What did you order or the post deliver? (Japanese N Gauge)

[cteno4]

I can say sammy made me do it! Wanted a Sanmei/Shishui after seeing his and amazon.co.jp was obliging and of course then a few sankei that were discounted quite a bit at the time (it’s weird they seem to constantly rotate 10-25% discounts on like 20-30% of their sankei, appear to be amazon not sellers), and then tgw steamer popped up, bad AI, bad AI! 
 

first amazon/DHL said 2 weeks, then a day later a week, then next day coming in 3 days, then next day coming tomorrow, but showed up that day! I seem to be in some sort of shipping time vortex…
 

cheers

 

jeff

[gavino200]

9 hours ago, disturbman said:

The color might be playing a role, the Tomix looks to be pure white in your pictures, whereas the Kato is off-white. Is the difference prototypical?

 

Yes, that's part of it. Maybe most of it. From memory, I think the real think is pure white. But pure white on the model makes it almost seem to glow. The Kato seems to trick the mind's eye better. The slightly off-white also shows up the details and contours, whereas the pure white obscures them. Even if slightly "non-prototypical", it seems to be a good choice. A perception thing.

[gavino200]

52 minutes ago, cteno4 said:

I can say sammy made me do it! Wanted a Sanmei/Shishui after seeing his and amazon.co.jp was obliging and of course then a few sankei that were discounted quite a bit at the time (it’s weird they seem to constantly rotate 10-25% discounts on like 20-30% of their sankei, appear to be amazon not sellers), and then tgw steamer popped up, bad AI, bad AI! 
 

first amazon/DHL said 2 weeks, then a day later a week, then next day coming in 3 days, then next day coming tomorrow, but showed up that day! I seem to be in some sort of shipping time vortex…
 

cheers

 

jeff

 

 

Very nice. I love making Sankei kits. I have quite a few that I need to put together.

 

What's that tiny little steamie?

[cteno4]

Yes I too have a pile more to do! I started playing with experimenting with lighting in them last year, I need to get back to it. Want to determine if I can get away without having to light seal walls if I set leds low enough and just preplant them in each room while building then can do the rest later. Downside of the sankei you can tear them apart as easily once built without really destroying them, so I’ve hesitated building some of the larger structure width a lot of internal structure. 
 

it’s this little guy. Couldn’t resist just too cute and lots of nice detail parts. 
 

https://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10272963

https://www.amazon.co.jp/-/en/gp/product/B00KYNIDAC/ref=ppx_od_dt_b_asin_title_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
 

the Sanmei/Shishui has a ton of detail parts to install one evening here! I’ll try the better small part tweezers I got a couple of weeks ago and see how well they work. Basically same idea as the nice Kato ones and better than the crudely cut ones I had from way back, but at $3 if they do the job…

 

jeff

[gavino200]

Very cute.

 

I've actually put lights in a Sankei kit. It's been a while. I'd have to look but I don't think I had to light seal them except for the corners/seams.

[cteno4]

yeah its been almost a year since i played with it, but my memory was if kept low it was fine, just need to really go thru. luckily seams are usually done as at least a single rabit and many times a double rabit joint so should self seal.

 

one option for easy light sealing is to use hamburger wrappers. this is thin white paper and a thin aluminum foil layer sandwiched together. its pretty thin and easy to cut and usual white interior wall then. just apply to the interior walls and cut out window areas. can even fold up a tiny bit at corners if you want a little joint light seal. this was the next thing on the list to try with a small sankei.

 

cheers

 

jeff

[cteno4]

Realized I never posted my Sakatsu pile from last month. They were fast to ship and well packed. Nice they are keeping the kobaru line going and selling Imon/pro hobby line as well which don’t seem to show up elsewhere anymore. They also seem to have a bit ysk in stock which is rare as they seem to do very intermittent production runs.

 

cheers

 

jeff

[Madsing]

First row, center, is it an optical fiber (light guide)? I have purchased one from AliExpress a few months ago but have not used it yet.

