We were going to title this post with something to do with whatever country’s flag goes red, blue, yellow, but it seems said colours aren’t a flag of anywhere (correct us in the comments if your country can claim it!). Upside-down Colombia is as close as we got, and we can’t make a title out of that. No matter, because Johnni D‘s tri-colour hot rods a lovely anyway, and there’s more to see of his upside-down Colombian creations on Flickr at the link above.
Every so often a creation comes along that shifts what we thought possible from LEGO bricks. This is one such creation. Created over the course of a year by Technic-building legend Sariel this is a fully working replica of JCB’s 5CX Wastemaster backhoe, powered by pneumatics, eleven Power Functions motors, and two third-party SBricks.
Underneath the brilliant Technic exterior are nine motors that drive all four wheels, the three-mode steering (two-wheel, all-wheel and crab), backhoe arm rotation and traverse, and powering a combination of pneumatic cylinders and linear actuators to control both the front and rear arms and their respective buckets. A further two motors power the pneumatic ‘remote control’, compressing the air which travels down twelve separate hoses to the model itself.
A motorised remotely rotating driver’s seat and a suite of LED lights from third-party lighting specialists Brickstuff complete the electronics, making this 2.4kg, 75 stud-long masterpiece one of the most technically advanced Technic creations to date. There is much more to see of Sariel’s amazing remote control JCB at the Eurobricks forum, on Flickr, and at Sariel’s excellent website, you can watch it in action via the video below, and if you’d like to build your own model with many of the features of this one we highly recommend LEGO’s own 42054 Claas Xerion 5000 set, which share its wheels and amazing three-mode steering with Sariel’s fantastic creation.
YouTube Video
We are going to have a very fat Elf in TLCB Towers shortly…
Arian Janssens has appeared here at The Lego Car Blog numerous times over the years, more often than not with his fantastic Model Team classic DAF trucks. But how to store a multitude of large LEGO models without them over-running the house? Fortunately the answer lies in how these trucks are transported in real life. Being designed to carry heavy loads, trucks are able to transport one another, and can be stacked on trailers several trucks high.
Arian’s ‘Jan de Rooy Transport’ DAF FAS 2800 shows how this looked back in the late ’70s to early ’80s, with an FT 2800 sleeper-cab tractor, an FA 1200 chassis-cab truck, and an FT 1600 tractor in transport behind it. Each is superb model in its own right (hence the Elf that found this is due to receive four meal tokens, to much jealousy amongst its co-workers), built with incredible attention to detail and further enhanced with realistic custom decals.
There’s much more to see of Arian’s DAFs-in-transit at his album on Flickr – take a closer look via the link in the text above.
Today’s creation is huge, very well travelled, and is a frequent visitor of truck-stops. Just like your Mom.
Built by Robert Heim it’s called ‘Space Truck 2’, and unlike your Mom it looks seriously cool. Join the convoy in space via the link to Flickr above.
WALL-E; the last surviving cute robot on an abandoned Earth tasked with tidying up the mess we made. Disney-Pixar’s masterpiece melted hearts around the world in 2008, but a decade on in 2018 several pieces of news have emerged over the course of the year that make us sure we’re heading ever closer to the grim reality depicted in the movie.
The world is in the midst of a mass extinction crisis, CO2 output has risen for the first time in 4 years, and our oceans are filling with plastic.
We don’t yet have cute little rubbish-collecting robots like the Wall-E and Eve pairing built by Flickr’s Luis Peña pictured here to help, but there are a few very easy things that we can do to lessen our impact upon our environment. Turn things off, recycle everything we can, and switch Google for Ecosia. Each year around 300,000 visitors arrive here at The Lego Car Blog directly via a search engine. If they all arrived via the tree-planting alternative Ecosia that would be a lot of trees!
To find out more about what The LEGO Company is doing to reduce its environmental impact click here and to see more of Luis’ brilliant Wall-E and Eve builds click the link above.
Lego mining excavators usually appear here in huge fully remote controlled form. Not so today, as Michael A’s mining excavator is – being mini-figure scale – rather smaller. Surprisingly though, Michael’s build still features a fully functional arm and bucket, thanks to the inclusion of several mini linear actuators from the Technic range that can be hand-cranked via the wheels hidden throughout the build. It’s a neat trick and one we’d like to see more of in Town scale creations. There’s more to see of Michael’s working Town-scale mining excavator at his photostream – click here to take a look!
No sooner does one Lego-building monthly bandwagon end than another begins. ‘Ma.Ktober’ is instantly replaced by ‘Novvember’, but because we’re incompetent we’re posting this entry on December 1st…
That does mean we nearly made it through the whole thing without getting dragged in, but if we’re going to get sucked into a spinning vortex of nerdiness it may as well be by something as cool as this.
