Meitetsu KiHa 8500 series
The Meitetsu KiHa 8500 series is a limited express diesel multiple unit operated by Nagoya Railroad in Japan from 1991 to 2001, by Aizu Railway from 2002 to 2010, and then by Sabah State Railway since October 2016.
History
The trains were manufactured in 1990 to replace aging KiHa 8000 series diesel railcars that entered service in 1965, in light of newer diesel railcars being manufactured by various companies.Five cars were manufactured by Nippon Sharyo in 1991 based on the KiHa 85 series built by the same company and used by JR Central, and entered service the same year, replacing all remaining KiHa 8000 series diesel railcars on Kita Alps services. When they were in service with Meitetsu, they were used on the Kita Alps and Hida services.
However, in 2000, a high-speed bus service connecting Nagoya Station and Takayama Station was introduced. With the introduction of the bus service, the ridership of the Kita Alps service was halved, and Meitetsu saw that there was no point keeping the five cars due to inefficiency when compared with the bus service. Due to this, all five cars were retired from service on 30 September 2001, the same day when the Kita Alps service was abolished.
All five cars were later sold to the Aizu Railway that same year, and began operations on the Aizu Railway on 23 March 2002. As the KiHa 8500 series were designed for high-speed operation, problems with the KiHa 8500 series started to surface when in service on the Aizu Railway, which resulted in deterioration of parts due to the frequent station stops the cars had to make. As such, the cars were retired on 30 May 2010 and replaced by newer AT-700 series railcars the same day. The cars were actually supposed to make a special final run on 26 and 27 March 2011 as part of an event, but said event was cancelled due to the Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami.