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Super Rail Tokaido Sanyo New Shinkansen Set

Originally written May 7, 2024

In 1985 the 100 series Shinkansen began servicing the original Shinkansen lines. The 100 series was commercialized for Super Rail and was sold in this and other sets such as the large Shinkanens & SL Wide Panorama Set and was part of the late Super Rail range in the early 1990s. This basic set includes an oval of track and was released as the Super Rail Tokaido Sanyo New Shinkansen Set (タカラ山陽ニュー新幹線セット).


My example is marked with TT-38, the mark Tomy used on boxes in 1987. I believe this set first came out around 1985, and it remained in the range in 1990 where it was the smallest set on offer.


Set contents
Quantity
Item
Photo
3 pieces
100 series New Shinkansen
2 Straight Rail
8 C Curve Rail
4 pieces Tunnel
4 Overhead wire holders  
1 Signal  
2 Trees (one of each type)
2 Reversing insert

The train in this set is a three-piece 100 series Shinkansen. The intermediate car depicts the 100 series double decker cars and has a different window pattern on each side.

A C battery fits down inside the cab of the front power car. The gearbox has a revering system built in with a hanging reverser lever. Some sets include specific track pieces with lifting reversers but the set also includes two clip-in reversers that can be placed on regular rail.

My set is missing the signal and overhead wire holders. The trees, tunnel, and other Super Rail components would later be used for Plarail.

Being a fairly simple set, the intended layout is a simple oval. The train is rather fast and zips around the track at a nice speed for a Shinkansen toy.

Even though this is a fairly small set, the included reversers do let you run the train back and forth around a portion of the layout or set up a shuttle type operation. I quite like the sound that the reversing gearbox makes and the way that the train slows down, changes direction, and then speeds back up, but some of this is probably a result of worn-out rubber traction tires.