Any Plarail fans here?

[Eilif]

Wondering if there's any fans of Tomy toys' Plarail train sets (also sold in various parts of the world as Tomy, Tomica and Tomica World) here? Any love for the classic Japanese blue plastic train tracks?

Here in the USA Tomy is the brand that used to have the license to make motorized Thomas and Friends toys. Roughly the same trains are now made by Fisher Price with a different track system, but a few blue tracked non-Thomas sets are sold in the USA as "Tomica World". I picked up a batch of the older Tomy Thomas stuff at a resale and am totally charmed by these battery powered trains that only go one way, but are part of this huge system of train sets that are designed to run in so many interesting ways. I'd love to see pictures of member's layouts.

For those who have no idea what I'm talking about here's a couple pictures of Plarail layouts. (not mine)

[tomdobs55]

I have a few of those tracks they're a lot of fun. So many accessories available for them too.

[Rob Klingberg]

I have the Plarail Advance sets-- the N-Gauge version of Plarail where two trains run on a single normal Plarail track.

Very cool stuff.

[CptPJs]

I was crazy about this when I was a kid, I made layouts that went round the entire living room, the dining room, and part way down the hall as well. Brought back some good memories seeing this.

[Eilif]

Took a few pictures of the layout I put together this week. This began by me acquiring a batch of plarail from craigslist so that when my son can play with the same Tomy and Trackmaster Tomas trains that he has at the Grandparents, but on a more advanced layout. At 3 he doesn't want to run the trains, just to push them himself. One of the neat feature of these trains are unique in that when the switch is "off" the motor is disengaged from the wheels so they will roll free.

Truth is though, this layout is more for me. It'll be a while before he's advanced enough to enjoy it so for now it's hidden in the attic bedroom. I've got some more stuff coming in the mail, and am still working on a layout that will allow me to change the train's direction repeatedly without it getting trapped in a one-way loop. I'm also using my stock of DUPLO and LEGO to increase the number of full-height girders.

[Bipin]

What a great toy! I remember having these as a young child, up until the point I flushed a curved rail down the toilet. I did not do too many silly things as a child, fortunately that was the extent of it. It was Playmobil and LEGO from there on in.

[Eilif]

Revisiting this. My initial design (as seen above) for girders doesn't allow for smooth passage of trains underneath. The layout above worked out fine, but when I tried to run a line under another one, the train hits the orange piers. I've devised a simple all-LEGO design that allows double level track arrangements and have acquired some more track to make a larger layout.

Pictures to follow later.

[Eilif]

I'm taking out the Duplo/LEGO supports and the Playrail orange piers seen above and bringing most of them to my dad's place where he has a batch of Tomy/Plarail trains for my son. Instead, here's the basic design for a support made entirely from LEGO that allows trains to run underneath. I've made about 22 of these which appears to be all I'll need.

With the new supports, the layout allows for two trains to run simultaneously on upper and lower loops. Also, the arrangement of the additional inner and outer loops allows for each train to reverse direction (plarail/tomy trains only run one way) without interfering with the other. I've started acquiring toy cars that have a "vintage" non-hot-rodded look to them. Mostly early 70s and earlier european cars. Most are matchbox. A few are Hot Wheels, but they tend to be a bit too flashy for my tastes.

More pictures of the layout here: http://s5.photobucket.com/user/dane5140/library/Plarail?sort=3&page=1

Next up: Now that I have a workable layout it's time to start building some LEGO structures for the layout!