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Mini Mini Plarail
First written October 11, 2024The Mini Mini Plarail (ミニミニプラレール) series was a small Plarail-style train toy released by Tomy in the early to mid 2000s. The trains run on rail with a gauge close to a singular regular Plarail rail so Plarail track can be used as double rail for Mini Mini Plarail. The boxes also included a small bag of "ramune" candy, the common name for sugar pellet type candy in Japan, and cost about 100 yen in total. Unlike some other candy toy type toys, the boxes showed which train in the series it contained. A Thomas the Tank Engine subrange was also released.
Trains
Mini Mini Plarail train cars have two wide rollers underneath that fit into their own track or a single rail trough of a standard Plarail rail.
The first series of regular trains, including the 500 and 700 series Shinkansens, the EF65 and Blue Train, and an L Limited Express, was released in 2001. These E3 and E4 shinkansen cars were part of the second Mini Mini Plarail series released in early 2002. The first two series can be seen in their entirely on this webpage.
Trains have peg connectors on either end, with each box including a connecting joint piece. There is no different "lead" or "tail" car for the Shinkansen-type trains, just an "end" car that works either way, letting you add a second one to the rear of a train to cap it off.
Track
Mini Mini Plarail track has a similar connection style to the older type of Capsule Plarail track and two raised rails which the train's rollers sit between. There is no immediate way to connect Mini Mini Plarail to other types of Plarail track.
Mini Mini Plarail turnouts. Some accessories like this railroad crossing with manually-operated boom gates were also released.
Because of the relationship between the Mini Mini Rail and Plarail rail widths, Mini Mini Plarail can run on regular Plarail track similar to Plarail Advance.
Mini Mini Plarail Thomas Series 1 (2004)
The first Thomas the Tank Engine series was released in 2004, with each of the five boxes in the set containing a train, piece of track, accessory, and connecting piece. These included...
(A) Thomas
Thomas's series one release included Thomas himself, a connecting part, a standing tree, and a curve rail.
(B) Percy
Percy with spinning windmill and curve rail.
(C) Toby
Toby includes a small Ffarquhar station and a straight rail. To make up for his fairly basic shape, Toby has extra stickers all the way around the back, something that was pointed out on the boxes.
(D) Henry
Henry includes a straight rail and a small Dryaw station.
(E) James
James with curve rail and signal with moving arm.
December 2024
While looking for the boxes for the third Thomas series shown below I also came across an unused boxed James from the first series. Here is the box - it was opened at some point before I bought it to remove the candy. You can see that it is marked E, showing which train is inside.
Inside the components are in a plastic zipper bag, with James, signal, and fresh sticker sheet in their own sealed bags.
Here is a scan of James' sticker sheet.
Mini Mini Plarail Thomas Series 2
In a second Thomas series was released as Mini Mini Plarail Thomas Series 2 in later 2004. This series included four new characters and new accessories. Unfortunately, I don't have the trackside accessories for this series. Series 2 included...
Thomas
Thomas himself was, naturally, reissued as part of the second series. The paint application on the face of the second-series Mini Mini Plarail Thomas is slightly different.
Annie
The only rolling stock released for the Thomas subrange, Annie. She has a nice face sticker, but its a little bit of a shame the sticker sheet did not just include stickers for Clarabel as well...
Edward
Mini Mini Plarail Edward. I think it is neat that this range opted to make Edward before/instead of Gordon.
Mavis
Mini Mini Plarail Mavis the quarry diesel.
Ben
Ben, with no release of his twin Bill. I suppose you could always make up your own stickers.
A third series called the Candy Mini Thomas Series was released around but it contains only reissues of previous Mini Mini Plarail Thomas items and there are only four trains (Thomas, Percy, James, Henry) and a track pack in the series. Somewhere I think I have a complete set of this later New series sealed in their boxes (with 15 year old candy still inside), and I will dig them out and photograph the boxes for this page at some point.
December 2024
Here is the box for the later Candy Mini Thomas (キャンデーミニトーマス) series. This set was released in association with Subarudo. The front and top of the boxes say which set is inside - the top of the box is scanned from set 1 and the front from set 5. The candy in these ones is marked best by 2010...