50 Years of PLARAIL!

In 2009, Tomy Plarail celebrates its 50th birthday. Coincidentally, Namikaze Toys is located in Hawaii which is celebrating its 50th anniversary of Statehood! In honor of both, we've created the Hawaii Five-O Loop and share the details of the evolution of PLARAIL!

1959 - Tomy creates Plarail, its first trains were hand powered rolling plastic trains1961 - Tomy releases the first battery powered plastic train sets1970 - The first Plarail logo is released, followed by some redesigns until they reach the modern day version below

It was interesting to read that the signature blue rail has not changed much in 50 years. The first "tsuru tsuru" is literally smooth, "zara zara" is rough, and "giza giza" is jagged.The rail's turning radius was determined by the ちゃぶ台 ("chabudai" - once a popular low tea table). It was 470 mm across and completely contains one circle of Plarail track.

So, to celebrate, Tomy has released the 50th Anniversary Commemorative C-12 Steam Train and Arched Bridge Rail Set. That's a mouth full, but onto the pictures!!!
* all information and pictures gathered from Tomy's website

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Tomy PLARAIL - New Releases, November and December 2008

Tomica and Plarail Town Set

This set combines Tomica's Town scene with the familiar blue PLARAIL train tracks. The set includes a Hokkaido train car, Tomica Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution X, and a PLA-Kid racer figure. The train takes 1 - AA battery. Other PLARAIL pieces include: J-13 City Train Station (2nd level with light blue parts), J-14 bridge legs, J-15 mini bridge leg, J-06 double length slopes, R-03 inner curve rail, R-01 straight rails, R-18 A&B climbing curved rails, and R-20 quarter length rails.


West JR Shinkansen - Fresh Green 0 Farewell Set

JR Series 0 Sanyo Shinkansen Bullet Train "Fresh Green Color" set to commemorate its retirement. There are 6-car trains and includes 4 segments of an elevated rail group for display purposes. The train requires 1-AA battery, and more elevated rail to create a functional route.
Shinkansen Mega Trailer

A bullet train transport trailer! This set comes with one PLA-kid train engineer. This mega transporter uses 1-AAA battery to power the lights. It has a manual arm crane to lift and place any 3-car train into the bed of the trailer. However, the Shinkansen shown in the picture is not included.

8000 Keihan Train S-59 (express)

It's cool, it's red and cream colored, JAM ON! This train has 2-speeds and requires 1 AA battery. 京阪 (Keihan) comes from the characters 京都 (Kyoto) and 大阪 (Osaka). The Keihan Densha runs between Osaka, Kyoto, and Shiga prefectures. The 8000 series was introduced to the Keihan line in 1989.

Hyper Guardian Series - HGS-03 Fire-Liner

A new addition to the Hyper Guardian Series - Disaster and rescue vehicles. This set comes with one PLA-kid fire fighter and requires 1-AA. The last car can be expanded up into a bucket ladder. Tomy has yet to announce another 2 more Hyper Guardian Series trains.

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Tomy PLARAIL - New Releases, October and November 2008

S-45 Model 321 Commuter Train with Sound
The Model 321 West Japan Commuter Train will be making it's PLARAIL debut in October. It makes sounds when it moves. This train requires one C and two AAA batteries which are sold separately.

'Arigatou Yume no Chou Tokkyuu' Hikari Set
The iconic first generation Hikari bullet train known affectionately as the 'Yume no Chou Tokyuu' or 'Dream Express' makes its appearance in this special set which includes special track sections from the elevated rail group which was released earlier this year.

J-06 Elevated Overpass (for use with Tomica Town)
This elevated overpass is modeled after existing concrete designs and is the same length as the R-01 rail and the same height as the J-14 bridge legs. The undersection is designed especially to accomodate Takara Tomy's new Tomica Town line which further integrates the existing Plarail and Plaroad (Tomica) lines.

J-18 Railway Crossing (for use with Tomica Town)
This railway crossing combines both a roadway and railway in a compact scenery set equalling the length of a single R-02 half-length rail. Trains which pass over the crossing will trigger a chime which mimics the sound of an approaching train. This scenery piece is also for use with other Tomica Town items.

J-21 Large Railway Crossing (for use with Tomica Town)
This is a larger version of the J-18 Railway Crossing and includes four barriers which will lower as a train passes across the railway. This set piece is equal in length to a combined R-01 straight and R-02 half-length rail. This scenery piece is also for use with other Tomica Town items.

Hyper Guardian Series - Hyper Guardian Ex-Guiner
Tomy is finally releasing its Plarail Hyperguardian line starting with this mammoth Ex-Guiner. This large item measures nearly 70 centimeteres in length and requires a double-width track setup (R-04, R-05 and R-28) to move along a rail. Pla-kids can sit inside the large cockpit area and the mid-section of the forward car rotates in a 360 degree range of motion and serves as a transport section for smaller support vehicles and other Hyper Guardian trains. The rear car can seperate to hold emergency vehicles from the Hyper Guardian Tomica series. This package also includes an orange search vehicle and a single Pla-kids figure, Captain Hayate. More pictures and some ridiculously awesome video can be found here.

