1/144 Kumamoto Castle Model

Well i can blame bill for this. he found it and tempted me with it and after a couple of weeks i finally broke down and put in a reservation for one... good thing there are not many trains i want right now!

Its a 1/144 model of the Kumamoto Castle complex! the kit even comes apart to show the internal wooden beam bracing and the rooms! Having visited this castle in 1984 i could not resist! really is quite a looker! going to take some figuring to find a place for it in my home layout planning! potentially we can use it in the center area of the jrm layout. its about 16" x 8". will need alot of open space around it as well and moats and mansion, walls...

http://translate.googleusercontent.com/translate_c?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&sl=ja&tl=en&u=http://www.mr-hobby.com/kumamotojyou/about.html&rurl=translate.google.com&twu=1&usg=ALkJrhg8vupott-3y3Qay0t872FYihcQYg

HS has it up for pre order for 20% off.

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10090055

hs has it listed for march release, but the GSI Ceros site has it listed for oct/nov 2010 in one place, but  it looks like end of march is the official date now. it started with an initial release date of nov 2008, so who knows!

video

cheers

jeff

Thanks for the blame!! 

Hey i have to have someone to blame with Dorothy when this finally shows up! you are a good pusher! hey i get the blame for pushing tech on a bunch of friends all the time...

thanks for taking the blame, really do look forward to getting this one!

cheers

jeff

Just in case you are not familiar with where the Kumamoto Castle sits in the city.

Leading up to the castle (at about 8:30).

Immediately in front of the castle.

ahh now you know why i bit on this one! hoping to make the castle as a little diorama that i can then plunk down with the streetcar ttrak, the jrm layout and eventually my home layout (and maybe it will look so cool i can sneak it upstairs in the living room for display at times!

cheers

jeff

On the one hand: OMG 200 DOLLARS FOR A BUILDING!

On the other hand: OMG THAT'S AWESOME!

That is very impressive! I may have to get one.

Be very careful, repeated looking at this model leads you to putting in a reservation... i know from experience... hopefully i wont be living in the castle model in the backyard.

cheers,

jeff

Be very careful, repeated looking at this model leads you to putting in a reservation...

*looks in amazement at model*

*looks at credit cards' available balances*

:repeat:

Be very careful, repeated looking at this model leads you to putting in a reservation... i know from experience... hopefully i wont be living in the castle model in the backyard.

 

cheers,

 

jeff

You'll be the only person in your neighborhood with a castle!!!!      

You won't be able to find the dog for a week. It'll be great, I'll ring the doorbell, and a week later Puchini will make it to the front door.

UH OH!!!! just got the email from hobbysearch that the castle is in stock!!! wooo hooo, but its going to hurt when the bill comes! good thing was i reserved it during the 20% off sale so that will help with the ems shipping which i expect to be harsh! but i did make 1000 bonus points on it!

cheers

jeff

So, now that you will have a castle, will you have a bigger train room? 

ok i may be living in the castle in the back yard... just got the shipping notice with the ems cost... im still reeling... 12900yen! OUCH! thats like 8kg! i guess getting the 20% + 5% helped some, but that means i spent about 65% of the cost of the item alone to ship it...

i best get back to work and earn some money to pay for this now!

jeff

My record is about 16200 yen for shipping alone. That was a HUGE box which had a 1:150 scale Nippon Maru and a Perfect Grade Gundam 00 Raiser =)

Sure was a shock when they finally got the final shipping cost. I was expecting it to be high, but wasn't really sure since the PG Gundam was pre-ordered, and I had no idea how big the box of the Nippon Maru was.

My record is 7500 Yen on a general order of 20009 Yen.  Second highest was 6100 Yen on a general order of 38,750 Yen (with shipping).  But that was only 15.74% of the order value.

Actually, my samurai armour cost a LOT more than 16200 yen to ship... Anyways, getting way too off-topic ;)

Martijn,

actually you brought it back on topic for me as one idea i have had for a long time for my ttrak modules was to have a park scene with a samurai demonstration going on as well as Yabusame. now with the castle it would be fun to have a demonstration going on there with a big crowd around as well as the regular tourists. figure there could be a small mock battle even or at least a demonstration of infantry and cavalry. its great as in the background area i can use all those tomytec horse carriers! whoo hoo!

other things this scene is also going to need:

• large parking lot of tourist busses!

