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Panorama Car

First written April 28, 2025

The 7000 series Meitetsu Panorama Car was the first of Meitetsu's panorama car trains, with these trains moving the driver's cab all the way up above a lower passenger deck that extends right up to the front of the train.

EC16 Panorama Car (1981)

The original Plarail Panorama Car train was introduced in September 1981 as EC16 Panorama Car (EC16 パノラマカー). It is a very nice bright red with a large translucent blue panorama window on the front and rear.

The head mark of the train reads "岐阜" or Gifu, one of the destinations on the train's route, and "特" for Special.

Before coming across a slightly grubby three-car train in an 80s Plarail lot in early 2025 I had previously found a rather nice condition power car and intermediate car from another old lot. Both trains use the same variation of the milky white plastic old-power gearbox with paper sticker over the battery contact strip.

When I got the three-car set, the rear window of the rear car had been knocked out of place... one screw hold the body shell onto the chassis, and another inside allows the grey roof insert to be slid down through the body to also release the blue windshield.

A nice four-car train.

In 1987 the Panorama Car was rereleased in new-power form with an additional pinky-white stripe along the body. Although the trains continued to run until 2009, the new power release was not rereleased in the mid 1990s with the move to seventh generation boxes... a special release appeared limited to stations and some local toy stores in 2003 and 2004, and it was very popular and sold out, but the 7000 series was not part of the regular range again...