ONE train – FIVE different colours !

Japan is well know for it’s variety of colourful trains, but in this case I think they have even outdone themselves …

In 1988, JR Kyushu took delivery of a sole Kiha183-1000 4 car diesel set to be used on ‘Joyful Train’ service. Because of the original Dutch influence in the Nagasaki area, it was called the ‘Holland Village Express’, and painted in a red/white/blue livery.

In 1992, the train was repainted an overall pale green colour with gold striping & lettering and named ‘Yufuin no Mori’.

When the KiHa72 ‘New Yufuin no Mori’ version was delivered in 1999, the  KiHa183-1000 was returned to the original red/white/blue livery, but this time named ‘Seibold’.

2004 saw the next change of colour and name – this time it was painted in an overall maroon color with gold lettering and named ‘Yufu DX’ (Yufu Deluxe).

In 2008 the name was kept the same, but the colour this time was an overall bright yellow with green lettering !

Model manufacturer ‘MicroAce’ has released all of these variations – the ‘Holland Village Express’ (A8246) & maroon ‘Yufu Dx’ (A8259) in July 2005, the ‘Yufuin no Mori’ (A8247) in October 2006 and the ‘Seibold’ (A8248) & yellow ‘Yufu DX’ (A8261) in November 2010 (with a 5% price increase). So technically even if you bought all of these models, you could never run more than one of them at the same time 🙂

In 2011 there is to be another change – this time being black & white with cartoon characters on it !!!! More info when I get pictures ….

Here are the pictures of the models (the ‘Yufuin no Mori’ looks different to the others only because it is placed the otherway round in the case) …