Yanmar Museum

In detail

The Yanmar Museum’s high-tech, game-based exhibits are a hit with children and parents. Each of the arcade-like challenges, which range from operating a backhoe to using body movement to power the pistons of an engine, is based around the benefits of ecology, innovation, and modern technology. Each visitor is issued a personal “Yanmar card” that tracks their progress as they earn points by completing the challenges, and each player’s point total is displayed on a huge video screen alongside those of the top scorers.

The Yanmar Museum was created by Yanmar, a machinery company founded in 1912 by an inventor and engineer named Yamaoka Magokichi (1888–1962). Yamaoka was born in Minami Tominaga, a village that is now part of Nagahama. Yamaoka developed the world’s first compact diesel engine, a technology that Yanmar has implemented in construction and agricultural machinery, ships, and electrical generators. The Yanmar Museum’s interactive exhibits (which include virtual farming, wake-surfing, a digital fishery, and a “sustainable energy” climbing wall) reflect the company’s three core themes of “land,” “sea,” and “city.”

The museum’s attached restaurant, Premium Marche Biwako, offers a menu of dishes made with sustainably farmed rice. The second floor has more traditional museum exhibits that introduce the history of the company.