[ToniBabelony]

one of the big problems with the system is you can only have one (or a few if you work it our right) busses on your roadway. for a city scene you end up with vacant streets. still think the faller system works best on a more deserted rural road in a place you can hide the turn arounds. that way it does not look odd there are no other vehicles on the roadway. also if you are doing a city scene with these and have a bunch of stationary vehicles around the faller roadway its odd that only one (or a few vehicles) are moving.

 

Oh how very true. I've seen quite a lot of layouts that were built in such a way where city streets were deserted with cars just to let a bus run his rounds. If Tomytec were to release a smart system with stopping points and simple switches (maybe with charging points as well), this would of course, change the whole aspect.

 

I'm really really looking forward to this. *already imagining a small table-top with everything moving*

[Martijn Meerts]

There's already a system for the Faller cars that allows computer control. It requires quite a bit of work on the vehicles, since they need a decoder installed, but they can do headlights, tail lights, brake lights, indicator lights and smooth acceleration and deceleration.

 

It requires computer control though, and unfortunately for most people here, at the moment the only program to support the system is only available in Dutch. I've seen it in action though, and it looks real nice.

[Guest ___]

I've seen a lot of the buses in Kyoto make odd maneuvers like this. But I recall as a kid our buses in Pittsburgh made 3-points and K-turns on some of the hill routes like the old 64 and 75 lines.

[cteno4]

it looks like tomix/tomytec is pulling the trigger on the bus system! Shizuoka hobby show blog shows more pictures. looks like they will have a system to not only start and stop, but also have a remotely switchable slow and fast speeds! also appears they will make these as mechanisms for the tomytec bus lines like the mechanism for the rr series so you can mix and match! really a great combo for tomytec as they have so many bus shells out there already and scads of collectors that will want to run their busses now! im hoping they can really get the mechanism cost down to near what they do the tram mechanisms for if they could do $25-30 they would really have a big hit on their hands i think.

 

http://translate.googleusercontent.com/translate_c?hl=en&sl=ja&tl=en&u=http://popondetta.com/blog/cat3/tomytec_27.html&rurl=translate.google.com&usg=ALkJrhjsWfh93CuWHjel_NA36iKzDeHWsQ#more

 

cheers

 

jeff

[Guest ___]

It's rather fascinating how aggressive TT has become over the past 36 months.

[cteno4]

it is indeed amazing. I assume they have been financially successful with it as i doubt it would have continued so long at the clip is has if it wasnt! i guess they found the right place to scratch on a number of markets at once! it is amazing that they have been so agressive with no real competition either. they drove bandai out very early on in the structures and vehicles. bandai was probably very smart to just put all their eggs into the btrain shorties as they pretty much had that locked up well and they were not going to compete well with tomytec with their vehicles and clay buildings.

 

i guess its the japanese always keep something new coming marketing strategy.

 

cheers

 

jeff

[bill937ca]

ithey drove bandai out very early on in the structures and vehicles. bandai was probably very smart to just put all their eggs into the btrain shorties as they pretty much had that locked up well and they were not going to compete well with tomytec with their vehicles and clay buildings.

 

 

This is a very naive view of Japanese business strategies.  In the home market companies directly competing is frowned upon unless they are of the same size.  Its not the United States.  I think you will find Bandai is very active in the toy premium side of scale models and special issues.  There is a whole side of the Japanese model industry that we do not see through hobby shops.  Bandai is one of chief suppliers of special issue model trains along with Tomytec.  Usually these are only sold at shows or in stations and often with individual purchase limits.  Anyways Bandai's toy business lies outside scale models.

[cteno4]

ithey drove bandai out very early on in the structures and vehicles. bandai was probably very smart to just put all their eggs into the btrain shorties as they pretty much had that locked up well and they were not going to compete well with tomytec with their vehicles and clay buildings.

 

 

This is a very naive view of Japanese business strategies.  In the home market companies directly competing is frowned upon unless they are of the same size.  Its not the United States.  I think you will find Bandai is very active in the toy premium side of scale models and special issues.  There is a whole side of the Japanese model industry that we do not see through hobby shops.  Bandai is one of chief suppliers of special issue model trains along with Tomytec.  Usually these are only sold at shows or in stations and often with individual purchase limits.  Anyways Bandai's toy business lies outside scale models.

 

Bill,

 

that was my direct meaning they drove bandai out. i do realize competition is not the same in japan as the us. what seemed to happen here was bandai started with the first sets of items for the cheap collectable (not the fine scale stuff) with truck sets and the town sets, but just after that tomytec started their lines and after the first few released from tomytec, bandai stopped their lines all together and very abruptly (they had i think one set of trucks in overlap at the same time as tomytec). unless tomytec got the impression bandai was giving up on this market and moved in quickly, i think this may have been a case where tomytec with its tomix train stuff as well thought they might be able to round up a better set of markets for the same product lines than bandai could. bandai realizing this did not want to compete, but refocused.

