yeah, were (me and the boys) are into them now. my 5year old loves the little tomy kids. We have collected a bunch of them through craigs list. .. though I am not sure exactly what 'line' they are from, we have some fire truck, police, that blue police that turns into a spaceship, the purple one that comes with the tomy city garage (got that new in box for $40)... and a couple others. I seriously think I have a disorder. We have over 100 trains. we are currently collecting the 'hyper' ones. basically that is anything that's not Thomas, not chuggington and doesn't have a face... lol... or isn't the tomy japan trains.
The US Tomica line mainly chose to release the Hyper Guardian trains over the stock-standard Plarail trains. The only 'normal' ones I ever saw were an EF Freight set and the Keisei Skyliner over here.
Wasn’t that also where the Amtrak F series passenger train comes from?
The EF6019 with the mixed freight was a wonderful starter set. Too bad you can’t find something like that at retail anymore.
You're thinking of the older Tomica World range. The one we speak of was just 'Tomica'.
The grey bits would allow them to be the power for that big 2-track command train. Never released outside Japan.
Oh...you are so right T-Fanz...I never knew that or how those connections were made for that amazing big unit. T had always assumed that the trains that came with it were the only ones that could be used but thanks to you pointing it out I know I was wrong. Thank you, I really enjoy learning new things about these trains.
Discovered this video which shows the big unit and how it connects to the trains at about the 9:48 minute mark.
Also Kmott...in this same video, at about the 3:47 minute mark, you can see details of your Cargo Liner including how to stand up the PlaKids in the open bay area and how other accessories can be mounted using those holes you asked about.
All in all the video is pretty cool and, if you really get into the Hyper Guardian Tomica line you may also like the big unit in the second video.
Wow, that is a bit extreme! We just bought a lot of hypers on eBay for $25!