Building the TomyTec Police station

Besides having over 100 actual Police stations, the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department has over 800 very small neighborhood Police stations referred to as "Koban".

One of the N scale gifts that I've received in my visits to Japan was this TomyTec Koban kit.  This is a great little quick kit that has all of the parts already painted and small enough to fit in many spots.  I wanted to use it on the expansion module because there used to be something very similar to it at that location.  When the area was redeveloped after the surface tracks were removed a new two story Koban building was constructed.

I used all of the parts with this kit and the only modifications I made was to make the base less thick by sanding the bottom and to the LED circuit as explained below.

This kit comes with a red LED to create the red light on the roof of the police station.  The wires extended from the LED through a black plastic tube for 3/4 of an inch which showed in the window of the building.  I modified this by removing the tube and bending the LED leads then soldering wires to them as shown here.  The wires go over an interior wall and down through the base unseen.

This view under the module shows the small 2 pin plug that comes with this kits LED circuit to make placing or removing the lighted structure easier.  As I have quite a few of these same type plugs from the LED's I am using to light my home layout I plan to use this same idea with other lighted structures..

This shot of the finished scene was taken with the small extension module sitting on the bench not connected to the main module.  Everything beyond the street is all part of a scenery sector plate.  The police van on the left covers one of the two screws that holds the scenery sector plate to the module.