 

it did indeed seem like bandai went off and focused on btrain shorties (big business with no one else doing the same ideas) and tomytec going after the 1/150 inexpensive scale vehicle, scene and building models. an example of the non direct competition, but the divvying up of markets into discrete units they each do alone w/o each trying to do the same thing.

 

kato and tomix on the other hand seems a very odd mix of japanese business that is ever evolving and doing odder things.

 

interesting thing is that bandai has about twice the over all sales of tomy.

 

cheers

 

jeff

[David]

EBIT has posted translations of some recently released TomyTec documents on the bus system on the Atlas forum. This includes pictures and information about the functional components and what exactly they do.

 

http://forum.atlasrr.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=62707

[ToniBabelony]

And pre-ordering now:

 

HS: http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10130252

HW: https://www.hwjapan.com/sh/TOM10101481.aspx

[cteno4]

pretty funny the first translation comes out on the atlas forum!

 

they show a magnet placed on either side of the intended bus stop, so i would guess if the bus is running fast the first trip makes its slow to a stop (ie at the stop), then when i would guess it just pauses a set time at the stop then starts up slow. then when it hits the magnet it speeds up to fast gear.

 

this is odd though as the bus stop slider says you can route the bus into the stop to stop or just go straight and pass up the stop. this would indicate a different stop mechanism when the slider is in the bus stop position and the bus goes into the stop and the magnets only toggle the speed between fast and slow.

 

in addition there is a note that the stop at the bus stop can be either selected to be forever or only a 15 sec pause. not sure if this toggle is on the bus itself or on the stop.

 

appears they got rid of using a rechargeable cell and went to LR44 button cells. for the difference in price between the tomix and the faller you could buy many thousand cells, but do hate the idea of chucking all those cells...

 

interesting they give you a steering holder so you can just run the bus straight or in a circle w/o the roadway.

 

cant wait till feb! at one half to one third the cost of the faller system its great. and im betting more of the bus shells might also fit on the mechanisms with some fiddling.

 

cheers

 

jeff

[keiman]

Looks interesting - will wait to see what people say about it when it is released.

[cteno4]

found it intersting that this week a seller popped up on ebay with lots of faller trucks and busses in n scale. not cheap at all, but they seem to be a dealer. these have been hard to find on ebay or with dealers in the last year or two, only showing up on ebay or in stock at euro dealers spottily...

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=250716065035&ssPageName=ADME:B:SS:US:1123#ht_635wt_1037

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/Car-System-Start-Set-MB-Truck-/250716065014?pt=Model_RR_Trains&hash=item3a5fd78cf6#ht_635wt_1037

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/Car-System-Mercedes-Benz-SK-Wiking-/250716065046?pt=Model_RR_Trains&hash=item3a5fd78d16#ht_635wt_1037

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/Car-System-Mercedes-Benz-SK-Truck-Wiking-/250716065061?pt=Model_RR_Trains&hash=item3a5fd78d25#ht_635wt_1037

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/Car-System-Henschel-Tanker-Truck-Littke-/220687121668?pt=Model_RR_Trains&hash=item3361fa3d04#ht_635wt_1037

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/Car-System-Traffic-Lights-Switch-/220687121674?pt=Model_RR_Trains&hash=item3361fa3d0a#ht_635wt_1037

 

will be interesting to see if tomytec branches out into the trucks and semis as well. they have the vehicles that could do it easily. i looked at possibly putting a faller buss mechanism into a tomytec hino and it looked like it should work well.

 

only downside i see to the tomytec version is their mechanism is in sort of a big sealed box. the neat thing about the faller is it was all modular parts that you could lift out pretty easily to graft into another vehicle and move the parts (switch, battery, etc) around to fit into the new vehicle. oh well it is a lot cheaper! will be interesting to see if the tomytec 'box' can be broken apart easily....

 

cheers

 

jeff

[bill937ca]

From a show at the Yokohama Landmark. At least three buses in motion and one tram.

 

[The_Ghan]

I love it!

 

Unfortunately, you need to keep the roads clear of other models which makes the setting look a little stark.  Still, 20 or so of these running simultaneously in a small setting, with parked vehicles along side might look good.  I'd love to see the ability to alter the route with "points" or "turn outs".  I'd also like to see traffic lights.

 

I think it needs a little evolution before I commit ... but I still love it!

 

Cheers

 

The_Ghan

[Guest ___]

I love it!

 

Unfortunately, you need to keep the roads clear of other models which makes the setting look a little stark.  Still, 20 or so of these running simultaneously in a small setting, with parked vehicles along side might look good.  I'd love to see the ability to alter the route with "points" or "turn outs".  I'd also like to see traffic lights.

 

I think it needs a little evolution before I commit ... but I still love it!

 

Cheers

 

The_Ghan

 

That also sounds very expensive when you talk 20 or 30