ICE T scale from Nurenberg toy show

[cteno4]

ICE train was shown by Endoshima at the Nurenberg toy show. its awaiting DB final approval to go into production. also kihas with roof color. even one running under live catenary! wow! t is still going! no steam engine or shinkansen yet though...

 

http://www.trainaidsa.com/support-tg-news.shtml

 

cheers

 

jeff

[Claude_Dreyfus]

Hmmm...

 

Those KiHas look rather smart.

[Mr Frosty]

I rather like the funicular.

 

[bill937ca]

I rather like the funicular.

 

It only looks prototypical in a general way from far back.  Funiculars do not have switches, but use interlaced track which avoids the costs and maintenance issues of switches.  You never have both cars on the upper or lower level anyways as these railways use counter balances in moving up and down.  Just an expensive toy not a true scale model.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Funicular

 

 

http://www.funiculars.net/

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gauntlet_track

[IST]

Hmmm, I quite like how the ICE T looks like. I hope they can make the agreement with DB, although I won't buy the model.

[westfalen]

I might have to have another look at T-TRAK. I bought a couple of the 103 sets when they first came out but I thought it had died out.

 

T gauge would be ideal for high speed trains like the ICE or Shinkansen but the following also caught my eye, ". . . and if you are waiting for a Steam Loco . . . the wheel design is done,

units of the wheelsets are ready for testing! . . . Wow!!! . . Saw a specimen. Exciting!"

[cteno4]

yes much better at speed with many cars powered just like the prototype!

 

the steam engine was one of the first thing that Harai san did in T scale actually! he has held off production as it he is very careful about having too many projects in the pipeline. he has shown it off in the past.

 

n700 was rumored to be after the ICE train. question is if it will be full chassis length or not.

 

jeff

[westfalen]

 

n700 was rumored to be after the ICE train. question is if it will be full chassis length or not.

 

jeff

T scale suffers one of the same problems as N scale, instead taking advantage of the smaller size and using wider curves we use the tightest radius the trains will go round to squeeze the same layout in a smaller space, I'm guilty of it myself. Imagine a HO track plan left the same size but just replace the HO track with T.

[cteno4]

yep, but the first pass at t scale was for the micro layout market in japan. as Eishindo has found that the rest of the world seems to be responding better to t scale i think they may slowly make larger curves. they did the flex track so you can do your curves as large as you want them!

 

cheers

 

jeff

[nik_n_dad]

We got Nik some T-guage a couple of years ago and he's had fun with it, so when the ICE comes out, I have a funny feeling it will show up around here....

[DanMacK]

 

It only looks prototypical in a general way from far back.  Funiculars do not have switches, but use interlaced track which avoids the costs and maintenance issues of switches.  You never have both cars on the upper or lower level anyways as these railways use counter balances in moving up and down.  Just an expensive toy not a true scale model

 

You sure on that one Bill?  :P  there are a few that use a single track.  They're not as common, but they do exist.

 

On a T-gauge note.  Not sure what I'm enthused with more, the KiHa designs coming out, the shorter chassis for the ICE and HST, or the overhead Catenary.

 

Oh, and there's also that rumoured steam locomotive ;)  The PWM controllers will come a long way to bringing T Gauge more mainstream.

[westfalen]

 

It only looks prototypical in a general way from far back.  Funiculars do not have switches, but use interlaced track which avoids the costs and maintenance issues of switches.  You never have both cars on the upper or lower level anyways as these railways use counter balances in moving up and down.  Just an expensive toy not a true scale model

 

You sure on that one Bill?  :P  there are a few that use a single track.  They're not as common, but they do exist.

 

On a T-gauge note.  Not sure what I'm enthused with more, the KiHa designs coming out, the shorter chassis for the ICE and HST, or the overhead Catenary.

 

Oh, and there's also that rumoured steam locomotive ;)  The PWM controllers will come a long way to bringing T Gauge more mainstream.

 

 

Most of the ones I've ridden, especially in Japan, were single track like the photo.

[bill937ca]

 

It only looks prototypical in a general way from far back.  Funiculars do not have switches, but use interlaced track which avoids the costs and maintenance issues of switches.  You never have both cars on the upper or lower level anyways as these railways use counter balances in moving up and down.  Just an expensive toy not a true scale model

 

You sure on that one Bill?  :P  there are a few that use a single track.  They're not as common, but they do exist.

 

That`s what I encountered most often.  Three funiculars in Lisbon all have sidings with interlaced track as doe Angels Flight in Los Angeles. If its single track it may not be a funicular, just a railway on a steep hillside.

 

 

http://model-railroad-hobbyist.com/node/3436#comment-27303

 

No switches.

 

 

Using normal model railroad switches is like running a Kato E5 on blue Plarail track.

