They See Me Crawlin’

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This is a remote control 4×4 rock crawler and it comes from previous bloggee Technic BOOM. If you’re a regular reader of this dilapidated corner of the ‘net you might now be expecting a tale of mass Elven destruction, corridor smushings, and even a trip to the ‘Elf Hospital‘.

However the clue is in the title with this post, as Technic BOOM’s creation is one of the slowest that we’ve ever encountered. This inevitably enraged the Elf that discovered it, unable as it was to inflict mayhem on its fellow Elves, but it also means that BOOM’s model is ridiculously capable off-road.

With gearing of 9:1, enormous non-LEGO RC tyres, remote control drive, steering, and differential lockers, Technic BOOM’s rock crawler can inch its way over almost anything. Very slowly.

There’s more to see of this superbly engineered machine on both Flickr and at the Eurobricks discussion forum, where you can also watch a video of it doing its thing on-location off-road.

Little Fokker

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Coincidentally the title of today’s post describes not only the creation within it but also the Elf that found it. This neat Fokker D1 tri-plane, made famous by Manfred Albrecht Freiherr von Richthofen aka ‘The Red Baron’, comes from Jonas Obermaier of Flickr, who has done a rather excellent job of recreating probably the First World War’s most famous aircraft in mini-figure scale.

Credited with over eighty air-combat victories, the Red Baron himself was killed aged 25 in 1918 by a bullet to the chest, although he managed to successfully land his aircraft in a field in France before he died. The D1 didn’t last long though, being stripped by souvenir hunters. Jonas’s lovely model shows us how his Fokker fighter would have looked, and there’s more to see at his photostream via the link above.

Squashed in Space

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After today’s earlier build we’re back to the usual TLCB nonsense and mayhem with this, a ‘multi-purpose all-terrain vehicle’ built by LXF and found by one of our Elves on Brickshelf. Despite the mini-figure in the cockpit LXF’s model is a Technic one, with a suite of remote control goodies inside too. Each track is powered by a separate LEGO Buggy Motor, whilst the single rear wheel steers via a Medium Motor. Those three motors are hooked up to a third party BuWizz brick, allowing not only Bluetooth control but also delivering eight times the power of LEGO’s own Power Functions battery.

If you’re thinking that sounds like a recipe for Elves getting squashed you would be right, as those caught at ground level stood no chance once this came hooning down the corridor. Thanks BuWizz…

We’ve now got to get some Elves (and their various bodily fluids) out of the carpet, so whilst we do that you can check out all the images of LXF’s mad creation on Brickshelf via the link in the text above.

Fishing with 5,000

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This spectacular creation is a squid fishing boat by Flickr’s Hoang H Dang (aka Know Your Pieces), and it is surely one of the most beautiful ships we’ve ever had the pleasure of publicising. A clever brick-built hull supports a ludicrously detailed cabin, but – very unusually for TLCB – it’s the background that amazes us the most.

The incredible undulating ocean has been painstakingly constructed from 5,000 blue antenna pieces, each capped by a blue technic pin and a translucent 1×1 brick of varying colour, creating the jaw-dropping effect you see here. It’s a technique that would work brilliantly for grass, animal hair, and a hundred other scenarios, but one we think is unlikely to be repeated often!

You can see more of how Hoang’s utterly amazing build at his Flickr photostream by clicking here, where you can also find images showing both the fishing boat and sea under construction.

Chevrolet Silverado K30 Crew Cab | Picture Special

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Here at The Lego Car Blog we’re not usually fans of American pick-up trucks. This is because they are, by and large, complete crap. However – and we appreciate there is little logic to this whatsoever – old American pick-up trucks, even though they’re still complete crap, are somehow becoming rather cool. This is one such ageing pick-up, the Chevrolet Silverado K30, in dually crew cab specification.

Perhaps it’s because as vehicles get older we’re willing to overlook their shortcomings, but we really want this truck. The Elves do too, seeing as it’s a giant tasteless 4×4. Fortunately for one of them, it did get its grubby little claws on this, as it found this rather impressive Technic recreation of the classic(?) Silverado K30 crew cab by previous bloggee filswagood on Flickr.

