fall inside a hole

Plarail Expo Silver Plated 200 Series Shinkansen (2012-2013)

First written September 30 2024

Throughout 2012 and 2013 at Plarail Expo events in Japan the individual cars to a silver-plated 200 series Tohoku Joetsu Shinkansen in the style of the later shark-nose trains were given away.

The standard Plarail 200 series based on the 100-series "sharknose" trains were discontinued in the early 2000s, reappearing as a previous Plarail Expo release in 2005. These trains were given away as individual cars in clear plastic bags, and I think the power car may have originally come with one of the paper foldout safety and parts form sheets.

The silver finish is shiny but susceptible to scratches. The front lights are translucent yellow plastic inserts, with red inserts in the trail car. The green chassis and skirting is translucent and has a neat look. There is no "Green Car" sticker like some other releases with the double-decker intermediate car. Because these were given away somewhat oddly and not as complete trains, it is possible to buy extra cars on the second-hand market or buy a complete three-piece train that someone else has pieced together (as I did). As of writing in 2024, these expo prizes are readily available for fairly little - I paid about 2200 yen or ~16 dollars on Yahoo auctions for this three-car train.

The plastic for the body shells is a creamy white that is sprayed silver. The production dates on my examples date the intermediate car to March 20th, 2012, the tail car to November 14, 2012, and the power car dates to March 5th 2013. I am not sure exactly what locations or events these were given away at, but they all seem to be fairly common (for now). The rarer plated sharknose 200 series is the gold variation.