Modeling the overhead wires

Nearly all rail lines in the Tokyo area are electric.  The overhead wire support structures are in evidence in any photo of trains in Tokyo so I felt that this would be an important item to have on these modules.  This photo shows an extreme example of this.


Here is another look at my reference photo that was in last falls Streets and Buildings post.  A clear view of one of the overhead wire support structures is shown.




What I found to be the closest match to this were the Tomix 3000 series.  I used 1 set of the 3004 ( set of six 2 track ) and 2 sets of the 3005 ( set of three 3 track ) to get full set of 8 overhead wire support structures which are spaced at every 80 - 100 scale feet on the modules with spares of each of the three widths that I ended up with.










Middle insulators were removed on the 3 track versions.




On two of them a section in the center was removed and the two sides spliced to match track spacing.  These overhead wire structure models are made of the same type of plastic that many locomotive handrails are made of.  It is very difficult to glue together.  I found that I got the best results by placing a .010 thickness of styrene between the two halves.  I also laminated a .020 thickness of styrene on the top to add strength.


The kits come with horizontal cross members that attach to vertical poles.  There are notches on the cross members that hook into slots that go around the uprights.  I wanted some reinforcement to this so I added a bead of Walthers Goo.


Each set of Tomix overhead wire structures comes with a spue of mounts that were designed to work with the Tomix track.  I used these to make my own mounts.  The styrene tubing extends down into holes that I drilled into the modules and up to a height of 2 -3 scale feet.  When completed and placed on the modules, the bases will be painted the finished assemblies a concrete color.


The mounting bases were glued into drilled holes on both sides of the tracks.  Height adjustments were made so that the structures would be fairly level as shown in the photo.



Here is a view of the structures after painting along with a 651 Series Super Hitachi train.   The overhead wire support structures plug into the mounts but can be easily removed if needed for track maintenance.

Tempoary Ghost Buildings

With only 5 weeks before the first exhibit of the Musashi-Koyama modules it's time to focus on making them presentable for that show in their not yet finished state.  Most of the scenes towards the front of the modules are completed and its the large number of structures in the back half that still need so much work. Its those areas where temporary finishes will have to do for now.

This area at the left end of the module set had a styrene box that hid two switch machines.  Eventually I want to build a nice complex of buildings here but for now I created some paper buildings using Microsoft Visio and pasted them onto the box.



I don't want to have any white styrene showing. This is the entrance to the Palm Arcade as it is now.  All parts that were not already painted got a coat of Floquil CN gray.




Kato and Tomix built up buildings will be temporarily set in the spots where there are no permanent buildings and of course the addition of vehicles and people will help.

Finishing the Aoshima Apartments

Here is the Aoshima Apartment Building at an almost completed state and mounted on the left module.  Looks a little lonely right now but more buildings are coming.

Oops !, looks like I have lost one of the brown colored rail pieces on the lower right.  Hope it turns up or I'll have to make one. 


The base that comes with this kit seems way too thick.  I was able to compensate for this by cutting out part of the 1/8 inch cork that I have on top of the module then setting the building in as shown in this photo.

This is a view down a typically narrow street that parallels the railroad track with a wall between  the tracks and the street.

With all of it's balconies and exposed stairwells, this building is great for creating those moment frozen in time mini-scenes.  It's a part of model building that I enjoy and I've created a few of those.

In this photo a woman is seen carrying a bag of groceries up the stairs.  There is no elevator at the Aoshima Apartments and  maybe shes thinking the next apartment she rents will have to have one.




Here's someone exiting the building talking on a cell phone.  The item seen hanging over the rail of the 2nd floor on the left hand side is a futon.  Several of these come with this kit.      

In each entry there is a set of mail boxes that I am looking for just the right figure to place in front of.

This is really a great kit and it's been fun to build.  While I built this one very much straight out of the box I've got plans for another building using two of these kits that will be very much a kit bash.

Lighting the Aoshima Apartments

Quinntopia is one of the N Scale blogs I follow and has some great tutorial posts on LED lighting for buildings including this model and is worth taking a look at if you are considering some building lighting.

I decided on my building to fully light the stairwells and just a few of the apartments.  There was a small indent on each floor that seemed perfect for a porch light. I drilled a small hole to one side of each of those and pushed the wires of pre-wired surface mount (SMD) LED's through with a bit of Walthers Goo on the backside of the LED to hold it in place.

