Bandai B-Train Shorty

[Cat]

This week, I've been sticking up our commuter trains.  Did the 5-car Series E231 batch today. 

Still meditating on the 5-car Series E531 set which is next.  I'm leaning towards making the set a Doctor Doolittle pushmi-pullyu with forward directional lights at both ends.  With that, it will always look correct when pulling in to any station.  We don't have turnaround loops, so it would be going backwards half the time if we put reverse lights on one end.

 

Edited June 27, 2020 by Cat

[lukewang01]

Has anyone converted types between the power units from bandai? I want to try and convert one of the No. 3 (EMUs) to a No. 4(Tram). From what I can see in the picture it's only missing the couplers, but I want to make sure I'm not missing anything before doing it. Also, where is a good place to look for bandai chassis? Prices are crazy on ebay, and mostly out of stock on hobby search.

[lukewang01]

1 hour ago, lukewang01 said:

Has anyone converted types between the power units from bandai? I want to try and convert one of the No. 3 (EMUs) to a No. 4(Tram). From what I can see in the picture it's only missing the couplers, but I want to make sure I'm not missing anything before doing it. Also, where is a good place to look for bandai chassis? Prices are crazy on ebay, and mostly out of stock on hobby search.

 

NVM, figured it out.

[Cat]

Yes, 4 is the same size as 3 without couplers.

Prices on Yahoo Auction Japan are much better than EBay for chasses (or most any Japanese items), but still high.  ZenMarket is generally the best way to bid on YAJ; Buyee is better when they are running a promotional coupon that covers their usual extra bidding fee.

[lukewang01]

Thanks

 

So sad to see this series kinda being left out. Would love to see a B-train Shiki-shima one day. 

Edited September 14, 2020 by lukewang01

[lukewang01]

On 6/27/2020 at 12:43 AM, Cat said:

This week, I've been sticking up our commuter trains.  Did the 5-car Series E231 batch today. 

Still meditating on the 5-car Series E531 set which is next.  I'm leaning towards making the set a Doctor Doolittle pushmi-pullyu with forward directional lights at both ends.  With that, it will always look correct when pulling in to any station.  We don't have turnaround loops, so it would be going backwards half the time if we put reverse lights on one end.
 

 

Would you mind confirming which type of chassis did the E531 come with? Did it come with the one piece chassis + 2 trucks or the 2 piece chassis? I'm planning on buying E231 Joban line (Released roughly the same time) and make a 1M3T using KATO parts, but I'm low on those one piece chassis. 

Thanks

[Cat]

It came with the awful 2-piece chasses.  

I was able to score a couple of large lots of the 1-piece ones at YAJ.  Sort by price low to high and start scrolling through, all the junk parts auctions come up first.  Also take a close look at any lots of junk cars — sellers often include a photo of the bottom side and you can confirm the type of chassis; sometimes you can luck out and they include upgrade bogies too.

[lukewang01]

Thanks, that sucks, I'm saving those one-piece for a possible skyliner type AE 2M6T, I guess just have to put the E231 aside. Is there some kind of cut off year where they switched style maybe? I thought I read it somewhere but I couldn't find it.

[Cat]

That would be roughly when they introduced their own T-kai upgrade chassis and switched to the 2-piece to take the bogie business away from Kato.  But they also changed the parts on some earlier kits that had later production runs.  I've got Cassiopeia cars from different packages with both types.  The T-kai type fetch a premium at auction (YAJ is still much better than EBay); it's a pity they haven't kept these in production.

[lukewang01]

Just in case anyone wants to build a skyliner type AE 8 car set as well, you're gonna need x4 A set and x3 B set, so you don't make the same mistake I made. 

[disturbman]

Discovered that a company was making interior lighting kits for Shorties.  Not exactly sure what to think of this. It looks really good but that seems completely wasteful.

https://twitter.com/syokudian/status/1211406796134346752/photo/1

[cteno4]

They were selling these on amazon.co.jp a while back I had posted it somewhere here. I really like the etched brass Kato truck retrofits. Bandai had all the stuff there from early on for lighting with their trucks with pickups, slots in the chassis and what looked like places to pop in conducting strips and such inside but nothing ever happened. i have a few packs of the bandai trucks with pickups they came and went pretty fast and I got them when they were getting cleared out at the end (maybe they didn’t sell well or reduced easy rolling too much).

