Category Archives: Model Team

Stalin’s Cat

Leave a reply

It wasn’t the British or the Americans that sacrificed the most in the Second World War, but Russia, with more lives lost than almost every other country put together. It was fitting then that it was Stalin’s army that victoriously made it to Berlin first to end the war in Europe.

Things quickly changed once the common enemy was defeated though, with Stalin killing millions of his own people to add to the wartime total, and the Soviet Union developing nuclear weapons to match the U.S, ushering in a decades-long Cold War.

Stalin’s wartime victory (and totalitarian regime) led to everything being called something with ‘Stalin’ in it, including the vehicle in this post. Built in Stalingrad, the Stalinec T130 bulldozer was actually an American Caterpillar manufactured under licence, despite the fact the two countries were on the verge of annihilating one another.

We’re not sure if Joseph Stalin ever drove a Stalinec, but he was probably pleased it – like everything else – was named after him, even if underneath it was actually designed by evil capitalist Americans. This lovely Lego recreation of the Stalinec T130 comes from Flickr’s martin nespor, who has also built an impressive Skoda Xena / LIAZ 400 Series truck and low-loader trailer to transport it.

All three models are beautifully constructed and detailed, with both the Skoda Xena and Stalinec T130 featuring remote control drive and steering via bluetooth. The Skoda also includes integrated LED lighting and authentic stickerage to add to the realism, whilst the Stalinec T130’s blade can raise and lower via Power Functions too.

A wealth of imagery is available via Martin’s ‘Stalinec T130’ album on Flickr – click the link above to make the jump to check out the complete gallery of Stalin’s Cat, and here to see more of the more modern Skoda Xena transporting it.

Forest Pigs

Leave a reply

Rallying was big business in the 1980s. With few rules making for wild cars, the WRC attracted as much attention as Formula 1, and Porsche wanted a piece of it, despite the unlikely suitability of their road-going products. Of course Porsche had a plan; their incredible all-wheel-drive 959, which would have been ideally placed for the WRC’s top-tier Group B once it was finished.

Unfortunately for Porsche the banning of Group B meant the 959 never got the chance to properly compete (although this did mean that the car raced in Paris-Dakar instead, becoming one of the most wonderful and weird winners in the event’s history), but before then Porsche still wanted a rally car whilst the 959 was in development. Cue the 911 with a giant wing on the back.

The 911 of the 1980s was of course only rear-wheel-drive though, meaning that the SC/RS version homologated for rallying stood very little chance against the all-wheel-drove competition in the WRC, but it was still a quick car. Switching to the lower-spec European Rally Championship proved smart, where Porsche’s stop-gap rally car was prepared by Prodrive and took several wins.

These two spectacular recreations of the Porsche 911 SC/RS come from TLCB Master MOCer Dennis Glaasker aka Bricksonwheels, who has faithfully recreated the ’80s icon in astounding detail. Each 1:14 scale model replicates a real version of the 911 rally car, with the famous Rothmans and Belga team liveries brought to life in incredible realism thanks to fellow previous bloggee JaapTechnic’s decal-producing wizardry.

Opening doors and engine covers reveal an interior and engine as beautifully recreated as the stunning exteriors, and there’s loads more to see of both 911 SC/RS models at Dennis’ ‘Porsche 911 SC/RS in Lego (1:14)’ album on Flickr. Click the link above to head to a forest in Belgium sometime in the 1980s.

Busty Rusty

1 Reply

Coincidentally the name your Mom had when your Dad first met her at the bar where she worked, and also today’s title, befitting this glorious rat rodded school bus by previous bloggee and Master MOCer Redfern1950s (aka red 2).

With an exposed Cummins diesel up front and a roof-chop the length of the seating area this probably isn’t as comfortable transport as it once was, but kids are short and who wouldn’t want to go to school in this?

There’s more to see of Red’s brilliant creation on Flickr via the link above, plus you can read how he builds models like this one via his Master MOCers interview by clicking here.

