This is the latest creation from TLCB regular Horcik Designs, he’s called it a Trophy Off-Roader, and its sort-of-but-not-quite a Toyota FJ, Jeep CJ and something weird and communist all rolled into one.
Wherever it’s from we like it (which is a good metaphor for people), and with Power Functions remote control drive and steering, plus working suspension, Horcik’s model boasts some decent technical functions too.
Click the link above to see more on Flickr.
The year is 1970, and Porsche need to win some races. Their new 917 endurance racer proved hugely unstable in 1969, with downforce still a relatively new phenomenon harnessing it was still largely experimental.
Cue chief engineer John Horsman, and an unlikely revelation caused by the splattering of bugs on the Porsche’s bodywork. John noticed that the 917’s tail was clean from insects, meaning that air wasn’t reaching it. A hasty modification with some aluminium sheets was made to the cars, and the 917 was transformed.
The newly modified 917K won all but one race in the 1970 endurance championship, taking first and second at Le Mans and, along with the Porcshe 908, relegating Ferrari to fourth place.
The 917 was run by serval works and part-works teams in the early 1970s, and it dominated sports car racing. The most famous of these are perhaps the Gulf Racing cars, thanks largely to Steve McQueen and his 1971 film ‘Le Mans’.
It’s this car that Technic building legend Sariel has chosen to recreate in Lego form, and he’s done so brilliantly.
Underneath the incredible bodywork (which includes wonderful period-correct decals) are no less than four LEGO RC Buggy Motors, with two third-party BuWizz 2.0 bricks controlling a pair each. This gives Sariel’s Porsche 917K both amazing speed and the ability to be controlled remotely via a bluetooth device.
Sariel’s 917 also features fully-independent double-wishbone suspension both front and rear, dihedral opening doors, and remote control steering that turns the steering wheel in the authentically detailed cockpit too.
It’s one of the finest Technic supercars of 2018 and one that is definitely worth a closer look. An extensive gallery of images is available to view at Sariel’s Porsche 917K Flickr album and you watch a video of the model in action and join the discussion courtesy of the Eurobricks forum.
See more of Sariel’s astonishing Technic recreation of the greatest endurance racer of the 1970s via the links above, and you can watch the original trailer for the 1971 movie ‘Le Mans’ by clicking here.
We’re going to have a very fat (and possibly very sick) Elf later today…
These three excellent Technic Mercedes-Benz Unimog 437s were found by one Elf, as they all come from previous bloggee Thirdwigg. Designed as a modular build, Thirdwigg’s ‘mogs can be built as long or short wheelbase, standard or doka cab, with manual features or Power Functions remote control, and with a variety of tipper bed options.
Each version also features four-wheel-drive linked to an inline-4 engine, working steering, and front and rear suspension.
There much more to see of the various ways in which Thirdwigg’s brilliantly-engineered Unimog 437 can be built at the Eurobricks discussion forum, you can find more images of the design on both Brickshelf and Flickr, and you can watch a video of the various ‘mogs on YouTube by clicking here, whilst we hand out three meal tokens to the world’s luckiest Elf.
We don’t particularly like wasps. They do eat pests and pollinate, but they also crash picnics, and no-one likes an uninvited guest.
We do like this one though, Ciamoslaw Ciamek‘s ‘Blacktron Wasp Intelligence Interceptor’ which, like its namesake, has a sting in the tail! See more at the link.
It is conceivable that humans will land on Mars well within our lifetime. This means that even if there isn’t alien life on Mars, there will be, well… alien life on Mars. For the first time in the history of mankind, we will be aliens.
Flickr’s Andreas Lenander imagines what a landing in 2050 could look like with his ‘HORN’ shuttle, complete with a rather splendid looking Martian surface.
Fast forward a few decades and driving across Mars will be as mundane as trucking up the M40. At least according to fellow Flickrer Luis Baixinho and his Mars Truck.