It’s called the Lone Eagle, it comes from Flickr’s F@bz, and it features more ingenuous building techniques than would normally be found in a whole month of spacey nonsense. Click the link above to head to F@bz’ photostream to check it out.
Pantera might a word better associated with an Italian-American sports car or a 1980s heavy metal band*, but it’s also apparently a self-propelled 4500-litre crop sprayer from 130-year-old German agricultural manufacturer Amazone. An unusual choice for a LEGO creation then, but perhaps an inspired one too, as this enormous Model Team replica of the Pantera 4502 by previous bloggee Eric Trax is a work of engineering genius.
Like the real vehicle, Eric’s Pantera is all-wheel-drive, all-wheel-steering (with three steering modes), and includes the crucial adjustable height system that allows these machines to raise themselves above the crops beneath them.
It also of course features the huge folding arms that deploy to spray crops; in Eric’s model extending to an impressive 1.4 meters in width! In all there are seven LEGO Technic motors powering the drive, multi-mode steering, adjustable ground clearance, and both the spraying arm extension and height.
It’s a spectacularly well-engineered build and one that’s well worth a closer look. A large gallery of images is available to view at Eric’s Flickr photostream by clicking here, you can read further details and join the discussion at the Eurobricks forum by clicking here, and you can watch this amazing machine in action via the video below.
YouTube Video
*Today’s title track. Turn it up!
No, we’re not sure what this is either, but we like primary colours! Clever building techniques have been used in abundance to create whatever this is, and you can place your guesses at Tammo S.’s photostream by clicking here.
LEGO’s 6668 Recycling Truck from 1994 is one of this writer’s favourite ever sets. Released during the golden age for LEGO Town it looked great, featured the clear everlasting decals that we constantly wish that LEGO still used, and included a neat rubber-band powered container-hook mechanism controlled via a little wheel on the side.
Flickr’s Krzysztof Cytacki (aka Dirtzone) has channeled this high-point of the Town range and supersized that humble truck, building a remarkably similar-looking MAN F90 hook truck in Model Team scale. Being a big bit for rubber band power, Krzysztof has chosen LEGO’s Power Functions motors and Technic pneumatics to control his hook mechanism, plus his creation features remote control drive and steering, a raising/lowering third axle, and working suspension on all wheels.
It’s a treat to watch in action and you can do just that via the YouTube video below, plus you can check out all of the images of Krzysztof’s MAN F90 truck at his Flickr album by clicking the link above.
YouTube Video
A few weeks ago a crack team of The Lego Car Blog Elves were dispatched over the perimeter wall of The LEGO Company’s HQ by way of the office catapult. Tasked with uncovering LEGO’s new-for-2019 sets, those that made it back to TLCB Towers would be revered as heroes, whilst their fallen comrades would be mourned for around 15 minutes, before we all moved on with our lives.
Today the lucky survivors able to out-run a Danish alsatian see the fruits of their courageous mission revealed to you, our readers – and what tasty fruits they are! So without any further pointless preamble, here are the brand new 2019 LEGO Speed Champions sets!
LEGO’s partnerships with real-world car manufacturers is (and we may be a bit biased given the title of this website), one of their best ever decisions. The sets resulting from the tie-ups to date have been almost universally excellent, so it’s little wonder that LEGO and other manufacturers are looking to partner. Dodge become a new addition to LEGO universe for 2019, joining the likes of Mercedes-Benz, Aston Martin, Porsche, Volkswagen, Ford, Volvo, Ferrari and others.
Their first set is 75893 Dodge Challenger SRT Demon & Dodge Charger RT, a wonderful dual car homage to Dodge’s fastest products. A brilliant classic 1970 Charger (complete with a huge drag-racing supercharger) competes against the brand’s latest 2018 SRT Demon at a drag strip, with three mini-figures and the drag racing ‘christmas tree’ lights included. Each car looks faithfully accurate – although some of that accuracy is admittedly due to stickers, and with just under 500 pieces 75893 looks to be an excellent addition to the expanding officially-licensed Speed Champions line-up.
Next we have a vehicle from one of the first manufacturers to partner with LEGO – it wouldn’t be Speed Champions without Ferrari! With 198 pieces the new 75890 Ferrari F40 Competizione set marks the entry point to the 2019 Speed Champions range, and brings one of the most famous supercars ever made back into LEGO form after its last appearance as the 1,158-piece 10248 Creator F40 set from 2015.
Although considerably smaller than its predecessor, 75890 is nevertheless a brilliantly accurate little set. This version of the F40 is the Competizione, or racing car to you and me, and thus it features a mini-figure racing driver, an all-important spanner, and switchable parts to convert the F40 from race to road. 75890 will reach stores in early 2019 and will be a roaring success.
