Rainichi! (Visit Japan!) New Layout

Pfunk Mar 2, 2022

  1. Pfunk

    Pfunk TrainBoard Member

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    Relax, it's just 32ft of Unitrack lol

    Looks like I get to play around a little on my day off tomorrw :)
     

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  2. Pfunk

    Pfunk TrainBoard Member

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    wanted to get out in the yard and do some digging this morning but Ohio had other ideas and out of nowhere it's raining, so I guess it's time to start playing civil engineer a little earlier.
     

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  3. Pfunk

    Pfunk TrainBoard Member

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    Everything fits together as planned. Almost o_O Am very glad I decided to do it this way and not wait until I had the permanent layout built, because AnyRail is not as exact as irl apparently. I found I could add a couple of inches to my elevated track and have more room, and the same for my inner loop. I just need two longer lengths of viaduct and a couple of the wee bits that come in a pack together of the regular, had enough extra to gap the rest.

    2-1/2" in N-scale is 33ft and change, so am very pleased with that much extra across the entire width.

    I am still waiting on a few buildings to come, and at least two of them are big as crap. I have a few buildings I want to make, another of which has a big footprint. I liked this idea, almost like a Hot Wheels playmat, because it will let me tinker and arrange and change anything at all before I actually spend the time and money building anything.

    A couple of things that might help out someone else who decides to do this ahead of a permanent set-up:
    1. Stay organized. Keep the cards with the blister they came out of, because if you're working off a diagram then you'll need to know what pieces are what the next time you open the box.
    2. Kato viaduct piers are super flimsy. You can't drag anything you have built, and at least half of them will fall out if you pick your shape up off the ground, so be very gentle and just expect that it's to come apart. I imagine I'll have to glue the piers to the base of the layout for stability.
    3. Keep a card from the packaging handy. I had a #$^%@& of a time with my sausage fingers trying to pick the track up off the paper. Having one of the blister pack cards to slide under and lift it made life much easier.
    4. If you are in your mid-40s (or +) and have back problems, you may want to rethink spending 3hrs on your hands and knees doing this on a hardwood floor. No pain no gain, but just a heads up lol

    It's really fun seeing your ideas come to life in front of you, but at the same time... WOW that's going to be a lot of work :LOL: Can't wait, though. Going to be a blast.
     

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    Last edited: Mar 15, 2022
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  4. Pfunk

    Pfunk TrainBoard Member

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    daaaaaang, getting all kinds of texts and emails today - two different Ebay orders and first round of trains from Japan all scheduled to come TODAY.

    The one Ebay order was from Feb lol can't wait to get home now, going to be like Christmas!

    well, if you bought all your own Christmas gifts, I guess o_O
     
  5. Pfunk

    Pfunk TrainBoard Member

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    so... yeah. I still can't believe all of this showed up at once on the same day, but here it is. A few building kits, a pkg of figures that is out of production, and TRAINS.

    The koki might be what am excited most about somehow. I'm almost positive JNR took all of these out of use years ago, but I remember the first time I saw one, it was like a Ron Popeil caboose - why hasn't anyone thought of this before? It's got the brake car and cabin, but leave it to the Japanese to not waste any space - is also a flatcar. LOVE IT. Kato still makes a similar one, but finally found this discontinued Tomix one on Ebay still NIB. The Tomix has working rear lights. So freaking cool :)

    The EH200 is a brick, thing weighs a ton. The Green Mover has more joints than Snoop Dog so was hoping it would go through my #4s, but I don't think it will so it'll most likely share the outside loop with the green Portram I already have (was actually expecting it tbh so planned for it that way). I didn't take the Narita out of the box, will wait until expansion cars come to take a photo of whole thing, but is such a unique and beautiful beast, as well.

    Just need to wait for that second DE10 to come back in stock and the preorder on the Type 2000 Enshu in June, and I will have all the trains I originally set out to get. Honestly did not expect that to happen!
     

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  6. Pfunk

    Pfunk TrainBoard Member

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    woke up to find an absurd amount of money missing from my bank account as of Friday and a DHL delivery notification email. Looks like both my DE10 locomotives, the apartment buildings I pre-ordered in January, and one other building I had pre-ordered are all on their way. Some figures I bought off Ebay are coming this week, too.

    At this point, I am pretty much on standby until all this stuff starts arriving little by little from all the random places I've had to buy it because they were the only ones in the world that were selling it. I think I've spent more in shipping alone than many do on their trains as a whole.

    Definitely should have done American freight in HO :LOL:
     
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  7. Pfunk

    Pfunk TrainBoard Member

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    a quick update since I was so excited about all this and then it's been weeks since have updated anything...

    Got the freight loco's and building kits, the locomotives are hands-down the best of any I own - the detail and color is amazing given how tiny they are. I should post some photos, am beyond ecstatic with them.

    Big issue is I decided that I would wait to start the actual layout until after I could get some projects done around the house because of the mess and dust it's going to create. Then we started getting spring rains and I found some seepage into the basement at one corner of the room I am planning to use (not more than about a couple drinking glasses or so worth, and it *IS* the basement of a 1939 home, but still....), turns out the drip edge and gutters are old and not working well anymore and the water is sheeting off the roof right under the gutters and pooling around the foundation all around the home. Not good. Was not planning on budgeting an extra $4-5k purchase this year when I started this.

