Is the Kato 5 car E531 set DCC friendly

[David]

http://www.katomodels.com/product/nmi/e531kei_jyoban.shtml

 

I already have the other powered set, 10-570 + 10-571 + 10-572 which form a 10 car formation. This 10 car set is definitely DCC friendly (EM13).

 

However the 5 car set carries a totally different number (10-283). At a glance it would seem to go with the 10 car set, given that the box has 2 extra slots to hold the 2 leftover cars from the 10 car set, and it's on the same page as the set described as DCC on Kato's website.

 

Does anyone have the 5 car set or can confirm that this is the same DCC tooling as the 10 car set?

[CaptOblivious]

I don't have it, but I'm quite willing to bet it's on the same tooling, and you will find it no different than the one you have.

 

Like many trains on the Joban line, the E531 runs as two sets coupled together (in this case in a 10+5 formation). The full 10+5 formation runs from Ueno to Tsuchiura, where they decouple. It's not clear to me what happens here, but the 5 car set apparently travels a bit further, then diverts to the Mito line, where the 10-car set continues through to…somewhere else.

 

So a complete model would consist of one each of all 4 of Kato's E531 sets.

[David]

I've figured out why the 5 car set has a totally different product number:

 

http://www.katomodels.com/product/nmi/010281.shtml

 

It's because the 10-283 set is actually listed under two different groups. The original (and now discontinued) set had 10 cars split between an 8 car basic set and a 2 car addon set (this explains the 2 free slots). Later, when the real prototype replaced 2 cars with double decker cars Kato responded by replacing the 10-281 and 10-282 sets with 3 new sets (with new numbers) splitting the 8 car set into 2 4 car sets, each 4 car set containing one double decker car. Fortunately the original 10-281 group is advertised as DCC friendly, so I think I can safely assume the 5 car portion is too.

 

Hobby Search also has a remark "Car Number Change" on the 5 car set - perhaps the newer runs of the 5 car set has new numbers (without any change to the Kato product #) so that you can run both 15 car formations without duplication.

[KenS]

I have both sets, and I can confirm that the 10-283 is "DCC Friendly".  I haven't actually installed a decoder in one, but the little "manual" (two pages of text, mostly Japanese) that comes with it has the DCC symbol on the list of cars (as does the newer model), and the hatch is present and openable, with the electrical contacts needed in place, on both the motor car and cab cars.

 

Both cab cars appear to be identically tooled, although the actual numbers on the car are different (and match the list on the manual sheet).

 

In fact, the only difference I found is that one of the cab cars on the 10-57x set lacks the little plastic insert in the DCC cavity that allows you to turn off the headlight if using DC (the second cab has it, and both cabs on the 10-283 have it).  That could have just been omitted by accident, or perhaps they expect that one to always be the front when using it in 10+5 configurations.  Since you discard the "switch" when installing DCC, I don't really care.

 

Actually, there's one other difference.  The 10-57x expansion set that included the display box came with the new light-green and white slipcase (which I consider ugly compared to the older dark green ones). The 10-283, despite being bought two months ago from Hobby Search, came with the dark green slipcase.

 

As for numbering, they are different.  The 10-57x set cars have "K417" on the front of the cabs (the cars are marked E530-17 and E531-17 on the sides), and the 10-283 cars are marked "K461" (or K401 or K451, it's really hard to make out even with my glasses), and the sides are E530-2011 and E531-1011.

[David]

I can confirm that my 10 car set has the same setup with the manual cab switches - only one end can be turned off.  I agree that it's likely because only one end is intended to join with the other set. Might it have something to do with the double decker cars not being in the center, but rather offset to one end of the formation - so prototypically speaking the 5 car set might only ever be joined to the one end of the 10 car set, where as the 5 car set itself is symmetrical?