[cteno4]

Yep, I have a smattering od plastic fiber optic fibers and these were inexpensive and small 0.25 and 0.75mm dia.

 

jeff

[Madsing]

Thanks.

Mine in 0.75mm diameter, not very flexible, I have not yet found a use case where it would be easier than 0402 SMD LEDs.

I will purchase the 0.25mm diameter type to try.

[cteno4]

To make sharper bends you can gently heat the plastic. I have made little lights above doors that are the classic old pipe with 90 degree bend and then tin conical shade over the bulb by heating thin plastic fiber optic fiber into a 90 degree bend (try to make it a small radius bend not a sharp 90). The end of the fiber then heat some to make it into a little bulb shape. Then have to paint the side of all the exposed fiber optic so it doesn’t light up visually.
 

when I was a tadpole I used some 3mm conical sequins for the shades. Did these over each door on my round house like you see on a lot of them. Then did (I think) three over the stall track and just ran all the fiber up into the roof area and to a single grain of wheat bulb (it was the 70s and leds were just coming into use and no smd leds!). The exterior ones I found some like 0.75mm so bit oversized but it was big industrial building so not horrible and about as small as I could find. The internal lights I uses some like 2mm stuff from one of those awful old fiber optic table lights and didn’t have to kink those but the brought much more light to the engine stalls. Worked well as you couldn’t see the upper roof area thru the doors or windows but these little lights thru nice little pools of light instead of glowing like it had when I first lit it with a couple of grain of wheat bulbs. First lighting I did post working with a lighting designer when we were shooting exhibit models and learned using more lights turned down low works much better.

 

I want to use fiber to light up some marquees and my dekotora trucks using the individually addressable smd rgb leds and a chase controller.

 

cheera,

 

jeff

[Kamome]

Not content with having way too many projects on the go and the philosophy “buy it when you see it,” else it won’t be there when you go back again. 

 

Today perusing my local hobby shop discovered the owner has folders and folders of n scale add on details from various manufacturers. Always impossible to leave the shop empty handed as so many things difficult to find elsewhere but managed to resist any large expenditure. Anyway came home with some Mokei Keishin dry rub details for the Tomix Kintetsu 80000 Hinotori. Some destination signs, missing from the model and because apparently I wish to punish myself, some headrest details. (Yes you read that correctly)

[disturbman]

21 hours ago, cteno4 said:

I can say sammy made me do it! Wanted a Sanmei/Shishui

I wanted of those, but I forgot and now I can't decide if I would prefer the green or the purple 🤔

 

20 hours ago, gavino200 said:

Yes, that's part of it. Maybe most of it. From memory, I think the real think is pure white. But pure white on the model makes it almost seem to glow. The Kato seems to trick the mind's eye better. The slightly off-white also shows up the details and contours, whereas the pure white obscures them. Even if slightly "non-prototypical", it seems to be a good choice. A perception thing.

Yes, I would think the slightly matt off-white would look more pleasing, less plasticky to the eye.

[JR East]

8 hours ago, Kamome said:

Not content with having way too many projects on the go and the philosophy “buy it when you see it,” else it won’t be there when you go back again. 

 

Today perusing my local hobby shop discovered the owner has folders and folders of n scale add on details from various manufacturers. Always impossible to leave the shop empty handed as so many things difficult to find elsewhere but managed to resist any large expenditure. Anyway came home with some Mokei Keishin dry rub details for the Tomix Kintetsu 80000 Hinotori. Some destination signs, missing from the model and because apparently I wish to punish myself, some headrest details. (Yes you read that correctly)

 

 

Do you have the reference page where you found that ? I was waiting to find them before I purchase the Hinotiri ?

 

I found it , but it seems they do not sell abroad (if it's where you purchased them): https://www.miyakomokei.com/shopdetail/000000014079/

 

 

JM

Edited December 11, 2021 by JR East

[Yavianice]

1 hour ago, JR East said:

Do you have the reference page where you found that ? I was waiting to find them before I purchase the Hinotiri ?

