Brian Kescenovitz‘s tiny creation caught the tiny eyes and minds of our workforce because of its name. Indeed we’ve had to keep his original title for this blog post, just to satisfy a hoard of tittering and sniggering Elves. Brian’s motorcycle caught our eyes because it’s highly detailed, with some very novel parts usage and connections. Click this link to his Photostream and scroll down to see more of Brian’s tiny motorbikes.
Constructed from around 36,000 pieces and 4 years in the making, this is one of the largest Lego projects that this site has ever featured. Ryan Link, a regular bloggee here at The Lego Car Blog, has been very busy.
Loosely based on the Tampa Bay Ferrari dealership, Ryan has designed and built a home for the eight Ferrari models that he has constructed over the past few years. Measuring 192×144 studs, Ryan’s enormous creation can easily house his collection, and features a wealth of incredible detailing, including brick-built wall mosaics depicting classic Ferrari models, beautiful Ferrari lettering, and even a couple of wonderfully intricate prancing horse logos too.
The shot above shows just how good the aforementioned mosaics and logos look, which feature throughout the interior of the dealership including in the showroom, customer lounge and accessories area, and workshop, all of which are lit by a third-party LED system integrated into the roof of the build.
The stars of Ryan’s incredible build are of course the Ferrari models which it was built to house, and they include a 458 Italia, Enzo, LaFerrari, 599 GTB, Testarossa, F12 Berlinetta, and even a fully liveried Ferrari team truck, all of which have been published here.
There’s a whole lot more of this spectacular creation to see at Ryan Link’s photostream and we cannot recommend clicking this link enough. LEGO, Ferrari… if ever you visit this little corner of the internet; invite Ryan out for a chat – we think the officially licensed Ferrari range of LEGO sets could so with a bit of expansion…
It’s been a while since we let the Elves watch a Transformers movie. This is partly because they’ve not found much in the way of Transformers-related builds, but mostly because after the abomination of ‘Transformers 4 – Age of Extinction’ we just couldn’t stomach any more Michael Bay directed nonsense.
Today though, we’ve relented, because one of their number returned with this cache of superb fully Transformable Autobots courtesy of Alex Jones aka Orion Pax.
Each creation is an ingenious work of art, and you can now build them for yourself, as Alex has released a new book containing step-by-step building instructions! There’s more to see via the link above, where you can also find a link to Amazon where Alex’s book is available to buy.
Formula 1 is – whilst not without its risks – relatively safe today. For almost all of the sport’s history however, it was a insanely dangerous place to be. Even as late as the 1980s Formula 1 drivers (and others involved in F1 trackside) were dying on a regular basis. This car belongs to one such driver, the hugely popular Gilles Villeneuve, who was tragically killed at Zolder in Belgium after just 5 years in the sport.
Gilles joined Formula 1 after winning the Formula Atlantic championship in both the US and Canada in 1976, debuting with McLaren in ’77 before World Champions Ferrari took him on for the ’78 season. In May of 1982 Gilles collided with the back of Jochen Mass’ car during qualifying, with Mass on a slow lap and Gilles on a fast one. Both drivers saw each other at the last moment, both took evasive action, and both moved to the right…
The Ferrari disintegrated, and Gilles, still strapped into his seat, exited the car and hit the catch fencing, fatally breaking his neck. Formula 1 had lost one of it’s most loved drivers.
Gilles is now remembered at his home track in Canada, renamed in his honour, and both at Zolder in Belgium and San Marino in Italy, each with a corner named after him. Yesterday marks 35 years since Gilles’ death, and race car building legend Luca Rusconi aka RoscoPC has paid tribute by uploading his incredible recreation of Gilles’ 1982 Ferrari 126C2 Formula 1 car to Flickr, 5 years after he first designed it.
Luca’s model is one of the most spectacular Lego recreations of a classic Formula 1 car that you will ever see, and its beauty lies as much within as it does on the surface, with working suspension complete with anti-roll bars, a 6-cylinder engine and full remote control drive and steering.
There’s more to see of Gilles Villeneuve’s Ferrari 126C2 at Luca’s Flickr gallery – click here to make the trip.
The Lego Car Blog Team own some interesting cars, as you’d probably expect from a website as nerdily automotive as this one, but no motorbikes. This is because if we owned motorcycles this blog would never have made it to five years old, and our organs would now belong to other people.
However despite our aversion to owning motorbikes, we do still rather like them, and fortunately newcomer Nesme Laurent (aka NEMOOZ) allows us to indulge in this passion from the safety of a comfy chair.
Laurent has built almost fifty Technic replica motorcycles, from manufacturers including BMW, Ducati, MV Agusta, Moto Guzzi, Honda, KTM, Yamaha, and Kawasaki, each features a variety of working functions, and instructions are available for many of the designs too.
You can see a selection of Laurent’s builds at his newly created MOCpage, and you can see the full back-catalogue of fifty or so bikes via Brickshelf.
Is there a more disappointing automotive brand than Alfa Romeo? We’re going to say no, and the disappointment started with this car.
Launched in 1966, the pretty Pininfarina-designed Alfa Romeo Spider was at the cutting edge of sports car engineering. A twin-cam engine, 5-speed gearbox, and disc brakes all featured, and whilst the Alfa cost nearly as much as an E-Type Jaguar, it found plenty of buyers willing to spend a bit to drive something so gorgeous.