See more of each build via the links in the text above.
*The title of this post definitely comes from this rather than this. Sorry LEGO, it wasn’t one of your finest efforts, even with the Futurama-esque tubes.
Germany got a bit ambitious in the 1940s. Not content with being complete dicks in Europe, they sent an expeditionary force to North Africa to assist their ally Mussolini in expanding his fascist ideas across the Mediterranean. Fortunately before long the Italian King had had enough of Mussolini and arrested him in 1943, triggering the collapse of Italy’s invasions and the eventual switch to fighting against, rather than for, the Germans.
This led to the German forces surrendering in Africa in 1943, although of course continuing to fight everywhere else, and the Afrika Korps were disbanded. Not really a worthwhile campaign then, but the Afrika Korps did get some very cool vehicles…
This is one of them, an Sd kHz 7 half-track, which was kinda like an armed, convertible, off-road people carrier. Watch Audi launch one imminently…
This wonderful cartoon-esque Afrika Korps Sd kHz 7 comes from previous bloggee and TLCB favourite Redfern1950s, and not only has he loaded his half-track with period-correct goodies, he’s built some interesting-looking characters to ride in it too!
There’s much more of the Sd kHz 7 to see at Red’s Flickr photostream – head to Africa and join the Korps via the link above!
Volkswagen, following the need to pay some huge fines, are having a bit of a model cull at present. In the for the chop are pretty much all of their three-door cars, including the Scirocco (boo) and the New New Beetle (meh). Still, that makes room for even more SUVs (sigh)…
With the Volkswagen Group’s line-up becoming ever more boring by the minute we’re going back to more interesting times, before dieselgate, greedy shareholders, and every customer needing a truck to take their kids to school.
This is the original Beetle, commissioned by Hitler, designed by Ferdinand Porsche, and becoming the world’s most successful car design ever.
This superb Model Team style Beetle comes from previous bloggee Lennart C, who has built one of the toughest cars to recreate from LEGO ever brilliantly, including a wonderfully detailed interior and an authentically replicated flat-4 engine.
There’s more to see of Lennart’s beautiful bug via the link above, and you can see LEGO’s own officially-licensed Volkswagen Beetle set by clicking here.
It’s a scene that even we’re familiar with; Empire AT-ATs stalking across the snow covered plains of Hoth and towards a Rebel Alliance base soon to be in great peril.
Luke Skywalker, commander of Rogue Squadron and famous for some reason, leads the defence in a company of small Snowspeeders.
And so goes down one of the most memorable battles in the Star Wars franchise, and one that has been recreated beautifully in micro-scale by Flickr’s GolPlaysWithLego. There’s much more of this stellar build to see at Gol’s photostream via the link, where there are also instructions available so you can recreate your very own Battle of Hoth in miniature at home.
We tried to find a Star Wars quote to link to here, but it seems no-one actually said ‘Join the Dark Side’ in any of the movies. Who knew?
Anyhoo, you can join the dark glide (see what we did there? No… oh yeh, the lack of a quote thing…) thanks to Dennis Glaasker aka Bricksonwheels and his sinister-looking 1:10 scale Harley Davidson Street Glide with chrome-delete.
Built from entirely black pieces (or very very dark grey) Dennis’ Street Glide includes a detailed engine, handlebar controls, and even brake and clutch cables fashioned from silicone wire, which means they aren’t black pieces at all and this sentence is contradicting itself.
This isn’t going well. Whatever, there’s more to see of Dennis’ brilliant brick-built bike at his photostream. Glide over to Flickr via the link above.
Andrea Lattanzio aka Norton74 is heading to the beach! Both of these radical Model Team hot rods have appeared here at TLCB before, but the addition of a few surfboards and the threat of being eaten by a shark has made them even cooler! See the image in full at Andrea’s photostream via the link above, and you can find our original bloggings of the green Ford Model-T and black Ford Roadster via these links. Dude.
