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Motor Tomica Basic Set (1997)

Originally written May 24, 2024


The Motor Tomica Basic Set (モータートミカベーシックセット) is a crossover Motor Tomica and Plarail set with an oval of combined parallel road and rail sections with small accessories. A Honda CR-V and DD51 run around the little oval.


The emblem on the front of the box with the Nozomi and Motor Tomica car is advertising "Tomica Plarail World." Somewhat similar to the exported Tomica World sets which often included both road and rail elements, Tomica Plarail World sets also included both trains and road.

Set contents
Quantity
Item
Photo
1 DD51 (set exclusive "Blue Train" variant)
1 Honda CR-V (set exclusive red variant)
2 DR-01 Straight Rail & Road (four pieces each)
8 DR-02 Curve Rail & Road (four pieces each)
1 "N" Battery  

The DD51 in this set is in the blue and gold livery used on the Hokutosei blue train. The engine does not have any designation numbers nor some of the details of the Blue Train livery like the shooting star on the side. A more detailed double-header blue train DD51 pack was released in the 2000s.

This set originally came with a set-exclusive red Honda CR-V. When I bought my copy of the set used in earlier 2024 it instead included the regular B-20 Honda CR-V which is blue. My first car was also a blue Honda CR-V that didn't look too dissimilar to the Motor Tomica version (although mine did not have neat red rims nor side CR-V graphics), so I wanted this version of the CR-V as well, but I later bought the correct pinky-red color CR-V to complete the set.

The parallel road and rail pieces are made up of large plastic bases with road and rail integrated in with a selection of barriers, street lights, and trees. These accessories were used on other Tomica and Plarail accessories - the street light tooling is from the 1970s if not earlier. These accessories were sold individually staring in 1997 as DR-01 Straight Rail & Road and DR-02 Curve Rail & Road with one of the integrated bases and one each of the smaller accessories.

Obviously the layout itself is simple but the parallel road and rail pieces are really cool and there are so many small accessories that you can configure them around in lots of different ways. Even without any added pieces to expand the set it looks neat as a little diorama setup.

Set name Motor Tomica Basic Set
モータートミカベーシックセット
Release period 1997-~1999
Vehicle rating Track rating
Accessory rating Overall
Notes: The ratings are high, but I really like the DD51 and Honda CR-V and the parallel road and rail Price 3980 yen (1997)
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