LEGO’s third new Speed Champions set brings another previous partner back into the range; McLaren, with their mind-bending track-only Senna. With 219 pieces the 75892 McLaren Senna set is slightly more complicated than the Ferrari above, as is required by the fantastically intricate design of the real car. It’s an aesthetic that doesn’t seem to translate too well to LEGO in our opinion, and – despite what appear to be a few new pieces to help replicate the real Senna’s shape – 75892 looks to our eyes a bit of mess. Nevertheless for McLaren / supercar fans it’s sure to be a winner when it arrives alongside the other Speed Champions sets in January of next year.
Chevrolet first joined the Speed Champions range a few years ago and they return to the line-up for 2019 with the 75891 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 Race Car set*. Another single-car set, 75891 brings Speed Champions into the world of NASCAR, although for licensing reasons you won’t find that link anywhere on the box. What you will find are 198 pieces, some of which are uniquely printed, a mini-figure complete with fuel-refill tank and the ubiquitous spanner, and a wealth of stickers to help recreate the ZL1 in LEGO form.
We’ve bemoaned the over-use of stickers rather than bricks to recreate real-world replicas in the past and the same is true here, but LEGO know their market, and also the most cost-effective way to hit the spot aesthetically. 75891 should be hit – especially amongst NASCAR fans!
*Plus an exciting new addition to the 2019 Technic range… but more on that another time!
The fifth and final Speed Champions set new for 2019 brings another old favourite back onto shelves; Mini, with a pairing of the iconic 1960s Cooper-S and a 2018 John Cooper Works Buggy. A tricky thing to make from rectangular bricks, LEGO seem have done a superb job recreating the original Mini in mini-figure scale, and whilst there are stickers present they’re not used to create the shape of the car – bravo LEGO! The classic Cooper comes in rally car spec, complete with quad spot-lights and a roof-rack, and includes a mini-figure rally driver.
The John Cooper Works Buggy isn’t quite as successful, looking not all that much like the real thing. But we’re guessing that if you’re reading this and you’re eight, that won’t matter one bit! Featuring big rubber tyres, a workshop complete with tools, and some cool stickers, if we were eight we’d absolutely love it!
75894 Mini Cooper-S Rally and MINI John Cooper Works Buggy is the largest set in the 2019 range at 481 pieces including four mini-figures and will join the rest of the line-up in stores from January.
Which set is your favourite? We’ll take the classic Dodge Charger and recreate the train-jump scene from the first Fast and the Furious movie, although we’d really need a Speed Champions Toyota Supra to do it properly. Over to you LEGO…
Smooth cats are usually properly weird. Not so this one, which comes from previous bloggee Sheo and is – as you can see here – exceptionally smooth. It’s a Caterpillar 320 hydraulic excavator and there’s more of it to see on Flickr. Smooth things over by clicking here.
After years watching from afar we’ve finally got the Ford Mustang in Europe. This is – on the one hand – quite cool, however on the other we’re wondering how long before we copy America completely and European Mustangs start doing things like this. And this. And this. And this…
It’s probably better if we stick to a classic Mustang, which – thanks to Eric Teo of Flickr and his excellent 7-wide Speed Champions-esque creation – we can. Eric’s ‘stang is a 1965 convertible with enough room for three mini-figures and, being a classic, it probably won’t do this.
See more by heading over to Eric’s photostream via the link above. Carefully…
*The words uttered by every bro moments before they inevitably do this.
Round round get around, I get around, yeah
(Get around round round I get around, ooh-ooh) I get around
From town to town (get around round round I get around)
I’ve a real cool mech (get around round round I get around)
I’m drivin’ real good tech (get around round round I get around)
I’m gettin’ bugged drivin’ up and down the same old road
I gotta mech with a van, it’s a wicked load
My buddies and me putting tracks in the street
Yeah, the bad guys runnin’ cos they can’t take the heat
The wise words of The Beach Boys there, slightly altered by the morons here at TLCB Towers to vaguely fit with today’s creation. Ok, we butchered a classic, but is was either that or we’d have to use this again. Anyway, the build; it’s a surfer-van-mech of course, from deep within the obscure mind of Dvd of Flickr. We’ve not really got any more to say than that, so it’s probably best if you check it our for yourselves at Dvd’s photostream. Head to the beach via the link above!
Making the Kessel Run in less than twelve parsecs, defeating the Death Star, rescuing Princess Leia, defeating the Death Star again… the Millennium Falcon has done many things worthy of Star Wars fandom, but the ship has never appeared in Technic form, which is – frankly – all that matters.
Until now that is. Jeroen Ottens received a commission to build a Technic Falcon and he’s done just that, immortalising the modified YT-1300 Corellian light freighter (we Wikipedia-ed it!) in Technic form. There’s a working access ramp, a fully articulated gun turret, and – to the joys of those here at TLCB who have to respond to our mailbox – there are even instructions available too!
There’s more to see of Jeroen’s super starship at both the Eurobricks forum and on Flickr, where a link to building instructions can also be found. Make the jump (in less than twelve parsecs) via the links above.