A few of the other Elves in TLCB Towers soon got to experience it too, but not in the way they hoped, as it ran them down in the corridor. Power Functions remote control drive and steering combined with bouncy suspension enabled filsawgood’s Chevy to comfortably squash a couple of our little workers before we took the controls away to take a look for ourselves.

And look we did, because filsawgood’s Silverado is a brilliantly-engineered build, not only featuring the aforementioned (and excellent) remote control drivetrain, but also opening doors, hood (under which is a detailed engine), tailgate, and toolbox (battery compartment), plus the model includes LED lights and a detailed interior too.

There’s much more of filsawgood’s superb Chevrolet Silverado K30 crew cab to see at his Flickr album by clicking here, and you can check out filsawgood’s other Technic 4x4s to appear here at The Lego Car Blog by clicking this bonus link.

Black Mirror

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We continue yesterday’s chrome theme with, well… even more chrome. This is ianying616‘s ‘Black Onyx’ hot rod, and it’s really very shiny indeed. It’s also two cylinders short of the engine usually fitted to a hot rod, but ianying has made up for this with a delightfully impractical (and enormous) vision-restricting supercharger. Both it and the V6 engine underneath it turn, plus there’s working steering and suspension too. Head over to Flickr for the full gallery.

Back in Black

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Flickr’s Jonathan Elliott has appeared here numerous times over the years with his excellent small-scale vehicles. Fellow builder JohnniD has too, but has since departed Flickr for pastures new. To pay homage to his old building buddy Jonathan has reworked one of Johnni’s classic designs, this lovely ’49 Chevrolet Pick-Up, and re-published the results. Clever techniques and superbly recognisable design cues are visible in abundance and there’s more to see on Flickr via the link above.

King of the Road

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Dennis Glaasker aka Bricksonwheels is a firm favourite here at The Lego Car Blog. He’s been building spectacularly detailed Lego creations over a decade now, with the most recent ten years demonstrating how retro-chroming bricks can take the realism of a model to a whole new level.

To celebrate a decade of chrome Dennis has built very possibly the shiniest bike we’ve ever seen, this glorious 1:10 scale Harley Davidson Road King Lowrider complete with, you guessed it, a lot of chromed pieces.

Dennis’ chromed Harley can be seen at his Flickr album by clicking here, you can read his Master MOCers interview here at TLCB via the first link, and you can check out our preview of LEGO’s new officially licensed Harley Davidson Fatboy set by clicking here. Dennis thinks it just needs some chrome…

MiGnette

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The Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-15 is perhaps the defining fighter aircraft of the 1950s (sorry America…). It had a career a lot longer than just the 1950s though, with an estimated 18,000 units built – making it one of the most-produced jet aircraft in history – some of which are still in active service in the air forces of the Republic of North Korea and the Republic of Guinea-Bissau. This neat MiG-15 vignette (hence our genius title!) comes from BigPlanes of Flickr, who is making his TLCB debut. Custom mini-figures and decals add to the build’s authenticity and there’s more to see at BigPlanes’ photostream via the link.

Atomic Bug

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This is the Atomic Bug. Is it sci-fi? Is is steampunk? Is it a mech? Is it a spacecraft? All questions we don’t know the answer to, but even if we did it probably wouldn’t help us. Whatever this is it’s a neat bit of building and there’s more to see courtesy of Kobalt on Flickr. We’d better stick to cars…

The Martian

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This year marks the 50th anniversary of the first moon landing. The world no doubt thought following NASA’s incredible achievement in 1969 that lunar exploration would become routine. As it turned out man last visited the moon just 3 years later, leaving a vast 47 year wait (and still counting) for a return.

Space it seems, is now pretty boring (we suppose it is mostly empty anyway), only utilised in 2019 to enable aubergine emojis to be sent around the world and to allow drivers to completely ignore road signs.

Hollywood however hasn’t forgotten the romanticism of a proper space adventure, and in 2015 ‘The Martian‘ showed us via incredible attention to detail how a manned mission to Mars might look. It even had it’s own star car, the funky and yet very probable-looking Mars Rover.

