My Layout so far

[Sean]

This is my N-guage layout so far, its about 25% complete.  I live in a very small Japanese apartment so space considerations have driven most of it.

 

It is basically a mid-sized city station in the centre, with a small loop line that will run through a mountain and small town station once I get the scenery done on the right.  The left side is still a blank.

 

One part that I quite like so far is the station area.  I had purchased a couple of those Tomytec Arcade street roofs (Akebono Shoutengai) in the early stages but had a lot of trouble making them look good.  The problem was that wherever I placed them the only thing you could really see if you put shops on both sides was the top of the roof, which obscured the view of the shops and the street.

 

Then I decided to have them run parrallel to the train platforms on each side of the station building and I think it works perfectly.  It helps tie the scenery from the station platform to that on the neighboring streets and it allows you to see the shops and streets pretty clearly.  Plus there are stations in Japan which do have shopping arcades running parrallel to the station like that so it looks somewhat authentic (though usually they are separated by an additional row of shops). 

 

 

 

I will add some more photos as this progresses!

 

[cteno4]

Sean great stuff! You are packing a lot in in your limited space. Great thing about Japanese scenes as it can be prototypical as well!

 

Keep us posted as things progress!

 

Cheers,

 

Jeff

[Sean]

Thanks, I will try to post pics as things go along!  :)

[JR 500系]

Very nice! You have captured the feel very well! Do the Tomytec arcade roofs come as so high or did you make some modifications to it yourself? If so, I might use a few on my Takahashi town~~

 

Looking forward to more pictures!   :)

[miyakoji]

The height of the roof looks correct to me.  I've seen some that are low, the maze around Tsuruhashi in Osaka comes to mind, but I'd say most are high, like this.

 

The shopping street right next to the station is awesome, btw.  I'm thinking of a Hankyu station (I think), but I can't remember which one.  Well, probably it could be several... :)

[Bernard]

Wow, you've done a lot with little space....nice layout so far.

[Sean]

Thanks JR 500, Miyakoji and Bernard! 

 

Yes, the Tomytec Arcade Roofs come the same height as in the picture, I just put them together as per the instructions!

[Mudkip Orange]

Nice setup, bro.

[kvp]

That is a suprisingly simple and great way to use the arcade roofs and the street scenes under them also look good.

[ToniBabelony]

The arcades look really great! It's difficult to put them to good use, but leaving one side open is a very nice solution.

[JR 500系]

Great idea on the Arcade roofs, now time to get some to try them out on Takahashi ~

[katoftw]

Looks great.  Will copy.

[Sean]

Thanks everyone! 

 

I really wanted to include arcades like that in my layout, they are my favorite parts of Japanese cities!

[Sean]

Update!

 

I`ve been working on the layout a bit this month.  I got a couple more office buildings for the downtown area and am working on building a tree-lined avenue stretching out from the station.  I have actually been using dark grey sandpaper from the 100 yen shop as road surface, its not too bad though I wish it was a bit lighter in color.

 

 

The big project though has been on the left side of the layout.  It had been a blank and I wasn`t sure what to do with it.  Then about a month ago I visited a train shop and they had a bunch of elevated track on sale, so I was able to buy a loop complete with the supports for only about $10.

 

So I set that up on the left side, which left me with a big empty space in the middle that I wanted to fill with something big enough to be worthy of having a train line running around it.  At first I thought I would put a big Tower (like Tokyo Tower) in there, but I thought that might overwhelm the layout and draw too much attention away from the centre.

 

Then while I was watching a Hanshin Tigers game I thought `Hey, that space would be perfect for a baseball stadium`.

 

It doesn`t look like much so far but I`m sort of basing it loosely on a Koshien Stadium-type ballpark from the 1930s. I gave it a bit of a Fenway Park inspired big green monster in left field (though I would not want that to be interpreted as a sign that I am a Red Sox fan).

 

The bleachers are made of matchsticks and the walls are made of balsa wood.  My plan is to have an upper deck in the infield bleacher sections complete with a Koshien-style roof.  I bought a large package of those super-cheap architectural figures, so the stands will be packed with people when it is finished (which should hopefully obscure some of the rough edges, match sticks aren`t the best building material).  I have a ton of leftover bits and pieces fromother model kits which will be used to accentuate the exterior of the stadium, the walls of which will be made (ironically) of baseball cards!

 

The field isn`t quite to scale (it would have required too much space) but I think it is big enough to at least look normal.  One challenge will be finding baseball players to put on the field!

 

Anyway, I`m having a lot of fun putting it together :)

 

Edited July 13, 2014 by Sean

[Sean]

I have been working a bit more this week on my baseball stadium, I finished one section of the bleachers on the 3rd base side.

