fall inside a hole
Round-Trip Plarail (1975-1992)
First written May 2024
Beginning in 1975 Tomy produced a series of very neat reversing Plarail trains under the "ofuku" Reciprocating or Round-Trip Plarail name. These trains all had reversing-capable gearboxes with bar-style couplers that are supposed to be able to reverse down onto a train, pick up its hook coupler, and then reverse back forward out of the siding to take the train away. A few different trains and sets were produced for the range.
Round-Trip Plarail trains
The two main trains released for Round-Trip Plarail were the ED70 based off of the earlier EF15 and the EF66 released individually after most of the rest of the range was discontinued. Additionally, it seems that at some point in the 1970s a Round-Trip C12 steam locomotive was in the works, but it was shelved for whatever reason and the toolings ended up being used to make (non-reversing) export C12s for Stelco and Palitoy in Hong Kong.
| Year | Name | Description | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1975 | ED-70 Electric Locomotive ED-70でんききかんしゃ |
Yellow or green reversing ED-70s with two return rails in a third-generation lift-top box | Can be seen in the Plarail Museum |
| 1976 | ED-70 Electric Locomotive ED-70でんききかんしゃ |
Green ED-70 in brief flip-top style box | Can be seen in the Plarail Museum |
| 1976 | EF-66 Electric Locomotive EF-66でんききかんしゃ |
EF66 with front and rear coupling bars, Esso tanker, and open wagon in brief flip-top style box | Can be seen in the Plarail Museum |
| later 1976 | Oufuku or Round Trip EF-66 おおふくEF-66 |
Individual EF66 with front and rear coupling bars in fourth generation "train" packaging | Can be seen in the Plarail Museum |
| 1978 |
EL02 EF66 Round Trip EL02 EF-66おうふく |
Individual EF66 with only rear coupling bar sold in fifth generation packaging |
 |
| 1987 |
Round-Trip EF-66 往復EF-66 |
Final release sixth-generation round-trip EF-66 with updated (but still old power) gearbox |
 |
| Unreleased | Round-Trip C12 | Planned and designed but never put into regular production, toolings for a reversing C-12 steam locomotive ended up being used to make (non-reversing) export C-12s in Hong Kong in the later 1970s |
 |
Round-Trip Plarail sets
Although I do not currently own even the components to most of these sets, for the purpose of providing information about the series, here are descriptions of the Round-Trip Plarail sets and links to the Plarail Museum pages with them featured.
| Year | Name | Description | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1975 | Round-Trip Plarail 3D Loading and
Unloading Set おうふくプラレールりったいつみおろしセット |
"Shuttle train" type set with a fairly small layout with a dumping and loading gimmick and yellow or green ED70 traversing up and down and back and forth | Can be seen in the Plarail Museum |
| 1975 | Round-Trip Plarail Train Set おうふくプラレールせんしゃじょうセット |
Set featuring the new-for-'75 Car Wash in a set-exclusive variant along with yellow ED70 | Can be seen in the Plarail Museum |
| 1975 | Round-Trip Plarail Shunting Yard Set おうふくプラレールそうしゃじょうセット |
Green ED70 set with very cool components like the old four-way "tentetsuki" four way switch and old pedestrian bridge | Can be seen in the Plarail Museum |
| 1977 |
Round-Trip Plarail ED-70 Loading and Unloading Set おうふくプラレールED-70つみおろしセット |
Loading and unloading set with both small balls and logs with a red ED-70 | Can be seen in the Plarail Museum |
| 1980 |
Forest Railway Loading and Unloading Set 森林鉄道積みおろしセット |
First set to use the EF-66 instead of ED-70, includes pretty large layout with elevated portion | Can be seen in the Plarail Museum |
| 1985 |
Round-Trip EF-66 Blue Train Set 往復EF-66ブルートレインセット |
Garage and car wash-type set similar to the 1975 set but with regular blue car wash and EF-66 with Blue Train 24 series cars |
 |
| 1986 |
Round-Trip EF-66 3D Loading and Unloading Set 往復EF-66立体積み降ろしセット |
Last Round-Trip set with interesting loading and unloading partially elevated loop with wide curves and log loader and unloader | Can be seen in the Plarail Museum |
Round-Trip Plarail track
Two styles of reversing track were used for Round-Trip Plarail. One was a "static" permanent reversing rail with a molded reverser near the concave connector. Two of the early type with the simpler "angled" reversing bar were included with individual ED70 releases.
Before too long the style of the reversing protrusion was changed to this style with a "pocket" for the pin to slide into as the train reverses. These reversing rails are oddly hollow on the underside and made of a less flexible plastic. These rails were included with the 1976 ED-70 individual release and many of the Round-Trip sets. The last Round-Trip Plarail set in 1986 has one of these reverser tracks in regular blue.
R-09 Reciprocating Return Rail
| <-- R-08 Stop Rail | R-10 Joint Rail--> |
The other style of Round-Trip reverser, first used in the 1975 Round-Trip Plarail Train Set, is similar to a stop rail in that it has a lever which raises or lowers the reversing section. These rails were sold in pairs in blue Hikari-go tags as おうふくプラレール リターンレール Round-Trip Plarail Return Rail, yellow Hikari-go tag bags as 往復リターンレール and around 1987 were given the R-09 designation, staying in the range as 往復リターンレール Reciprocating Return Rail until 1992 when the Round-Trip EF-66 was discontinued. R-09 later became the number for the double track individual outer curve rail.
Similar reversing tracks were used for the Tomy Trains range beginning in the late 1980s. Tomy Train had a similar "static" straight rail with a reverser molded into one end although it more resembles a regular straight rail on the bottom. The switchable reverser was changed to a half-straight form factor for Tomy Train, which is neat and allows more granularity when placing reversers. All of these reversers are cross-compatible and will trigger Tomy Train or Round-Trip Plarail engines.
As mentioned in the set section above, the Car Wash was designed to work with the Round-Trip Plarail system and has an integrated switchable reverser. This allows a player to send a round-trip train into the wash where it will roll against the brushes, hit the reverser, and roll against them again on the way back out. This remained in the tooling after the end of Round-Trip production in 1992 until the molding was refreshed in 2003.