Purple Haze

Leave a reply

The Honda Acty is not a fast car. In fact, in second generation 35bhp 550cc form, it is a very slow one. We therefore very much appreciate the mildly deranged mind of someone who decides to turn the 1980s kei van into a dragster. Cue Michael217, who has done just that, equipping his Model Team recreation of the Acty with dragster wheels, a wheelie bar, and a LEGO Buggy Motor – which explains the requirement for the first two items. Plus it’s purple.

There’s more to see of Michael’s brilliant remote control Honda Acty dragster at both Eurobricks and Bricksafe, and you can find today’s awesome title song by clicking here.

Holidays are Coming…

1 Reply

Actually this is the most American thing* we’ve ever seen (following today’s earlier post featuring a ’70s muscle car with a giant flaming bird on the hood).

The Coca Cola Christmas truck is nearly as well-known as the guy drinking the coke on the side of it, and it’s been recreated astonishingly well in brick form by Flickr’s Lasse Deleuran, who might just have built the best Lego-lettering since we last said something had the best Lego-lettering.

Seriously though, it’s a mightily impressive mosaic that not only looks stunningly accurate, it’s so brilliant it almost makes the superb remote control tractor unit fade into the background. Which is what good branding is all about.

There’s more to see of Lasse’s amazing rendition of the probably the world’s most famous truck at his photostream via the link above, where you can also find a link to building instructions so that you can build this design for yourself.

*To maintain our BBC-like impartiality, here’s the Soviet version too!

Pontiac Firebird Trans Am | Picture Special

17 Replies

This might just be the most American thing we’ve ever seen. Apart from Police brutality of course. This is the late ’70s-early ’80s second generation Pontiac Firebird Trans Am, GM’s sister car to the Camero, and the Mustang’s fiercest rival.

Powered by an expansive choice of enormous V8 engines ranging from 4.3 to 7.5 litres, plus some marginally less enormous six-cylinder motors, all of which produced about as much horsepower as a European or Japanese engine half the size, the Trans Am completely erased the words ‘oil crisis’ and replaced them with a giant flaming bird motif. Because America.

The iconic slant nose arrived in 1977, bringing with it huge sales numbers, with this iteration of the Firebird selling between 150,000 and 210,000 units annually until emissions regulations finally caught up with it in 1980. The Trans Am’s starring role in Burt Reynolds’ 1977 movie ‘Smokie and the Bandit’ can’t have hurt its popularity either, a film basically about little more than trucking, car chases, and beer*. Because America.

Recreating this icon of American automobiles is TLCB Master MOCer, regular bloggee, and all-round excellent human being Firas Abu-Jaber, who has captured the ’77 Pontiac Firebird Trans Am in astonishing detail. Firas’ model replicates the Firebird’s famous exterior beautifully, with opening doors, trunk, and hood (complete with giant flaming bird motif), plus an amazingly accurate interior, and with presentation as stunning as the model itself.

Over a dozen spectacular images are available to view at Firas’ Pontiac Firebird Trans Am album on Flickr, where a build commentary can also be found. Click the link above to take a closer look, and the first link in the text to read Firas Abu-Jaber’s Master MOCers interview here at TLCB to learn how he creates incredible creations like this one.

*Well, Coors, which is nearly beer.

My Other Car’s a Camper

1 Reply

You may not be familiar with Matra, but they’re probably the most important car company you’ve never heard of. Enormously successful on track, Matra won the Formula 1 World Championship in 1969, and the Le Mans 24 Hours in 1972, ’73 and ’74. They designed the first MPV, the first crossover, and – for a while – they made this, the delightfully weird three-seat Bagheera sports car.

Powered by 1.3 or 1.5 litre Simca engines, the lightweight Bagheera was faster than most other European small sports cars of the time, and cheaper too. It was a trend-setter in other ways however, being appalling built to the point of winning the ‘Silver Lemon’ award in 1975 for poorest quality, which when combined with a chassis without any rust protection whatsoever, makes the Bagheera a very rare sight today.