 

always thought it would be fun to light the btrains. I did test just soldering wires onto a Kato truck with pickups and it worked pretty well with 34g wire but harder to hide the wiring as it needs to be free to turn easily.

 

one isssue I worry about with Btrain lighting is they will probably flicker a lot as the cars are light and do bounce around a lot.

 

jeff

[disturbman]

2 hours ago, cteno4 said:

one isssue I worry about with Btrain lighting is they will probably flicker a lot as the cars are light and do bounce around a lot.

Could. Their video shows pretty stable lighting, no flickering at all.
 

 

[Welshbloke]

It would probably be fairly simple to make the brass pickups to fit the Bandai bogies. The other problem might well be the extra friction though. I've had enough trouble persuading the wheels in the whitemetal leading bogie of a steam engine to turn while the wire pickups bear on the back of them with enough force to work!

[cteno4]

Hmm doesn’t look like any caps on the board. But going on pretty straight and even track. 
 

makes me think now of using the pc board as the carriage bottom, but would require CNC cutting the pickup arcs in. No reason a few caps couldn’t go on the board to nix any flicker like thru points etc. I like how they use good old rectangular leds with long leads and just bend them over. Simple.

 

ill dig out my soldered on truck and solder up a current regulator on it and a couple of leds to try. It seemed to not restrict the truck much with the wire, but I never powered it up and tried to run it. 

 

is it wire or a rubber band attaching the pc board to the chasis?

 

heres the topic on this.

 

¥2780 for a two pack so about $13 per car.

 

https://www.amazon.co.jp/gp/product/B07WTSNF7R/ref=pe_8258952_391135552_em_1p_3_ti
 

Then ¥980 for what looks to be pickups for 2 trucks. Getting expensive fast.

 

https://www.amazon.co.jp/-/en/dp/B089VQF7VN/ref=pd_sbs_21_1/358-3393127-4046803?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=B089VM36LS&pd_rd_r=9bf0ba2e-c7ca-4b05-8b37-796c558aa070&pd_rd_w=wfJFk&pd_rd_wg=Q6GrI&pf_rd_p=4acc31d7-eae8-4ee9-8e37-275fb9bc20c2&pf_rd_r=VWYZ721PVGY033Y34PJY&refRID=VWYZ721PVGY033Y34PJY&th=1

 

jeff

[cteno4]

Does sound like rubber bands to hold the pc board in place from the amazon train stuff description. Actually one of the most informative amazon product descriptions I’ve seen! 
 

jeff

[Welshbloke]

If it works then try mouldable glue for a permanent fix. Used it to hold the innards of a 3D printed video light in place (as it's more controllable than the hot glue the instructions suggested) and it shows no sign of working loose.

[lukewang01]

Starting to prototype my own one piece chassis so I can run KATO parts. Planning on 3D printing it.  

[cteno4]

Cool! Others could use these as well! 
 

maybe put in the truck power connection arc slots? 
 

jeff

[lukewang01]

No problem, wouldn't be too hard, we'll see how does requests and demands go. I'm still in the phase of tuning the model better. The holes where KATO bogies plug in are too thin for the printer's liking, I'm probably going to change to a smaller diameter nozzle to reduce the defective rate.

The lower right printed out fine while the top left didn't go well.

 

The height with the current model looks fine for me. From left to right :KATO Power unit, Printed Chassis + KATO bogie, OEM Chassis + KATO bogies

[cteno4]

Nice work. Now that’s a good excuse to get a extrusion printer! I’ve circled the idea but few yeah that’s a good excuse that I can’t do easily another way! I’ll keep trying to resist though as I have too many projects laying around...

 

jeff

[lukewang01]

Well, I'm not gonna say don't get one. It unlocks quite some potentials for projects, and there are some good consumer grade printers that are very affordable. You just need to have some level of 3D modeling skills to get started.

[cteno4]

Yeah, it’s the cad work that is the time sink. I’ve learned cad like 3 times in the last 30 odd years. It’s a bit of a learning curve investment, not horrible and doable just time! Too many projects and too little time!

 

jeff

[lukewang01]

Printed two test batches of five today one with 0.4mm nozzle and one with 0.2mm. Quality of the holes is significantly better with the smaller diameter nozzle, but now the tabs holding the chassis to the body is too flimsy. It snapped when I was barely holding it, and print time increased from 15mins each to 40mins each. Need to find the middle ground between the two.

Edited October 1, 2020 by lukewang01

[Kanpai Keith]

I’d use the bigger nozzle and drill the holes.