Hyper Guardian Series - HGS-01 Pat-Liner
Short for Patrol-Liner, the high speed HGS-01 makes its plarail debut. It includes working lights, a large cockpit for Pla-kids to sit, space to accomodate other vehicles from the Hyper Guardian Tomica series as well as a number of other gimmicks which include a blue search vehicle and a single Pla-kids figure, Officer Nozomi. More pictures and a video can be found here.

Hyper Guardian Series - HGS-02 Drill-Liner
The HGS-02 Drill-Liner is a Special Construction vehicle. Like the HGS-01, it comes with a number of gimmicks including working lights, a detachable third car which transforms into a backhoe-like vehicle with an elevated cab, a cockpit for a Pla-kid and a revolving front drill. Packaged with this train is a single Pla-kids figure, Officer Kodama. More pictures and a video can be found here.

Hyper Guardian Wide-Area Patrol Set
This set comes with the Hyper Guardian Series - HGS-01 Pat-Liner mentioned above. It's made up of a set of the newly released R-28 double width turn out rails and a set of R-04 and R-05s double with straight and turn rails. This double-width 'wide' layout is made specifically to accommodate the large Ex-Guiner and other Hyper Guardian engines.

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New Designs: Auto Rail Switcher - Round2

A NEW layout with R-16 auto rail switcher!!  Our J-04 Double Length and Width blue iron bridge is flying high over the middle of the track.  Again there are 3 loops being automatically controlled by the rail switcher so we added another train to the mix.

Featuring Taiwan High Speed Railraod and JR East's やまびこ(Yamabiko):

• 19x R-01 Straight Rails
  
• 2x   R-02 Half length Rails
  
• 28x R-03 Inner Curve Rails
  
• 5x   R-04 Double Width Straight
  
• 4x   R-05 Double Width Curved
  
• 6x   R-06 Double length Slope
  
• 1x   R-11 Turn out Rail
  
• 1x   R-13 Single to Double Splitter
  
• 1x   R-16 Automatic Switch Rail
  
• 2x   R-18 Climbing Curved Rail
  
• 1x   J-04 Double Length Bridge
  
• 34x J-14 Bridge Legs
  
• 18x J-22 Double Width Bridge Legs
  

We realize these latest designs are on the larger sprawling side, so we'll get back to work on more compact designs next.

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New Designs: Featuring the Automatic Switcher!

Our new shipment included many items that we wanted in our own PLARAIL collection.  This layout was built around incorporating R-16 3-way automatic switcher rail piece. The yellow knob at the bottom right allows you to switch between automatic and manual switching mode.

There are 3 loops that merge at the R-16 piece. We've turned the whitespace into a train yard and all the extra scenary we had. Here's the bird's eye of our newly designed layout:

Now a clip of a Tsubame Shinkansen making automatic rounds between 3 loops with the help of R-16:

  

Other pieces that helped to create this layout include:

• 6x R-06 Double length slopes
  
• 3x R-18 Climbing slope sets
  
• 1x R-16 Automatic 3 way switcher
  
• 1 Ippai Tsunago Rail Set (contains blue iron bridge)
  
• 3x R-13 Single to Double rail splitters
  
• 3x R-11 Turn out rail splitters
  
• 1x R-24 N-shape splitter
  
• 6x R-04 Double width straight rails
  
• 6x R-05 Double width turn rails
  
• bunch of R-01 straight and R-03 curved rails
  

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Hyper Guardian Series!

Tomy has dropped another bomb on us this month with the teaser page for a new series of Plarail trains called the Hyper Guardian Series. The teaser page can be found here. Judging by the text and the images, it's a series of fictional search, salvage and rescue type trains based on the Tomica Hyper Series. The interesting part is that one of the trains looks to be far larger than most Plarail trains and spans across an entire R-04 double-width rail.

Naturally, utilizing Tomy's existing rail lineup, a train that wide would be limited to going in circles. With the news of the R-28 Double-width Turn-out Rail release for August, it looks like they're going to change that. Hopefully this will be the start of more creative trains and a more varied lineup for the double-width rails. We'll be posting updates as they are released!

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Opening Soon!

Hey folks! Hopefully our store will be opening soon and we'll have some actual stock to show you. We'll be sticking to PLARAIL for now, but may add more popular items as time goes by. Until then we'll keep you posted on new releases from Tomy here at our blog. Not all the new releases you see posted will be kept in stock, but we will try to deliver as many high quality products as possible.

We'll also try to add more personal content-- showing layouts, possible modifications and some other tips and tricks to help you create the perfect PLARAIL layout.

Fans of PLARAIL and trains in general, feel free to leave a comment and stop by often!

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