fall inside a hole
Mini Mini Rail No. 2 National Railway Set
Originally written January 24, 2025
The Mini Mini Rail No. 2 National Railway Set (ミニミニレールNO.2セット国電) was one of the early Bandai Mini Mini Rail sets sold with one of four different colors of JNR 103 series commuter trains.
A sticker on the bottom of the box indicates which color of train is included - green, in this case. In addition to the orange, green, yellow, and blue JNR trains this track layout was also sold with a D-51 steam locomotive and the Shinkansen Hikari.
Set contents
| Quantity |
Item |
Photo |
|---|---|---|
| 3
pieces |
National Railways JNR 103 series commuter train (green) |
 |
| 4 | 801 Long Straight Rail |
 |
| 10 | 807 Long Curved Rail |
 |
| 2 | 808 Short Curved Rail |
 |
| 1 | 811 Points (Right) (manual) |
 |
| 1 | 812 Points (Left) (fixed) |
 |
| 1 | Signal |
 |
| 1 | Semaphore signal |
 |
| 8 | Overhead Line Pole (single) |
 |
| 2 | Tree |
 |
| 2 | Tree |
 |
| 2 | N batteries |
The pre-Action-Series JNR 103 series train was produced in orange, light blue, yellow, and green as pictured in the same No.1, No.2, and No.3 sets as the other trains. The power switch is located towards the front of the left side of the lead car.
The front car holds the powered chassis with the intermediate and rear cars using the same unpowered chassis as most of the other carriages in the series. The rear of the tail car has painted tail lights, with the headlight picked out on the front.
Track in this set is the earlier type of all-grey track. The switches for this system were produced in both manual and automatic, which sends the train straight through, with the number 2 set including a manual right and automatic left switch.
One of each type of signal as well as a nice amount of electrical catenaries are included, as well as two N batteries. I don't think these are the originals, which I think would have been red National Hi-Tops - the two old Neos included in the box when I bought it used decades later have 1979 production codes.
The No.2 set is better than the No.1 set, obviously, but the No.3 set, which I don't have any examples of (I'd love one with a different color of the JNR train...) is certainly the coolest of the initial Mini Mini Rail sets.