[westfalen]

I misunderstood the terminology, to me that's single track with switches, just that the switches don't have points. What I thought you meant by interlaced track was the variety that has three rails with the inside of each car sharing the inner rail like this one. http://www.coloradotimetable.com/Joomla158/index.php/midwest/563-dubuques-fenelon-funicular

[bill937ca]

I really wonder how well a funicular would work as a model.  We all know model trains stall at times.  Funiculars generally are counter-balance where the upper car`s weight helps pull the lower car up. The cars always pass at exactly the same point. Passing sidings on many prototypes are very tight. A model funicular would  need a real siding or risk a collision if the cars don`t meet exactly as intended because of track or other issues.

[DanMacK]

OK, now I get you.

 

By Gantlet, I assumed you meant sharing a common middle rail.

[Mr Frosty]

For model purposes, it would probably be easier to use a twin track set up, rather than a common rail.

There is this system in GN15 scale, which even has the track rollers.

http://www.ozsteam.com/html/o_scale_mine_incline_kit_.html

 

Many prototypical systems use flangless wheels on the inner rails.

[DanMacK]

That's how they're redoing it in T-Gauge.  if you look in the bottom left corner of the HO one, you'll see the T-Gauge set up ;)

[cteno4]

sorry, but they are not doing this in T gauge only HO. Adarsh said they are doing it as it required the magnetic wheels and pulley motor that they were good at so they did it.

 

cheers

 

jeff

[cteno4]

Bill,

 

yes it looks like the main design of funiculars is of one chap (carl roman abt) used the fixed point design by having the inside wheel no flanged and the outside wheel flanged on both sides to keep it on the tracks and pull it thru the point. but i dont think that the definition of a funicular requires that it use this design and i bet there is one out there that do use a point and regular flanged wheels. funiculars can use two separate tracks, the interlaced tracks or shared track. mainly its that they are a counter balanced cable rr.  i suspect they are just doing this to make it function well in n scale with spring switches and not doing a special double flanged wheel. we really have to cheat in n scale on the flanges most of the time anyway because prototypical flanges at n scale are extremely picky about the track.

 

in all other aspects this model is a funicular as its powered by the cable between the two cars with a pulley motor at the top and little cable guide pulleys along the tracks, just like a prototypical funicular. i would not call it a toy as its as close to prototypical as most of our model railroad track and trains go. we run shinkansens at 1.160 while all other trains, track and structures at 1.150, track radiuses are way off most of the time, etc so we cheat all the time for the sake of compromise in the modeling.

 

good news is that they may release the parts so folks can roll their own in n thru On3 and if they want to hand lay track they could do the perfect fixed switches if they want to get all the rivets.

 

trainaids updated their page some

 

http://www.trainaidsa.com/support-tg-news.shtml

 

jeff

[DanMacK]

On the T-Gauge Forum, Alan Ramsay of T-Gauge UK said that they're doing a dual track version in T with just 2 straight tracks, no switches.  It's got 2 cars and the pulley setup.  It's in the lower corner of the HO version.  you can just make out the T-Gauge car and the two single tracks going up.  There's a powered car and an unpowered one and they balance each other out. 

[westfalen]

Brawa make, or made, an N scale version of the Standseilbahn in Stuttgart. This one was on eBay, http://www.ebay.com/itm/Brawa-N-Scale-Standseilbahn-/320690587452.

 

I've seen a couple, there was one on the rental layout at Popondetta in Osaka, but I've never seen one in operation.

[cteno4]

Cool on the t gauge version, ardesh thought they were not doing it. Hirari San does dream up a lot of products (very creative guy) that don't get into production as he has a very small team.

 

Jeff

[cteno4]

ok had coffee with adarsh, the us T gauge distributer (trainaidsa.com) yesterday as he is local here in the dc area. He actually stayed in the same hotel with Hirari san and they shared a rental car with him so spent a lot of time chatting. The news on the HO funicular is that it is proper with the double flanged wheels and the track is not something that Eishindo is going to do. that display was just done with off the shelf track. they are just doing the magnetized wheels and the pulleys it looks like, so if folks dont want to use points they can use the abt static point design with the double flanged outside wheel and no flanged inside wheel, you will just have to lay your own track to do so. fast tracks would probably the the way to design the custom abt style points to do this. perhaps a secondary producer will make rail sets for this.

 

the t gauge set up was not done for production purposes, but more of a fun example to show that the t gauge car could actually do it under its own power if counter balanced by another car. Adarsh said he was not doing that as a production item. so i wonder if Alan Ramsay just saw the example they had there and thought it was going into production as well. really not much needed except a pulley to make that work on your own.

 

jrm got a very nice bag of dealer samples to show off at shows and incorporate into the club t gauge layout. some clear track sections, unpainted, clear shells, y power adapter, and a very very cute little laser cut chipboard station model. Eishindo is starting to do some buildings in laser cut like this similar to sankei n scale buildings. sounds like they are going to be reasonably priced.

 

there was some other juicy news that im making totally sure i can let out of the bag, ill keep you posted.

 

cheers

 

jeff

[cteno4]

got the ok to release the other tid bit. its over on this thread

 

http://www.jnsforum.com/index.php/topic,6322.0.html

 

also there are a few other t gauge updates here

 

http://www.jnsforum.com/index.php/topic,6321.0.html

 

jeff