In the past I have not had too much experience or luck working with the small wires that are attached to these small LEDs.  I thought the best way would be to land them on a PC board so I cut out a small section that would fit into one of the apartment sections.  I wired  2.2K ohm resistors on the board for each LED for a total of 10.

To light the apartments I used bright white LED boards that came from Atlas engines that I installed had DCC decoders in.  These boards already have a current limiting resistor.  After experimenting  I got the best results by attaching the board to the ceiling and bending the LED down as shown in this photo.

This photo shows an overall view of all the wiring and other electronic parts that are now inside the building before the walls go on. 

Styrene view blocks were added so the wiring won't be seen from the other side of the building which is going to face outward on the module.

Here is this building with the sides and roof added and the lights on.  The porch lights are partly blocked by the stairs but the stairs are illuminated which is the effect I was after.  5 apartments are lights with LEDs of various shades.

Building the Aoshima Apartments

The kit comes with easy to follow instructions.  In the first steps they have you assemble the internal floors and walls and the walls around the stair towers. The stairs were the same color as the walls which I did not think realistic so I brush painted them with Floquil Concrete.


The color of the base did not look to me like concrete so I airbrushed this with Floquil Concrete.

I also installed two 4-40 screws through the base for mounting this building on the module as explained in the post Attaching Buildings.


The largest part of building this kit is installing the windows, balconies, and railings on the wall sections.  I found that everything in this kit fits together very well as long a you are careful to smooth the connections to the spues.



The kit comes with a decal set with window coverings both opened and closed that are meant to be applied to the inside of the windows.




The internal walls and floors come with openings that allow for installing interior lighting.  This should be done before installing the exterior wall assemblies.  After testing how the lighted building might look, I decided that I would set up some LED's inside some of the internal compartments of the building.

To be continued.

A new building kit

Recently I was looking on ebay for some additional figures (people) for the Musashi-Koyama modules when I came across a large apartment building kit that I had never seen before from a company that I had not heard of before, Aoshima.  I searched for this name and found out that this kit had been released in late 2009.  The full name of the company is Aoshima Bunka Kyozi which my wife tells me translates as Green or Blue Island Cultural Manufacturing.



So I purchased the kit and several sets of figures and they arrived within about 2 weeks. This kit came in a box that was approximately 13 x 8 x 4 inches.

There are about 14 spue sets in the kit, each in its own bag, plus step by step pictorial instructions and some stickers.  This photo shows about half of the parts that come with this kit.

Many of the parts in this kit have already been air brush painted.  Shown here are the railings for the balconies.  Some other painted details include pipes on the roof, window frames, and vents on the walls.  Looking over all the parts spues nothing seems to have that plastic look to it.


Two sets of stair towers are included.  I wish someone would offer pre-molded stair sets just by themselves for us kit bashers and scratch builders.

There are other nice touches to this kit like interior floors and walls, a hole between floors for lighting,  This is going to be great fun to build.

I have just the place for this apartment building on the Musashi-Koyama modules as shown highlighted in violet.

Buying on ebay: I purchased this kit from the ebay seller plazajapan in Osaka.  I have purchased from them several times and they have always been reliable.  Another good ebay seller of Japanese N scale items  that I have purchased from is hit-japan in Sapporo.

Exterior stairways

Exterior stairways are quite common on buildings in Japan.  When I built my model of the 6 story "Mr. Donut" building, I left the stairs off.  Lately I've decided that it really needed the stairs to make it look right and have been working on those.

This photo on the left shows the prototype building.  Close examination of this and other photos shows that the stairs are the open frame type with a mesh type screen over the railing.









This photo shows my model of the building as it is now, without the stairway.  The highlighted area is where the stairway will be added.  I need to match the existing building tile.












Plastruct makes a line of products in N and HO scales to model industrial stairway.  I've used these before and would use them for the basis of this project.











Here is what I have so far.  I started with a .020 sheet of styrene.  Then I laminated the tiled styrene over that with gaps where the doors would be.  Except for the bottom and top flights, all the stairs are in.  The Plastruct railings are used for the inside and .020 x .250 styrene strip for the outside as seen between floors 2 and 3.




I'll make another post on this in the future showing how it came out when it's done and attached to the building.