One Bagheera that won’t rust is this excellent Model Team version by previous bloggee monstermatou, who has constructed his entirely from the parts found within the Creator 10220 Volkswagen T1 Camper set. Following his stunning Citroen DS19 built for TLCB’s Lock-Down B-Model competition, Monster’s Matra continues his weird-French-cars-built-from-LEGO-sets theme, and his run of incredible B-Model builds that you can find at his photostream.

There’s more to see of monstermatou’s Matra Bagheera on Flickr via the link above, along with a host of other ace alternates including the aforementioned Citroen, a Morgan built from a Mini, and a Fiat 500 constructed from the same Camper set as this classic French oddball.

My Other Helicopter’s an Aston Martin

Leave a reply

We’re sure that many helicopter owners also have an Aston Martin in the garage. Flickr’s Serge S thinks so too, having turned the 10262 Aston Martin DB5 ‘Goldfinger’ set into this rather neat helicopter for TLCB’s Lock-Down B-Model Competition. There’s just two days to go to get your entry in, which is how long Serge took to build this one. Head to Flickr to see more of his ‘Bond’s Helicopter’ by clicking here, and you can see the original LEGO set from which this model has been built via the link above.

Log Jam

Leave a reply

This mega MAZ-537 8×8 truck, complete with an enormous logging trailer, was inspired by a similar creation by Pavol Vanek that featured here back in 2015. Following appropriately slowly is this version by Matt’s Lego Creations, whose own MAZ logging truck has arrived here half a decade later. Measuring over a metre long it’s quite a beast, and one you can see more of on both Flickr and Eurobricks.

Collection of Letters

4 Replies

Mercedes-Benz might make some brilliant cars, but their naming policy is madness. We’re not sure if Germans play ‘Scrabble’, but we suspect the naming department at Mercedes do, as their cars seem to be whatever letters Klaus pulled out of the Scrabble bag that day. A, B, C, E, S, GLA, GLB, GLC, GLE, EQC, CLA, CLS, SL, SLC, and lastly AMG GT. And that’s not including all the past combinations of letters Mercedes-Benz have recently dropped in a (failed) attempt to make their range less complicated than the large hadron collider.

This is one of brand’s more sporting collection of letters; the AMG GT, a name so anonymous we’d forgotten it existed at all. Built by previous bloggee Alexander Paschoaletto this Model Team replica of Mercedes-Benz’s V8 sports car captures the look of the real thing superbly, and includes opening doors, hood and trunk too. There’s more of Alexander’s excellent creation to see at his ‘AMG GT’ album on Flickr – click the link above and try to get a triple world score.

Challenge Accepted

Leave a reply

We have a very happy Elf here in TLCB Towers today. Not only has it earned a meal, and a yellow Smartie (due to the yellowness of its find), it also managed to use the model it found to squash a fellow Elf. Only one, but that’s better than none if you’re one of our smelly little workers. It required some ingenuity to do it too, seeing as the model it found is on the slow side, but we won’t detail its methods here as we suspect some of the Elves are learning to read.

The find in question is this enormous fully remote controlled Challenger MT965E tractor, controlled via bluetooth thanks to a third-party BuWizz battery and with a suite of Power functions motors. An XL Motor drives all four wheels (making it appropriately slow, hence the lone squashee), whilst the MT965E’s articulated steering is delivered by two linear actuators driven by an L Motor. There are manual locking differentials, a working V12 engine, a Medium Motor powered rear hitch, and an L Motor driven rear power take-off.

All of that makes newcomer mktechniccreations’ creation seriously impressive from an engineering perspective, plus it looks super accurate too, with its excellent action to detail enhanced by realistic custom decals. There’s more to see of the Challenger MT965E at mktechniccreations’ Bricksafe folder and at the Eurobricks forum, where you can also find a link to building instructions and a video of the model in action.

White Elephant

1 Reply

Is there a car we hate more than the Mercedes-Benz G63 AMG? Ok, maybe the Audi SQ7. Or the Hummer H2. No… no, with think this takes it. We hate it on a cellular level. From its stupid bodykit to its stupid wheels via its stupid interior, we hate it.

