It amazes me how some toys and games had such impact on people's lives that they all came together in the digital age to share their love and enthusiasm and help others with getting into the hobby. 40 years ago you wouldn't think about joining a community of people based around toy trains designed for toddlers and young kids but nowadays those same kids have grown up with a fondness in their hearts and understand others who enjoyed these toys. I just love that.
That Tomy Train 4 is hard to find. I still have problems with the old trains when going over the top of the hill. Think it is from worn out traction tires. That signal light is one of the pieces I am looking for. Very cool hearing from your perspective as someone who had this set originally. I never new what those levers where for on the station because I didn't have the manual - thanks for showing how the magnets on the feet is supposed to work! And thanks for showing how you repair them!
Hey Train Tsar Fun, thanks for the comment. I've tried to keep my old toys in good condition, I always looked after my toys, well, with the exception of Crash Dummies ;) glad I could help, the old trains are pretty simple to repair, I'd advise taking photos whilst you disassemble to know where the cogs sit correctly. Also, ensure that the lever on the back is switched to ON when you seal it back up, if you don't you'll feel that the lever can't move otherwise. A small amount of contact adhesive and some oil can work wonders with these old toys, have used the same techniques on some of my other mechanical Tomy toys :)
Fantastic review. I'd so much fun making and playing with these sets. The oddball child in me immediately feel it was the place to set up battlegrounds for my army soldiers in it aswell. Many a battle was fought over the train station, and many a time the bridge was sabotaged, often with opposing troops being transported across it. The 5 year old me must have had an instinctive understanding for the merger or trains and warfare. Greats toys...
Really are fantastic sets and were designed for kids to play with and just enjoy. Sounds like you made the most of them when you were a kid, thanks for sharing your memories, always good to hear people have fond memories of these as I do.
Makes me remember the Plarail(Tomy Train) sets i have. I have enough track and scenery to fit in two ikea blue bags. And 2 containers of trains and cars. Oh lord, i still want more. I will always remember the sound of the train moving on the tracks, and the long trains i have, and the fact that i put batteries on the log cars. Sigh. Maybe one day i will go on amazon and spent so much money on these again lol. If i sell them worth is probably A LOT!
I had some of these sets. I loved how compatible they were with each other, how you could expand your layout. I was curious to see if earlier sets they made like the Merry-Go-Copter could be incorporated into layouts with the stock shown here, maybe in the form of a loop-line...
Got a load of my old Tomy trains down and trying to figure out what I had, I think it's actually set 4 as it has the bridge and the Inter City train, along with Percy and James from the Thomas line and a load of other stuff like the swing bridge and suspension bridge. I have the full electronic Sound Play Station but it had batteries in it so it'll take some cleaning up. Scanning through the Spotters Handbook from 92 to try and identify things, found this and it's in relatively good condition. I actually have video of Christmas mornings when I was a kid so I'll have to go back and watch. Interestingly, most of the trains I've found have hard rubber tyres like yours but the 'James' train with 6 wheels has a different type of tyre that hasn't gone hard.
My first set was the Amtrak set and I think I got some second hand track too for Christmas 1990 too :) remember vividly making a huge layout on the carpet, my grandad and me playing with them all afternoon
Ja, I remember we had that set second hand as a child, plastic logs and all, I'd make the train pull a little man around all day, just because 😂 I took the train station apart as a child and couldn't fix it again, as an adult I hunted high and low for anotber train station, but this time I took it apart and got it to work again, the voice mechanism was all I kept! I've been after one of the original trains for a while, but all 5hat comes up is Thomas the tank engine stuff, crazy to think it's still around some 25+ years later!
I also became interested in Tomy Thomas the Tank Engine sets as a child, but that was mostly because they were used on RUclips to remake TV episodes. I never actually started collecting them, but nowadays, I sometimes wish I had.
