We’re not really sure what’s going on here but we expect the cement mixer truck won’t be the same shape by the end. Built by hachiroku24, there’s more to see of ‘Spiderman vs. Sandman’ via the link, where building instructions can also be found!
The 2021 LEGO Technic set previews continue here at The Lego Car Blog, with this; the brand new 42122 Jeep Wrangler Rubicon!
Adding another real-world manufacturer to the Technic line-up, 42122 will slot into the middle of the range, being aimed at ages 9+ and costing around £45/$50.
665 pieces make up the new Jeep Wrangler set, with many of these new, including the excellent looking tyres (of which there are five), and several new yellow panels.
We’re not sure these add up to the most convincing visual replica of Jeep’s iconic 4×4, but 42122 still looks ace, with a few stickers ensuring it’s Jeepy enough for fans. Of course Technic sets are about more than just aesthetic realism though, and that’s where we think 42122 might fall a bit short…
As far as we can tell, the new LEGO Technic 42122 Jeep Wrangler Rubicon includes no engine, and therefore we would expect there is no 4×4 drivetrain either, because what would it connect to? That means no differentials, no pistons (even miniature ones), and no driveshafts.
Steering and suspension are present, although the suspension looks to be of the un-sprung pendular type, which you can see in the image above (in which the wheels are fitted at a stage that is definitely not in line with the instructions!), the rear seats fold down, the doors and hood open, and there’s a winch up front.
We might be wrong in our assessment above of course, and 42122 may indeed have a 4×4 system linked to an engine, but if it doesn’t… is it really a Jeep Wrangler at all?
The stickers might say it is, but we’ll be looking for our Technic Jeep fix elsewhere.
Inspired by a Hot Wheels toy, and named after an obese rapper or one of the giants in the BFG, this is Tim Inman‘s ‘Bone Crusher’; a V8-powered hot rod pick-up with a giant skull on the front. And on the rear deck. And with bones for seats. The Elves, predictably, think it’s the greatest vehicle of all time, and you can see more of Tim’s creation on Flickr via the link.
*Today’s title song. ‘Cause we’re street.
If you’re new to this site and were expecting to see something else based on the title, sorry; here’s a Lego van instead. But it is built from pink bits.
Two shades of pink in fact, which recent previous bloggee Brick Flag has used in the creation of this rather excellent 1960s Dodge A100 van.
The Dodge A100’s story is a similar one to the Ford Econoline that appeared here earlier in the week, being designed to combat the influx of imported Volkswagen Type 2s. Like the Ford, the Dodge was available in pick-up and van body styles, featured a three speed gearbox (three!), and an inline 6-cylinder engine. A V8 was also available, although we have no idea why.
Brick Flag has taken the hot rod route with his superb A100 van, fitting his creation with lowrider suspension and a custom pink paint job, and there are further images available to view on Flickr. Click this link to see more pink bits.
It’s the time of year when our TVs are filled with a brightly-lit truck, travelling slowly through American towns distributing soft drinks to happy citizens, and it makes everyone feel a bit more magical.
This is not that truck.
Flickr’s Keko007 has chosen to mark the start of the festive season by resolutely not building the famous Coca Cola Christmas truck, instead building an unadorned trailer for Coke’s rival, pulled by the blandest and most generic European truck that there is, the DAF XF.
Which is not magical at all.
It is a great build though, with one of the best brick-built logos we’ve seen in ages, and there’s more of Keko’s excellent Not-The-Coca-Cola-Christmas-Truck to see at the link above.
From one simple, basic workhorse to another now, and possibly the most blandly-named vehicle in American history, the Ford Econoline.
Worried by Volkswagen’s assault on the budget van and pick-up market with the Type 2 Transporter, America’s domestic auto-makers began to build their own ‘forward-control’ pick-ups in the 1960s.
Ford based their design on the Falcon sedan which helped to keep costs low, as did leaf-spring suspension both front and rear, and a manual gearbox with just three speeds.
The Econoline did feature a racing stripe down the side though, and today we think it looks rather good, particularly as the Econoline had become a standard and far less interesting two-box van by the 1970s.
This superb Model Team recreation of the 1960s original comes from Brick Flag of Flickr, who has captured the 1961 Econoline pick-up wonderfully, including an excellent brick-built version of the ‘FORD’ stamped tailgate.
There’s more to see of Brick Flag’s model at his photostream – click the link above jump back to ’61.
Here at The Lego Car Blog we’re basically seven year olds, so it tends to be fast, loud, and obnoxiously coloured vehicles that feature here. Not today though, as we’ve flipped to the other end of the vehicular spectrum for a vehicle that is very slow, and very grey.
This rather lovely vintage tractor is the work of MangaNOID of Eurobricks, who has based his creation on a 1950s Massey Ferguson. Manga’s model features a working 3-cylinder engine, differential, power take-off, three-point hitch, suspended drivers seat, steering, and positive caster, camber and toe for accurate old-timey tractor realism.
It’s a great example of Technic functionality and there’s more to see of Manga’s build at the Eurobricks discussion forum – click the link above to take a look!