    Owning an old house is an exercise in expecting the unexpected, am finding out, but frak me is the unexpected murdering my recreational spending :cry: Am still getting little scenery things, vehicles, people, etc little by little and trying to find those "just what I needed!" items, but for now I have to back-burner anything that's going to cost a lot at once (Google: lumber, Unitrack). That, and no sense building anything that is going to be worth thousands+ in a room that has water intrusion, however slight. Can't put the cart before the horse.

    So for now am in a holding pattern on the actual construction. Which - to put it mildly - sucks massively. Hopefully can get back on track sooner than later.

    ...pun 100% intended :LOL:
     
  8. Shortround

    Shortround TrainBoard Member

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    I understand your displeasure. It is some of why I moved on from my second home. It was originally built as a summer cottage on the lake. And it was showing it's weaknesses. Oh well. But I did have a country home on a nice lake for 13 years.
    Best wishes with moving forward.
     
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  9. Pfunk

    Pfunk TrainBoard Member

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    I actually bought this one because of the construction. Is solid red oak 2x6 throughout, cross-beam floors vs OSB subfloor, roof is beam, not sheet... haven't built houses like this in a long time - is an old 1930s Sears Roebuck, if that tells you anything, the bones are as good as anything out there.

    I like it plenty, is just one *MAJOR* expenditure after another, it seems. AC and furnace had to be replaced last summer, was already slated for about $8k on an equity to do the kitchen this summer. I don't know if I can add that much onto it, or if it would even be worth it to do so tbh
     
  10. BigJake

    BigJake TrainBoard Member

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    Sometimes model railroading is a healthy distraction from the real world, and sometimes vice versa...
     
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  11. Mudkip Orange

    Mudkip Orange TrainBoard Member

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    You might think about doing a 30x60 or a 30x72. Single level, just a loop of R282/315 with a couple yard tracks.

    I’m in the same boat - old house, lotta work - and being able to set up temporary layouts on a poker table helped tide me over for the 2+ years before I got to start working on layout benchwork.
     
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  12. badlandnp

    badlandnp TrainBoard Member

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    Keep after it. Fixing the gutter and drip edge issues will solve most of the water issue. Add extensions to the downspouts to get it away from the house as well. Then just make sure that the ground will drain away from the house. I had one customer's house with this issue, a very old house, and just adding gutters, (it didn't have any!) and putting rain caps over the window wells eliminated it entirely. Still dry, and that was ten years ago.
     
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  13. BoxcabE50

    BoxcabE50 HOn30 & N Scales Staff Member TrainBoard Supporter

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    If possible, application of a seal to the foundation. Also, (based on one experience I had to resolve), be certain that all around the structure, to encourage proper drainage, ground slopes away.
     
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  14. Pfunk

    Pfunk TrainBoard Member

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    [​IMG]
    Just wrote a $4700 check to the roofing company, they'll be out to start in the next few days. It's the right thing to do here, but I mean... o_O
     
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  15. MK

    MK TrainBoard Member

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    Ouch! I'm assuming that's for a repair and not a roof replacement.
     
  16. Pfunk

    Pfunk TrainBoard Member

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    Replacement drip-edge and seamless gutters with leaf guard.

    Been getting standing water around the foundation which was leaking into the basement, needed to fix that before building anything of value down there. Just not a dollar amount I was prepared for this year.
     
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  17. Pfunk

    Pfunk TrainBoard Member

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    Had a little bit leftover from moving money around and decided to get something for me to make myself feel better HAHAHA I have been obsessed with this vertical lift bridge kit from CMR since I saw it years ago:
    [​IMG]

    ...but since adding a second set of tracks to my plan, it would mean buying TWO of them - to the tune of about $200/ea - and making my water scene really bulky, which I didn't like the idea of at all. Spent a long time trying to come up with a solution, and I landed on one I like even more. Kibri makes an arched single or double-track bridge with matching approach bridges (37669 and 37668, respectively)...

    [​IMG]
    [​IMG]
    ...just ordered the bridge and both approaches, which I think with an airbrush, some LEDs, and some styrene to redo the cheapo-looking piers, I can makeshift turn into the Kobe Ohashi bridge, one of my favorite Japanese landmarks:

    [​IMG]

    not the worst $60 I've spent recently by any stretch ;)
     
  18. MK

    MK TrainBoard Member

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    You did the right thing. CMR has stopped all production of their wood products until wood prices come back down. And who knows when that will be!!!!! :mad:
     
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  19. pomperaugrr

    pomperaugrr TrainBoard Member

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    That will make for an impressive scene!
     
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  20. Pfunk

    Pfunk TrainBoard Member

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    I pre-ordered a 2-car passenger set in February that was scheduled to be released in June. Just saw where Tomix has released a third car so I thought that yeah, I should probably just go ahead and preorder that one, too. Then I saw it's set to release NOVEMBER 30th, 2022. It's not that big of a deal, have kind of resigned this project until taxes next spring as-is but it's just hilarious to me that it'll take a full calendar year for a 3-car set LOL
     
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