 

I found it , but it seems they do not sell abroad (if it's where you purchased them): https://www.miyakomokei.com/shopdetail/000000014079/

Miyakomokei does not sell abroad, I asked him way back when.

However, Miyakomokei products are sold at RGR (not sure about this specific product, however).

 

An alternative would be this: https://store.shopping.yahoo.co.jp/ajisaitei/s7201.html which I reckon you can combine with a proxy purchase. 

[cteno4]

3 hours ago, disturbman said:

I wanted of those, but I forgot and now I can't decide if I would prefer the green or the purple 🤔

That’s easy 98101 gets you one of each! Did they issue it singly as well?

 

jeff

[disturbman]

You can get singles, there are always a few people that break this kind of sets on YJA.

[cteno4]

Ahh but I expect with the service fees you may be close to just getting the set and having both! One of the main reasons I got them was the green and purples chosen not only make the art have a very aesthetically pleasing contrast (jut enough but not screaming), they are also just pleasing colors and work well together.

 

jeff

[disturbman]

It depends, prices can some time be reasonable. I wanted a single because I already have a lot of painted JRH KiHas and don’t “need” another couple. I would actually like to have more of the regular colored ones, I only have… one.

 

That said, I really wish Tomix would release the Fox/Octopus/Crab ones.

[Kamome]

4 hours ago, JR East said:

 

 

Do you have the reference page where you found that ? I was waiting to find them before I purchase the Hinotiri ?

 

I found it , but it seems they do not sell abroad (if it's where you purchased them): https://www.miyakomokei.com/shopdetail/000000014079/

 

 

JM

That’s the one but I didn’t purchase directly from the manufacturer. A small independent shop near me had them. 

 

They also produce clearer printed seat  formation graphics for the external body. Not sure if the ones Tomix include are either wrong or the replacements have better clarity. There is also a light unit filter to replicate the mood lighting.

[JR 500系]

On 12/11/2021 at 1:55 AM, cteno4 said:

I can say sammy made me do it! Wanted a Sanmei/Shishui after seeing his and amazon.co.jp was obliging and of course then a few sankei that were discounted quite a bit at the time (it’s weird they seem to constantly rotate 10-25% discounts on like 20-30% of their sankei, appear to be amazon not sellers), and then tgw steamer popped up, bad AI, bad AI! 

 

I was glad i was able to help Jeff!  🙂 Those Sankei kits are really interesting too!

 

8 hours ago, disturbman said:

It depends, prices can some time be reasonable. I wanted a single because I already have a lot of painted JRH KiHas and don’t “need” another couple. I would actually like to have more of the regular colored ones, I only have… one.

 

That said, I really wish Tomix would release the Fox/Octopus/Crab ones.

That might be MicroAce A5933... I used to have this set, and yes correct silly me made the mistake again...  X_X 

 

My Kiha-40 fleet is also expanding without my knowledge. I'm sure those little fellows re-populated themselves in the cabinet. I might have to look into separating them further apart.  😛

[cteno4]

Fox/squid/crab is one of my top 10! Cephalopods rule!

 

jeff

[railsquid]

Did someone mention squid?

 

MicroAce KiHa 40 (KiHa 40-807) by Rail Squid, on Flickr

[JR 500系]

More Pre-orders.... DEcember is an expensive month 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[disturbman]

4 hours ago, JR 500系 said:

That might be MicroAce A5933... I used to have this set, and yes correct silly me made the mistake again...

It is, but I would like a Tomix reissue. I’m not a big fan of MA 40s, they are getting pretty old, and I have a lot of Tomix 40s.

 

If you are feeling nostalgic, they come often on YJA, at least also in the single sets, and sell for reasonable amounts of money iirc.

 

You might end up with strange mutants, half KiHa, half animals.