• lots of tourists

• lots of folks taking pictures

• would be fun to make some strobe flash effects in some places for the photographers

• visitors' center

more im sure!

have to start researching the grounds around the castle some. you can get a rough view of it on google maps. if anyone has pictures it would be a help!

not sure now if its worth the cost, but it is just too cool!

cheers

jeff

There's a few photos here.

http://noble-scarlet.at.webry.info/200808/article_4.html

Thanks bill i need to do some poking around. i think i had a link to the plan of the grounds that was on some wargaming site, but need to track down that link. whats going to be tough are the outer walls and houses to fill in. the grounds are pretty extensive and stretch all the way to the river. there is a good 3D of the castle in google earth that should be a good starting point.

http://www.google.com/aclk?sa=l&ai=CRttVN5CyS7OyFIGalQfu0L3NAeXw_rgBh_uk8Q3I0vG_AggAEAEguVRQ_8228wdgyZ6GiYikgBCgAfmw6-4DyAEBqgQYT9ADuoT-VralK98xlPykeIKrd2YP2QfagAWQTg&sig=AGiWqtxWkcn8F2wnnu2s4dslvu55LqYOtg&q=http://www.google.com/gadgets/directory%3Fsynd%3Dearth%26preview%3Don%26cat%3D3d%26url%3Dhttp%253A%252F%252Fmaps.google.com%252Fmaps%252Fgx%253Foe%253Dutf-8%2526output%253Dghapi%2526q%253Dhttp%25253A%25252F%25252Fearth.google.com%25252Fgallery%25252Fkmz%25252Fkumamotocastle.kmz

im thinking i will probably do a stylized scene and not get into trying to make it totally prototypical. the size needed for the whole complex would be huge!

cheers

jeff

Martijn,

 

actually you brought it back on topic for me as one idea i have had for a long time for my ttrak modules was to have a park scene with a samurai demonstration going on as well as Yabusame. now with the castle it would be fun to have a demonstration going on there with a big crowd around as well as the regular tourists. figure there could be a small mock battle even or at least a demonstration of infantry and cavalry. its great as in the background area i can use all those tomytec horse carriers! whoo hoo!

 

other things this scene is also going to need:

• large parking lot of tourist busses!

• lots of tourists

• lots of folks taking pictures

• would be fun to make some strobe flash effects in some places for the photographers

• visitors' center

 

more im sure!

 

have to start researching the grounds around the castle some. you can get a rough view of it on google maps. if anyone has pictures it would be a help!

 

not sure now if its worth the cost, but it is just too cool!

 

cheers

 

jeff

I have a DVD that shows a certain school of archery in Japan practicing in armour. There's about 20 of them or something, and they go through a whole routine of how an archers unit would've operated during the various wars in Japan pre-arquebus period. You could base a scene on that, as such demonstrations are still quite common.

Here's a (rather crappy) video of an indoor demonstration of the same school (heki ryu satsuma ha), it's not quite as interesting as the DVD I have, but it does give an idea. Interestingly enough, I shoot the same general technique as these guys (I shoot heki ryu insai ha.)

Does it come with the giant flaming samurai as shown on the box?

(*Somebody* has to stop the monster lizard....)

You know there is an all new Godzilla remark underway for the US for 2012. It's a remake of the original movie that follows the original 60's movie more closely than the 98 remake.

Ok i have created a monster or at least bought one! The castle showed up today and its huge! the shipping box was 70cm x 70cm x 25cm and 8kg! it was packed in a dual corrugated cardboard outer box and then a single layer corrugated box inside that then the actual model box. the model box is almost as big as the shipping box. there is also a separate box with the display stand which is a nice piece of black lacquered wood. Inside the actual model box are 4 long boxes containing all the parts bags. about 6 parts bags per box. there are about 70 sprues of parts!

there is also a 95 PAGE BOOK for assembly! each page shows photos of the assembly step along with a diagram for painting and detailing. it also has a small color booklet as a color guide with photos of the actual castle along with pictures of a completed, painted model.

this thing is really going to take some time to assemble and paint. since the model can be take apart by floor, you can paint all the interior details like wall mats, tatami mats, etc. these items are detailed into the casting of the walls and floors, but are going to be very interesting to see about trying to paint them! i am almost thinking of printing up sheets that would be wall mats and tatami mats with some patterning on them or maybe textured paper even and sticking them down. this will give them a bit of relief which the actual thing would have and i would rather spend time cutting them up and placing them than trying to paint out several hundred tatami mats!

this is not a project ill have done in the next week, maybe not even the next month or even year unless i really want to sit down for a week and whack at it! maybe a vacation is in order that all i do is build the castle! at $350 total i think i want to spend a good long time figuring out how im going to approach this!

the cool thing is that in the back of the manual they have all 70 spures diagramed and listed out for sale individually from 200 (small belfry details) - 3800  yen (main base)! so if you muck a part up you can get it replaced! important with a kit costing this much money, very smart!

cheers,

jeff

Jeff - could you post a photo of the size of this shipment, it hard to image the size of it.