This is that vehicle, albeit in Technic form, as built by Samolot of Eurobricks. Underneath the movie-realistic exterior Samolot had included an array of clever remote control functionality, all of it powered by LEGO’s own Power Functions motors and controlled via the third-party SBrick bluetooth brick and mobile app.

Each of the rover’s four enormous wheels is powered independently by a separate L Motor which – due to their size – are ingeniously housed inside the wheels themselves. All four wheels steer too, courtesy of a Medium Motor, whilst independent suspension allows the model to traverse the rocky martian landscape.

Finally two more Medium motors power the rover’s winch and rear crane (switchable via a gearbox) and an on-board compressor that feeds air to the crane’s pneumatic cylinders and those that open the cockpit doors.

Samolot’s creation is superbly accurate to the ‘real’ vehicle that starred in the movie and there’s loads more to see at the Eurobricks discussion forum via the link above, including a video of the model in action. Click the link above to make the trip, and remember that help is only 140 million miles away…

The Fake Prince of Bel-Air

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The ’50s Chevrolet Bel Air is a regular here at TLCB. A favourite in the classic car scene it’s become an icon of its era, more than the sum of its parts and possibly a bit over-hyped. Not that car fans ever do that (cough Toyota Supra A80 cough). However it’s not the only great-looking Chevy from the period, as the Bel Air had a smaller, slightly more affordable brother.

Always in the Bel Air’s shadow the Chevrolet 210 was just as pretty if slightly less glamorous, and it too could be had with the same ‘Blue Flame’ I6 and V8 powerplants. And a two-speed automatic transmission, Seriously, two. Shortage of gears aside we rather like the 210. It was comprehensively outsold by its larger Bel Air sibling too, so it’s more of a rarity these days.

This 1:18 Model Team recreation of the ’57 Chevrolet 210 4-Door Hardtop comes from TLCB debutant Tenderlok who has done an excellent job of replicating the classic Chevy in Lego form, helped by the application of a lot of custom chrome. Head to Eurobricks via the link above for more images of Tenderlok’s build and a full description.

LEGO Technic H2 2019 | Set Previews!

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Our Elves have been sneaking! Following our reveal of the H1 2019 Technic sets another batch of Elves were dispatched to The LEGO Company’s HQ to uncover the H2 additions to the Technic line-up. The survivors returned home over the summer and after much consideration we’re now able to offer our ‘expert analysis’ of LEGO’s latest sets! So, here you go, the H2 2019 LEGO Technic line-up…

– 42098 Car Transporter –

There’s a theme running through the H2 2019 Technic range and, much like your Mom, it’s size. We’ll start with the largest. Or longest at least. This is the 2,500 piece, 3ft long 42098 Car Transporter, a vehicle type that LEGO have dabbled with in the past in the Technic range, but never really tackled properly.

Three models in one, 42098 includes a truck, trailer and a muscle car, all of which are packed with mechanical functions like Technic-of-Old. The aesthetics are very much Technic-of-New though, with plenty of stickers and an increased level of visual realism.

42098 can fit five cars on board by our count, leaving room for four of your own once built. Both the truck and muscle car feature ‘Hand of God’ steering and miniature working piston engines, whilst the truck and trailer include ingenious hand-powered mechanisms to access the top decks, with gears lowering and extending a multitude of ramps to enable a full load to be driven on board.

42098 looks like a really interesting addition to the Technic range, and it’ll be nice to be able to store other sets and MOCs neatly on top of it. Expect the new set to cost c$180/£140 when it reaches stores later this year.

…

– 42099 4×4 X-treme Off-Roader –

Next we have a set that’s got the Elves very excited. It’s huge, it’s orange, it’s remote controlled, and it features LEGO’s penchant for poor spelling when words contain the letter ‘x’.

The 42099 X-treme Off-Roader looks… well, nuts, and it features LEGO’s new bluetooth remote control, finally catching up with third-party providers such as SBrick and BuWizz who have been offering control-via-phone for some time.