That said, this Lego recreation of the G63 AMG by Flickr’s Noah_L is awesome. Recreated with incredible attention to detail, Noah’s stunning model perfectly replicates Mercedes-Benz’s most ludicrous SUV, from its stupid bodykit to its stupid wheels via its stupid interior.

There’s more to see of Noah’s genuinely phenomenal build, including a link to building instructions, at his ‘Mercedes-AMG G63‘ album – join us there where we’ll be simultaneously viewing the images in awe and hating it.

Sukhoi Su

Leave a reply

Russia may have a current political direction as backward as America’s, but – like America – they sure know how to make a fighter jet. This is the Sukhoi Su-35, a multi-role air-superiority fighter conceived as the Soviet Union collapsed around it. The design survived though, and the first iteration entered service in the early ’90s whilst an updated version (this one) followed in 2007. In service in the Russian Air Force and the ‘People’s Liberation Army Air Force’ (aka the Chinese Air Force), just over 100 Su-35s are in use, with Egypt and Indonesia placing orders too.

This superb Lego recreation of the Sukhoi Su-35 comes from previous bloggee Lennart C aka Everblack, who has captured the real aircraft beautifully with some seriously smooth building techniques. There’s more of Lennart’s Su-35 to see at his photostream, where it joins a wealth of other excellent builds. Click the link above for some Russian air-superiority.

My Other Car’s a Mustang

4 Replies

LEGO’s brilliant 10265 Ford Mustang set is one of the finest additions to the Creator line-up yet. That it has spawned so many B-Models too, is testament to how great a set it really is. In fact, it inspired this whole competition.

Joining a host of other builders to use 10265 as their chosen set in TLCB’s Lock-Down B-Model Competition, Flickr’s monstermatou has taken the Mustang in a very different direction, recreating one of the most technologically advanced and unusual cars of all time; the glorious Citroen DS19.

Despite using only the parts from the 10265 Ford Mustang set, monstermatou has replicated the DS19’s spaceship exterior absolutely beautifully, from the roof-mounted indicators to the hidden rear wheels. The superb realism doesn’t stop with the outside either, as behind the four opening doors is a brilliant interior with a working steering wheel, a detailed engine sits underneath the opening hood, and even the trunk opens too.

Things are getting tough at the top for the competition judges, and if you’d like to enter your own B-Model into the competition (where the winner and runner up will receive some awesome prizes) there’s still plenty of time; entries close on June 30th.

Until then you can see more of monstermatou’s stunning Citroen DS19 at his photostream by clicking here, where you will not only find a huge gallery of pristine images, there is also a link to building instructions so you can build it for yourself, plus monstermatou has a whole range of other incredible B-Models to view!

Two Trucks Tuesday

1 Reply

Two Elves returned to TLCB Towers today, each with a red truck, and each hoping for a meal token as reward. Long-standing readers of this impoverished backwater of the internet will know that this usually only leads to one thing, and duly an Elf fight between the two applicants immediately erupted. Fortunately for them both finds are worthy of blogging, so both were patched up, awarded a meal token, and given a red Smartie. It’s nice to be nice sometimes. Anyway, the builds!

First (above) we have Lasse Delueran’s superbly rendered Renault Magnum. Named after a gun… or an ice cream… or a condom… the Magnum had the tallest cabin of any truck in production. We’re not sure why that matters but nevertheless the Magnum had it and it did look quite cool. Lasse’s version includes Power Functions remote control drive and steering, free instructions are available, and there’s more to see here.

Today’s second truck comes from Fuku Saku, and it too is a European ‘cab-over’, coming from rival truck manufacturer Mercedes-Benz. Fuku’s Arocs cab is mounted on an eight-wheel chassis with a tipping dump bucket behind it, and it includes one of the fiddliest, most fragile-looking, and most excellent grilles we’ve seen on model of this size. An extensive image gallery is available to view (demonstrating some really stunning photography too) and you can make the jump by clicking here.