Or travel ti the phillippines and go to the Toys R Us Idk of they still sell it, but that was knowledge from 2015(visted there for like a few months, stayed with family)
when i was growing up, i didn’t have the tony train sets but rather the geotracks line, where were they were similar but in my opinion were better than to my track becuase you didn’t need female and male connection, they were universal, second they were remote controlled, and third there was a little cog wheel on the bottom of the trains to let it do action such as climb high hills, toy gimmicks for a station, and gave it much more traction, i highly check them out or research about them, the only downside was that the pain was later found out on the toys were harmful to children so they were lately recalled
All of my friends had Tomy and all I had was a cheap knock-off with no additional accessories etc. Tomy was many times better for the fact you'd want to buy more for it, which is great for Tomy. I've recently discovered Plarail (the non-Thomas variety), which predates Tomy Trains by about 10 years and was the basis for Tomy Trains as sold in the UK, Australia, NZ etc. The rails are a lighter blue colour the trains are significantly more detailed and to scale, based on actual trains found across Japan. They mostly lack the reversing feature which is a shame, but some have a 2 speed gearbox. Most importantly, they're very affordable, great for anyone with a few spare quid in their pocket.
What was said about electric Hornby train track was exactly the reason I could never get into it. I bought and tried out a Hornby train set, but the connection between the pieces of track and all the wires and switches was too fiddley and I just couldn't get the train to work, no matter what I did, which is part of the reason I got even more interested in BRIO wooden train track instead.
Well Luke from the down from the attic have you tried train simulator video games & Nancy Drew PC mystery games such as last train to blue moon canyon?
I had this as a kid, seriously train sets of the 90s were EPIC!
It amazes me how some toys and games had such impact on people's lives that they all came together in the digital age to share their love and enthusiasm and help others with getting into the hobby.
40 years ago you wouldn't think about joining a community of people based around toy trains designed for toddlers and young kids but nowadays those same kids have grown up with a fondness in their hearts and understand others who enjoyed these toys.
I just love that.
That Tomy Train 4 is hard to find. I still have problems with the old trains when going over the top of the hill. Think it is from worn out traction tires. That signal light is one of the pieces I am looking for. Very cool hearing from your perspective as someone who had this set originally. I never new what those levers where for on the station because I didn't have the manual - thanks for showing how the magnets on the feet is supposed to work! And thanks for showing how you repair them!
Hey Train Tsar Fun, thanks for the comment. I've tried to keep my old toys in good condition, I always looked after my toys, well, with the exception of Crash Dummies ;) glad I could help, the old trains are pretty simple to repair, I'd advise taking photos whilst you disassemble to know where the cogs sit correctly. Also, ensure that the lever on the back is switched to ON when you seal it back up, if you don't you'll feel that the lever can't move otherwise. A small amount of contact adhesive and some oil can work wonders with these old toys, have used the same techniques on some of my other mechanical Tomy toys :)
@@downfromtheattic is this set valuable at all? As I picked one up boxed for £5 at a local charity shop but I can't find any info on it 🤔
Fantastic review.
I'd so much fun making and playing with these sets.
The oddball child in me immediately feel it was the place to set up battlegrounds for my army soldiers in it aswell.
Many a battle was fought over the train station, and many a time the bridge was sabotaged, often with opposing troops being transported across it.
The 5 year old me must have had an instinctive understanding for the merger or trains and warfare.
Greats toys...
Really are fantastic sets and were designed for kids to play with and just enjoy. Sounds like you made the most of them when you were a kid, thanks for sharing your memories, always good to hear people have fond memories of these as I do.
Makes me remember the Plarail(Tomy Train) sets i have.
I have enough track and scenery to fit in two ikea blue bags.
And 2 containers of trains and cars.
Oh lord, i still want more.
I will always remember the sound of the train moving on the tracks, and the long trains i have, and the fact that i put batteries on the log cars.
Sigh. Maybe one day i will go on amazon and spent so much money on these again lol.
If i sell them worth is probably A LOT!
Great toy and great video with very helpful demo. Thanks!
Awesome. I don't remember having this set but I think a friend did.
I had a lot of thease Trains growing up and in Recent years I've been recollecting it to go along side Plarail.
I had some of these sets. I loved how compatible they were with each other, how you could expand your layout. I was curious to see if earlier sets they made like the Merry-Go-Copter could be incorporated into layouts with the stock shown here, maybe in the form of a loop-line...
IDK if they're still around but what a great company tomy is. They made alot of neat stuff.
Got a load of my old Tomy trains down and trying to figure out what I had, I think it's actually set 4 as it has the bridge and the Inter City train, along with Percy and James from the Thomas line and a load of other stuff like the swing bridge and suspension bridge. I have the full electronic Sound Play Station but it had batteries in it so it'll take some cleaning up. Scanning through the Spotters Handbook from 92 to try and identify things, found this and it's in relatively good condition. I actually have video of Christmas mornings when I was a kid so I'll have to go back and watch.
Interestingly, most of the trains I've found have hard rubber tyres like yours but the 'James' train with 6 wheels has a different type of tyre that hasn't gone hard.
I remember having a Tomy Intercity 125 train 🚆 set for Christmas 🎄 1990 when I was 6 years old
My first set was the Amtrak set and I think I got some second hand track too for Christmas 1990 too :) remember vividly making a huge layout on the carpet, my grandad and me playing with them all afternoon
Ja, I remember we had that set second hand as a child, plastic logs and all, I'd make the train pull a little man around all day, just because 😂
I took the train station apart as a child and couldn't fix it again, as an adult I hunted high and low for anotber train station, but this time I took it apart and got it to work again, the voice mechanism was all I kept! I've been after one of the original trains for a while, but all 5hat comes up is Thomas the tank engine stuff, crazy to think it's still around some 25+ years later!
I also became interested in Tomy Thomas the Tank Engine sets as a child, but that was mostly because they were used on RUclips to remake TV episodes. I never actually started collecting them, but nowadays, I sometimes wish I had.
Now that's genius. I wish they could still do this
The Lawl is the *LAWL* the line, still exsists?
Lol search plarail on amazon
Or travel ti the phillippines and go to the Toys R Us
Idk of they still sell it, but that was knowledge from 2015(visted there for like a few months, stayed with family)
This whole playset became two lines
Tomica(cars, and some other stuff)
Plarail(trains, scenery)
Is that the traintown theme I hear? love these videos so much
Haha good ear! "that's a fender bender!"
when i was growing up, i didn’t have the tony train sets but rather the geotracks line, where were they were similar but in my opinion were better than to my track becuase you didn’t need female and male connection, they were universal, second they were remote controlled, and third there was a little cog wheel on the bottom of the trains to let it do action such as climb high hills, toy gimmicks for a station, and gave it much more traction, i highly check them out or research about them, the only downside was that the pain was later found out on the toys were harmful to children so they were lately recalled
I've just had a watch of Geotracks, interesting system and nice to know kid friendly train sets are still being developed and produced
Love the video.
All of my friends had Tomy and all I had was a cheap knock-off with no additional accessories etc. Tomy was many times better for the fact you'd want to buy more for it, which is great for Tomy. I've recently discovered Plarail (the non-Thomas variety), which predates Tomy Trains by about 10 years and was the basis for Tomy Trains as sold in the UK, Australia, NZ etc. The rails are a lighter blue colour the trains are significantly more detailed and to scale, based on actual trains found across Japan. They mostly lack the reversing feature which is a shame, but some have a 2 speed gearbox. Most importantly, they're very affordable, great for anyone with a few spare quid in their pocket.
What was said about electric Hornby train track was exactly the reason I could never get into it. I bought and tried out a Hornby train set, but the connection between the pieces of track and all the wires and switches was too fiddley and I just couldn't get the train to work, no matter what I did, which is part of the reason I got even more interested in BRIO wooden train track instead.
i had this as a kid, then i got a Hornby layout. i wish i never sold mine as my nephew would have loved this
You could make a Tomy Pip and Emma out of that Intercity 125.
Well Luke from the down from the attic have you tried train simulator video games & Nancy Drew PC mystery games such as last train to blue moon canyon?
The fact that Plarail became more popular because of Thomas just amazed me
1:54 I can see Thomas characters!
I can see Percy
Omfg the nostalgia
Always wanted one of these as a kid but my parents always said no!
The Thomas at 11:45 is not made by tomy but Mattel and are of very poor quality
here here
Amazing
The items in this set, now i have the modern versions, but nit all of the,
Tomy Train 4 box is the one I’m missing
Did you ever have any electric trains growing up. Like just electric trains the Tomy me one I like that
I had a fair bit of Hornby railway stuff too, sadly I sold this a long time ago, a big regret :/ ah well
I forgot to mention lego showcase RUclips videos.
Unfortufantly, the lego patts are no longer supported
This is what Lego trains should be like
What know Plarail was formerly of TOMY Train is first in japan after now plarail of Takara TOMY are best popular only in japan like a kids
I hope Track Master Thomas The Tank Engine Can work on Tomy Train
Everything Trackmaster/Tomy pre-2014 works on Tomy tracks, after 2014 it goes crap