Skip to main content

Adventures in T-trak: Second Draft of planning scenery for an urban module

Whoops.

Reviewing the T-trak module something didn't look quite right. 

The Tokyo Metro entrance was indicated on the first scenic plan draft. However, it was not the correct size.

A few quick calculations gave the proper dimensions. Turns out it was bigger than expected. That meant the plan had to be revised and re-measured. (See the new draft below.) The pencil lines are darker and should be easier to see. 



Adding the properly sized entrance, shifted the side street over to the right. It also required a wider sidewalk on the side street. 

The website http://www.sumidacrossing.org/ is a great resource for Japanese trains, prototype and model. That site supplied road and sidewalk dimensions.

The road will be two lanes, with a parking lane on the side closest to the buildings. 

So far, so good. The plan is starting to come together.

The lesson: mistakes can happen. I'll do my best to try to fix them. 

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Adventures in T-Trak: Laying track

Laying track on my new T-Trak module was not a complicated job. Still, the process hit a minor snag, providing a learning experience. My friend, Steven Cox is the owner of precisionmodelrailroad.com/ . His new firm builds laser-cut model railroad benchwork parts. The company offers helix parts, straight benchwork sections and T-Trak modules. The T-Trak modules are an early product used to test the concept. T-Trak is a modular system that uses Kato N-scale Unitrack. The idea is that if you have limited space its possible to get modeling and participate in the hobby. The T-Trak concept is young, born in 2000. It has international interest. In part, that’s due to the partnership between the T-Trak standards group and Kato. Steven sent me a pre-production T-Trak kit. It assembled into a 12-inch by 12-inch box. I’m not going to post a blog about building that kit because the current kit design is different. It took me a couple of hours to build the module. Most of the time was waiting for...

Learning how to hand lay track in N scale -1

The N-scale Japanese commuter trains I'm modeling are 1:150 scale.  U.S. prototype N scale is 1:160. The Japanese commuter trains are a slightly larger scale because, with the exception of the Shinkansen (bullet train), most heavy rail Japanese trains run on narrow gauge (1067 mm, or 3-foot, 6-inch) track.  In the miniature world of Japanese commuter trains, 9 mm N scale track is used. As I found out at the Pacific Coast Region convention this weekend, the track is not exact. Oh, well. (Sigh!) The Takadanobaba in Alameda is envisioned as a shelf layout with roughly six square feet of scenic area. There will be a high ratio of railroad to other scenic features.  For that reason, the raised right of way will be the layout's dominant feature. It needs to be properly represented.  When I first cooked up this layout concept, Atlas Code 55 flex track was considered. That's what I have on hand. But, the prototype track needed to be studied. In the selected era, the second ...