 

It is my first time to make such a large structure from scratch and it is incredibly time consuming but kind of fun.  I`m pretty satisfied with the results, I put a little roof over it which I think is a cool touch.  I recycled some parts from an elevated railway kit to use as supports for the roof structure, but otherwise it is all made of matchsticks, balsa wood and baseball cards (the roof).  I also added yellow foul poles.

 

 

I think the height of it is perfect as it is just slightly higher than the elevated track that surrounds the station.  I`m trying to design it in such a way that the trains will come into and out of sight as they circle the stadium, creating for some interesting views. 

 

 

A view of the stadium `contstruction site` as seen from downtown:

 

[Sean]

I have been working a lot on the baseball stadium half of my layout the past couple of weeks. 

 

 

It will have a street running from the main station to it.  I decided on the name too, `Najima Kyujoo`, which is just the name of a town I used to live in whose kanji looked suitable for a stadium name..

 

I got the scoreboard put together last week.  Ignore the giant Tron poster in the background, I have yet to get some background scenery for my layout.  I built the scoreboard and the outfield seats at a height which would allow the elevated train line to be just visible through the bits of open space here and there, which I think will make for some interesting views.  Actually I have been building the whole stadium with that little track in place for the purpose of seeing how parts of the stadium will look in relation to the trains, it gets in the way but I think that is a good way to approach a project like this.

 

With the left field wall I initially used advertising billboard stickers left over from some other kits, but they didn`t quite look right.  So for the scoreboard and right field bleachers I just started using actual company advertisements used in real baseball stadiums that I found on the internet and just printed - I like the Pepsi logo and the Glico sign on the scoreboard, they look way more authentic than the stickers.

 

The exterior I have done in grey and I like the way it looks in relation to the elevated railway line - having them close together gives it a bit of an intimate feeling.  I don`t know of any baseball stadiums in Japan with elevated rail lines built so close to them, but there are a lot of other buildings that do so it looks kind of authentic.  This obviously hasn`t been landscaped or anything, but it will be a pedestrian area and I will get some small shop buildings to have facing it.

 

I also have my first section of the upper deck built on the infield, that will eventually wrap all the way around and will have some spotlights on top.Far and away building those bleachers is the most time consuming part. 

 

This has been a pretty cheap project so far, the only thing that has cost serious money have been the figures.  I have a lot of 600 architectural figures, mostly seated, to populate the stands.  Fortunately they are much cheaper than normal figures so it has been manageable.

 

If I ever get a bigger apartment I might expand the train line which is a simple loop right now and extend it onto a new section, so that the stadium would only be surrounded by a semi-circle rather than the full loop.

Edited September 6, 2014 by Sean

[railsquid]

Interesting layout, gives me some inspiration for mine :)

 

What are the approximate dimensions of your board(s)?

[Sean]

Thanks!

 

I use a bunch of 30cm by 60cm boards that I picked up at the 100 yen shop.  The total layout is a bit oddly shaped, but more or less it is about 75-90cm deep and almost 2 metres long.

Edited September 7, 2014 by Sean

[railsquid]

Thanks, that's about in the same ballpark I have to play with (hah). Hmm, 100 yen shop? I'll take a look at my local ones, never occurred to me they might have boards of useful size.

[JR 500系]

That's a nice stadium! Really has the feel of a stadium to it! Any plans for some roads running in the city? Great job!

[Sean]

Thanks!  I will be putting down some roadway soon.  I have some fine grain sandpaper that I am painting grey that will be used for most of it (mainly because it is so cheap, I can get big sheets of it at the 100 yen shop).

[Sean]

Thanks, that's about in the same ballpark I have to play with (hah). Hmm, 100 yen shop? I'll take a look at my local ones, never occurred to me they might have boards of useful size.

 

Oh yeah, the 100 yen shops (especially Daiso) are a treasure trove of cheap DIY railroad layout stuff.  THe smaller ones don`t have the boards that I use, but there is a huge one near my place that does (the boards I use actaully cost 200 yen each but are definitely worth it).

[ToniBabelony]

Nice going here!

 

I've also been looking around in the local Daiso and found tons of great resources to make a layout. I'll have to calculate though if it's ceahper to buy base wood in the DIY shop (big sheets) or in the 100 yen shop (pre cut). It'll probably balance out to a compromise between both shops.

[railsquid]

I was looking at the plywood sheets available in my nearest DIY shop and the smaller sizes didn't seem particularly great value for money (though I don't recall the exact price).

 

Time for another 100 yen shop trip (I've acquired various boxes to keep bits and pieces in already, never thought to look for useful parts).

[Sean]

I was pretty happy to find these boards at the 100 yen shop, though there is some added expense in getting brackets and screws to hold it all together. The main benefit though is that it will make it very easy (well, relatively easy) to disassemble when I move.

 

Another useful shop is Tokyu Hands if they have one in your city.  There is one in Nagoya here that has a whole level devoted to hobby-type things.  Bit more expensive than the 100yen shop but still reasonable.