Motorizing Editions Atlas' Hong Kong Tram

Editions Atlas Hong Kong tram with Kato 11-104 truck

In Voie Libre #106 I read about an interesting HO-9 tramway layout called Plage Bel Air by Frederic Mottet. The first thing that caught my attention was it was a seaside scene with a kidney bean track plan much like the LOL, only considerably smaller. The second was the use of static trams by Editions Atlas, which Mottet motorized. 

I had a look online to see what Editions Atlas had to offer, and came across an HO scale double-decker Hong Kong tram. I've admired Bachmann's OO Hong Kong tram, but haven't been able to locate one for LOL Mk II. So, even though the Editions Atlas version is unmotorized, I thought I'd buy one and try my hand at motorization. I found one on Ebay from a German seller, and for a very reasonable $US 7 shipping charge it was in my hands in a mere 5 days!

Bumper pried off

There was nothing conceptually difficult about this project. In fact the hardest part was the most fundamental: figuring out how to get the body and chassis separated without damage.

First thing was to pry off the front and rear bumpers. This revealed 2 holes at each end of the metal frame where the bumpers attached. 

For some dumb reason I thought these might also be holes where screws were inserted to hold on the body. I drilled them out, but the body didn't release.

It turns out the trick was that I needed to drill out the front and rear lights. Behind the light is either a screw or rivet, and once drilled out, the chassis drops out of the body. I'll need to repair those lights during final assembly, but that's not a big deal.

The toy's truck is held on with 2 screws, as is the upper deck seating. Once those items are unscrewed, you're left with the metal chassis.

Now the fun begins.

I have 2 Kato 11-104 powered chassises that I bought a few years ago thinking I'd use them to build a quasi-freelanced O-9 model of Thaddeus Lowe's personal Mount Lowe trolley. 

After lots of thought and inspection, I figured I couldn't build what I was after with these Kato units, so they've been sitting on the shelf. 

Lucky for me the Kato unit fit the Hong Kong tram quite well. 

The only modification I made was to cut off the end platforms, buffers, couplers, and railings: basically, everything outbound of the screws that hold the motor in place was cut off. This reduction in size of the power truck meant a much smaller opening needed to be cut into the toy's metal chassis.

Cutting the opening for the power truck was a big job. It took me about 4 hours of on-and-off work with a drill, dremel with cutting disks and grinding stones, files, and sanding sticks to cut a suitable rectangular opening into the chassis. I probably should have made a video of the process, but I wasn't sure if my methods were best, or even if this was going to work out. 

One important thing to note. The metal beams that connect the front and rear platforms need to cut off for the power truck to fit. However, this weakens the chassis as all that is left to connect the end platforms are those horizontal metal strips you see in the picture. Once the beams are cut off you need to make sure you handle the chassis carefully or you might accidentally bend it during further cutting operations. 

Also, make sure you wear your eye protection and work gloves when doing this job.

Once the chassis is cleaned up it's just a matter of epoxying on the power unit. I've tacked it in place with some dots of epoxy, but I need to go back and see what edges and seams could use some extra epoxy to give the whole thing better strength.

And that's the end of what I think is the most important part of converting this static toy into a not too shabby HO-9 tram. Detailing and paint are next, but to check things out I temporarily slipped the body on the chassis for a quick run around the test track.