This TLCB writer is finally able to start the count down to Christmas as the office-wide ban on mentioning the holidays in posts expired last night! Cue something red, fast, and open top. No, not Santa’s sleigh (hah, got one in already!) (Don’t push it. Ed.), but this rather wonderful 5-wide Caterham Seven 1600, as built by RGB900 of Flickr.
Despite its tiny size there’s no doubting which make and model of car RGB’s creation is replicating, which – although being wholly inappropriate for winter – often seem to appear on the roads over the Christmas holidays. Because British people are mad.
There’s more to see of RGB’s brilliant Seven at his photostream via the link, plus you can check out LEGO’s rather larger officially-licensed 21307 Caterham Seven set here.
Ahhhh Robotics…
For every new breathtaking advancement in robotics, 10 memes come out declaring the end of humanity (Boston Dynamics, I’m looking at you). LEGO appears intent on speeding up robotic dominance with the new LEGO Mindstorms 51515 Robot Inventor set, the much anticipated successor to the EV3 Mindstorms set. While the new set offers a bunch of quality of life improvements with its new app and native scratch and python support, no one can discount how the new Gelo build looks eerily similar to Boston Dynamics’ robot dog Spot…
Luckily, our topic today is a little more human-friendly. Grady Koch’s new book High Tech LEGO Projects demonstrates that there is still a ton of life in the older EV3 kit, pushing the boundaries of what the 7-year-old kit can do, without the whole world-dominance vibe.
No Starch Press has kindly provided me with a print copy for this review. My particular copy may be a pre-production copy as it has a bit of a raised splatter texture on the back cover. Nonetheless, the actual contents of the book is clearly printed on nice semi-gloss paper. Colours and text come out well, ensuring no issues following build and programming instructions.
High Tech LEGO Projects is the most recent book tailored towards EV3 users from No Starch Press. This time around, High Tech LEGO Projects introduces some basic circuitry and hobby-grade sensors to the mix, extending the capabilities of the ageing EV3.
A wide range of projects are covered in the 12 chapters of this book, with 2 extra projects available for download from the No Starch Press website. Each project showcases a different electrical component either to use with the EV3, or simply to add to one of your existing or upcoming lego creations.
Many of the projects will require extra pieces beyond what is provided in the EV3 Mindstorms set. Most of these can be found on BrickLink/BrickOwl, while many of the electrical components and tools can be found at local or online electronic stores.
Get comfortable acquiring the extra LEGO pieces, but don’t get too attached to them. Some of these projects are not for the faint of heart. The second project already has you drilling holes through TWO technic gearbox pieces! I can already hear the collective screams of agony right now. The first time I saw the picture demonstrating where to drill, my first reaction was to cover the eyes of all my Lego mini-figs.
The world’s most vibrant cities have often been defined by their public transport system. London’s red Routemaster bus, Tokyo’s Toyota Crown with its amazing self opening doors, Hong Kong’s wonderful Star Ferries, and – perhaps most iconic of all – New York City’s yellow cabs.
Checker sedans and Ford Crown Victorias were long part of NYC’s street furniture, and were big, softly sprung, and almost ridiculously inappropriate for taking one or two people a short distance at a low speed.
Despite their thirst, pollution, and unnecessary size, to a tourist they were somehow rather wonderful, however recently (and probably rightly) their days were numbered.
Today few cities have their own bespoke taxis. The cost of developing or adapting a vehicle for just a few thousand sales a year is too great, thus New York’s yellow cabs can now be one of any number of mainstream vehicles that are about as interesting as a white sock. Even if they’re yellow.
Flickr’s Ralph Savelsberg, whose glorious classic Checker NYC cab appeared here a few days ago, has now updated his brick-built taxi fleet inline with New York’s recent changes, building this excellent (and incredibly boring) Toyota Highlander Hybrid.
We’re sure that Toyota’s large SUV makes a far better taxi than the Ford Crown Vics and Checkers that preceded it, but when it’s the very same car used to collect Tommy and Ashleigh from school, it’s somehow not better at all.
There’s more to see of Ralph’s NYC Highlander at his ‘LEGO NYC Taxis’ album on Flickr, where you can also find his Lego recreations of a few other real-world yellow cabs that might not be as good, yet are somehow better in every way.
If you’re a regular reader of this dilapidated backwater of the internet you may have noticed some changes recently. Yes, after years of enhancing basically nothing about this site whatsoever, we’ve finally upgraded something!
We kinda had to actually, as our previous site structure had become unsupported many years ago, which we had solved by just ignoring it. Anyway, it was finally time to actually do some work and upgrade TLCB properly, which over the last few days we’ve done. Probably very badly.
No matter because the site does seem to be – somewhat miraculously – functioning as it should. However this upgrade did cost something, and thus we’ve decided (as we’ve been mooting for some years now) to permit a greater degree of advertising here at The Lego Car Blog.
This is to a) pay for our recent upgrade, and b) because we do feel some responsibility to maximise this platform for good causes, and thus we will continue to donate our profits to people and organisations who need them more than we do.
We hope the new ads aren’t too intrusive (and if you feel like clicking on them please do!), but if you have any problems or complaints, or you find something somewhere on the site has broken and we’re not paying attention, please do let us know in the usual ways.