As has been documented on these pages before, we don’t really understand the whole flying boat thing going on in the steampunk world. Nevertheless, the creations it produces are often spellbinding.
Markus Ronge‘s clever ‘Netbrix’ original series offers the hope that we’ll finally learn what this is all about, but if not we’re still going to see some magnificent creations, not least the incredible flying liner teased below.
There’s more to see of Markus’ beautiful Netbrix Original Series ‘Full Steam’ preview posters on Flickr via the link above, where you can follow Markus to ‘subscribe’ to Netbrix.
This is a near perfect working replica of the McLaren P1, it’s really orange, and it might be the finest Technic Supercar of 2018…
Built by brunojj1 of Eurobricks, this incredible 1:8 model of McLaren’s flagship hybrid hypercar measures over 70 studs / almost 60cm in length and is constructed from over 3,000 LEGO pieces.
Bruno has designed two different versions of the model, one manual and the other remote controlled, and he’s made instructions available too. Both variants have adjustable front and rear suspension, opening butterfly doors, hood and engine cover, a working V8 engine, and a deployable airbrake/active rear spoiler.
The remote control version adds a suite of Power Functions motors to electronically operate the suspension, airbrake/spoiler and doors, plus drive and steer the model remotely. Two on-board LiPo batteries or third-party BuWizz bricks provide the power, whilst twin SBricks allow the McLaren’s working functions to be controlled via a mobile device.
A huge gallery of images is available to view through the Eurobricks discussion forum, where you can also find a link to Bruno’s McLaren P1 building instructions and watch a video of the remote control version of the model in action.
Find out more by clicking here, and you can read our reviews of the third-party BuWizz and SBrick parts used in the McLaren via the links in the text above.
Last time we mentioned something about a vehicle belonging to Russia’s government forces we got in trouble (despite having been positive in the past too) so today there’ll be no backstory. However none is needed, because this MAZ537 8×8 soviet military truck is incredible.
Built by gkurkowski of Brickshelf this 3.3kg behemoth is one of the most beautifully recreated replica trucks that we’ve ever featured. With superb detailing both externally and inside, gkurkowski’s MAZ is certainly befitting of the ‘Model Team’ category here at TLCB. However, this creation is much more than a static display piece…
Inside that brilliant body is a full Power Functions remote control drivetrain with power going to all eight wheels shod in LEGO’s huge 42054 Claas Xerion tyres. Each of the four axles is suspended and the first two offer four-wheel-steering powered by a Medium Motor. There’s also a V12 piston engine, LED headlights, a suspended fifth wheel/trailer hitch and opening everything.
It’s an incredible build and one that definitely deserves a closer look. A full gallery of over thirty images is available to view on Brickshelf, including CAD drawings of the drivetrain and WIP shots, plus you watch gkurkowski’s amazing MAZ537 8×8 in action courtesy of the video below.
YouTube Video:
It’s been a while since the last ‘Mad Max – Fury Road’ vehicle featured here at The Lego Car Blog. This means the Elves haven’t watched the movie in ages, seeing as they’re only allowed to do so if they find an appropriate creation.
Cue much Elven celebration today therefore, when one of their number returned to the office with this, a rather excellent recreation of the Gigahorse stacked Cadillac from Flickr’s hachiroku24.
Not only has hachiroku replicated the movie car brilliantly, he’s also made instructions available so you can build one for yourself. Head over to his photostream via the link above for more.
Today’s creation might look like something from that box your Mom has for when her ‘special friends’ visit, but it in fact comes from the mind of Dwalin Forkbeard.
Dwalin’s mind harbours some unusual designs it seems, as a throughly weird mix of pieces has been used to create his ‘T3 Phage’ which is apparently a spacecraft of biological make-up. Or of course, Dwalin could be just one of your Mom’s special friends.
Either way there’s more to see on Flickr – click the link above for more.