Like the 42098 Car Transporter above, 42099 is a complicated set aimed at ages 11+, but this time it swaps mechanical functionality for LEGO’s Power Functions motor system, now with the addition of the new ‘Control’ bluetooth-compatible app-based operating system.

This gives 42099 superb-looking playability, provided the set’s all-wheel-drive, remotely controlled steering, and suspension are up to the job. Judging by the images we’re hopeful, and if the number of stickers is a measure of off-road ability, the X-treme Off-Roader will be able to climb Everest.

Like all the sets previewed here 42099 will reach stores later this year. We’ll do our best to resist testing its Elf-smushing ability when we get our hands on it…

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– 42097 Compact Crawler Crane –

The last H2 2019 Technic set we’re previewing today (but not the last in the range…) is this, the 920 piece 42097 Compact Crawler Crane. Featuring an all-mechanical array of functions including boom extension and raising, four spidery legs that use the huge stabiliser parts from the 42078 Mack Anthem set reviewed here earlier in the year, a winch, and a set of manual tracks, it looks like no crane we’ve ever seen but contains some excellent gear-driven functionality nonetheless.

Still towards the top of Technic’s age range, 42097 is aimed at ages 10+ and will cost around $100/£80, making the H2 2019 line-up one of considerable size and complexity, earning LEGO a few TLCB Points after a slightly lacklustre H1 range.

There’s one more set in the H2 2019 line-up left to reveal, and we’ll do just that later this summer. In the meantime you can check out our preview of the H1 2019 Technic sets here, plus you can visit our Review Library where 100 LEGO sets past and present have been reviewed so far via the link.

Y-Wing

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Regular readers of this dilapidated little corner of the internet will know that here at The Lego Car Blog we do not have an unconditional love for Star Wars. In fact, in a couple of ways (primarily any form of dialogue whatsoever), George Lucas’s most famous movie franchise is so awful it’s almost a parody of itself.

However, in plenty of other regards the Star Wars movies are an absolute triumph, one example being the incredible attention to detail paid to the vehicles in the Star Wars universe. This is one of the most famous, the Koensayr Manufacturing BTL-S3, or ‘Y-Wing’ as it is commonly known.

A multi-role starfighter/bomber, the Y-Wing could serve in both atmospheric conditions – where it could hit 1000km/h – as well as in space, and was in use within the Republic Navy as early as 22 BBY. No, we don’t know when that is either, we pulled it from ‘Wookiepedia’, so best direct any follow up questions there…

This jaw-dropping recreation of the famous Star Wars spaceship comes from Jerac of Flickr, who has recreated the Y-Wing in unbelievable detail. The build is made all the more impressive when you consider that whilst it may not look it, Jerac’s model is only mini-figure scale.

There’s much more to see of Jerac’s incredible creation at his photostream via the link above, which includes the Y-Wing in both its movie and original specifications (which might just be the nerdiest thing we’ve ever written), and if you’d like to learn more about the ‘real’ spaceship (and to see where we plagiarised the stats from) you can visit Wookiepedia here or wait for one of the proper blogs to find this creation too…

Ferrari 250 GT Berlinetta SWB | Picture Special

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This beautiful recreation of a beautiful car has just become our favourite creation of 2019 so far. The Ferrari 250 GT Berlinetta SWB was launched in 1959 for road and GT racing, fitted with both steel and aluminium bodies and with between 240 and 280bhp. Just 176 GT Berlinetta SWBs were produced and it became an instant classic, consistently rated as one of the best Ferrari’s of all time.

This wonderful Model Team replica of the Ferrari 250 GT Berlinetta SWB comes from previous bloggee Noah_L (aka Lego Builders) who has absolutely excelled himself with this stunningly accurate recreation of the iconic historic racing car, complete with a beautifully detailed engine and interior, opening doors, hood and trunk, and the coolest stripes we’ve ever seen.

An extensive gallery of fantastic imagery is available to view at Noah’s Ferrari 250 GT Berlinetta SWB Flickr album via the link above or via MOCpages here – click the links to make the jump to our favourite creation of the year so far.