TLCB Team
Here at TLCB we’ve taken a fairly backwards approach to employee payment. As in, no one gets paid anything. But why should we have all the fun when we could not pay you guys for doing work too! Cue Francesco Frangioja, who joins us here at TLCB to review one of Game of Bricks’ new lighting kits. For free. Because he’s great. Over to Francesco!
…
TLCB kindly offered me the chance to pick two Game of Bricks light kits for 2020 vehicle sets, and my first choice was the light kit for the LEGO Technic 42111 Dom’s Dodge Charger set. After a couple of weeks (due to the shipment), I finally had time to install the kit in the set for which it was intended.
The lighting kit comes in a cardboard box, black and premium quality, with only the logo of the manufacturer on it.
Inside the box I found:
The actual building instructions are found on the Game of Bricks’ website; a series of “photographic” steps that show where to place the individual “light points” and how to organize (where they have to pass) the various wiring.
I’m already familiar with the installation of this kind of product (light kits from other manufacturers) and the instructions were very similar, so I was able to follow the steps for this set very easily. Installing all the front lights is pretty simple: you have to “squeeze” the various LED element between the respective/relative transparent piece and the underneath on which the transparent one is originally fixed.
After that, you have to place the “array stripes” in the position/as shown in the photo-instructions.
Because normally there is exactly zero space between a transparent piece and the stud below it, you need to push it in place carefully even with this super thin wire. In fact, compared to the kits of other manufacturers, the peculiarity of the kit from Game of Bricks is that only a few of the “light points” are glued into LEGO brick. In practice, only the bricks of set 42111 which have to be physically replaced with counterparts with the LED already wired and glued inside, have been inserted in the light kit. All other “light points” are realised by fixing the LED element between the transparent and to be illuminated LEGO element, and the stud of the underlying piece.
The rear section was just as easy to manage; once the wiring steps are completed, you need to attach the tiny connector to a “splitter piece”, also equipped with adhesive tape to fix it in the position indicated by the photographic instructions. The connectors are very thin, so the use of a modeling plier can make the job easier. The cables, although very thin, are very resistant to traction and torsion. You just have to pay attention to the “scissors effect”: if you “staple” them too hard between brick and stud, you risk that they get cut. Therefore, you must always pay a lot of attention and procedures gently and carefully.
The battery box requires 3 AA-LR6 batteries and includes a female USB connector. It’s up to you to choice to fit it into the model (i.e. into the trunk) or to keep it outside the model. Just remember that you will need to be able to access the on/off button.
Once the installation is finished and all the LEDs are connected, the final result is really great.
Keep in mind that the kit in my possession is the top version, the one with the highest number of lighting points and including remote control to manage the on/off of each group and some “lightshows”.
Unlike the light kits I have tried before previously, the solutions of modular wiring and the interlocking of the lighting elements between the transparent bricks and the stud below implemented by Game of Bricks are perhaps the two most significant plus: not having bricks with pre-glued LEDs inside, you do not have to do too many replacements of parts of the official set to be illuminated, as well as the modularity of the wiring, allow you to decide from time to time if and which lighting elements to insert and which not.
You can find the Game of Bricks lighting kit for the 42111 Dom’s Dodge Charger set, alongside a wide range of other kits designed to fit official LEGO sets, by clicking here!
New York had the coolest taxis. Built from the late ’50s until the early ’80s, the Checker A9-A12 was as synonymous with NYC as the Black Cab was with London. However with awful air quality both cities have since replaced their taxi fleets with standard passenger hybrids like the Toyota Prius, which are far less polluting, but far less soulful too. It makes us think that perhaps their could be a market for retro-fitting an EV powertrain to a classic cab – we’d be the first to hail a ride. Until then we’ll look wistfully at this beautiful classic Checker cab by regular bloggee Ralph Savelsberg, and try to forget what would be coming out of the tailpipe…
Ways to generate complaints here at The Lego Car Blog: Mention Trump. Or Putin. Or the NRA. Insulting NASCAR is probably another method, so here we go!
NASCAR sucks. Old technology circling endlessly whilst everyone waits for a crash to liven things up. However we think Rod Gillies may have found a route to making NASCAR interesting, thanks to the addition of jet engines and the removal of gravity! Now the racers can crash in whole new ways!
This is Rod’s Racing Hover Car, piloted by the #5 mini-figure Todd Ravelston for Goddard-Reid Racing, and it looks good enough to get even TLCB staff into NASCAR. A long time in the future. Join us in the crowd waiting for the anti-gravity pile-up via the link!
At this time of year TLCB Team regularly drive on salt. Monotonous November roads and yet more rust eating the office’s Rover 200 are probably not what you had in mind though. Fortunately Flickr’s Faber’s Flickr’s Faber Mandragore has created a far more interesting salty journey, recreating the Utaharian landscape of the world famous Bonneville Salt Flats and a mini-figure scale salt-flat hot rod in which to tackle them. It definitely beats a grimy motorway in November, so we’ll be at Faber’s photostream imagining we’re in Utah. Join us there via the link.