And then Alfa Romeo just kept making it. And making it. And making it. The final Series 4 version of the car (pictured here) was released in 1990, thirty-six years after the Series 1 debuted, wearing a stupid 1990s bodykit and featuring tail-lights robbed from the 164 sedan.
The striking GTV finally replaced the Spider in 1995, but it was a flash in the pan moment for a brand that had traded on the past glories of its badge for far too long. Years of automotive drivel followed, mostly re-badged Fiats in pretty dresses – which wasn’t a good starting point, and Alfa Romeo seemed on the verge of disappearing altogether.
But now something remarkable has happened. Alfa Romeo are back. And not just with a Fiat in a pretty dress. The new Guilia sedan and Stelvio (whisper it)… SUV are receiving properly good reviews, and could finally be the saviours of the brand that we’ve been awaiting for so long. So cross your fingers, and your toes, and try to forget about cars like the Series 4 Spider.
Oh, we nearly forgot! This excellent Model Team recreation of the Series 4 comes from previous bloggee Andre Pinto, and there’s more to see at his photostream by clicking here.
And yet… somehow… rather cool. Even so, we’re glad this Ferrari 250 GTO (variants of which are the most valuable cars ever sold at auction) gasser hot rod exists only in Danish plastic.
Previous bloggee Tim Inman possesses the slightly warped mind that created this, and there’s more to see at his Flickr photostream via the link above.
Let’s go to the beach, each
Let’s go get a wave
They say, what they gonna say?
Have a drink, clink, found the Bud Light
Bad bitches like me, is hard to come by.
The profound words of well-known poet Nicki Minaj there, whose affront to music perfectly captions this neat mini-figure scene from Flickr’s sanellukovic. There’s more to see of his excellent Town-scale hot rod complete with Wolverine-esque driver at his photostream – click the link above to catch a wave.
Has there ever been a more perfect mash-up than this? 1960’s Batman – he of exploding-pop-out ‘Batwords’ fame – and a dodgem car surely means a cacophony of pop-up onomatopoeia at the fun fair. TLCB regular Redfern1950s is the builder and you can buy a ticket to the Gothem dodgems via the link above.
Mechanics. They seem to appear less and less frequently here at TLCB. Such is the prevalence of LEGO’s (excellent) Power Functions electronics that mechanically operable functions have become a bit old-hat. However when done well, mechanical features can result in a model that’s more than a match for anything with a motor shoved in it.
Today we have one such example suggested to us by a reader, and it doesn’t have a battery box in sight. Built by Didumos69 of Eurobricks what it does have is a wealth of mechanical engineering, including all-wheel suspension, working steering, hand-adjustable seats, and a functioning sequential gearbox hooked up to a V8 piston engine.
You can see full details of the model at the Eurobricks forum via the link above, which includes detailed steps showing how each functional element was engineered. Click the link in the text above to make the jump.
This TLCB writer wasn’t around in the 1970s, but from the remnants that exist today it seems like it was pretty bleak time in ’70s Britain. Everyone was on strike, nothing worked properly, and everything was brown.
Hence British TV series ‘UFO‘, written by Thunderbirds and Captain Scarlett creator Gerry Anderson, and set in the near future of 1980, UFO offered some escapism from the drudgery of 1970s Britain. At least for a year, as it only lasted from 1970 to 1971.
UFO featured some pretty cool vehicles though, as is Anderson’s hallmark, and this is one of them; the S.H.A.D.O Interceptor, deployed to protect the secret moonbase from where operations against the alien invasion of 1980 could be orchestrated.
This slick mini-figure recreation of the Interceptor comes from previous bloggee and TLCB Master MOCer Andrea Lattanzio aka Norton74, joining his previously featured UFO Command Centre, and was suggested to us by a reader. There’s more to see at Andrea’s photostream – click the link above to escape for yourself.
We may only be four months into the year, but we’re pretty sure we’ve found our favourite creation of 2017 already…
This breathtakingly beautiful scene comes from Michel Van den Heuvel aka Start Bricking on Flickr, and it is -of course – Scuderia Ferrari’s 1950s workshop, recreated wonderfully in mini-figure scale.
Inside Michel has taken care of every detail, from tools to trophies, rubber to race cars, nothing is missing, and it’s all been thoughtfully replicated in miniature from our favourite Danish plastic.
Outside the workshop and underneath some stunning brick-built lettering are a trio of historic Scuderia Ferrari Formula 1 racing cars, complete with a superb Fiat team transporter ready to take the cars to their next race.
Michel hasn’t stopped with Formula 1 either, as Ferrari’s legendary endurance racers and sports cars have also been exquisitely recreated in Lego form.
There’s a whole lot more to see of Michel’s incredible build at his Flickr photostream by clicking here, and if anyone from LEGO is reading this; please make this an official set. You know you want to!
The news is full of nuclear war hysteria at the moment, thanks to the orange leader of the free world and overweight North Korean despot Kim Jong-un. As a classy blog not interested in clickbait we’re seamlessly jumping on the bandwagon with this, Nico71‘s glorious Fallout 4 inspired retro-futuristic nuclear concept car.
Back in the ’50 and ’60s wild concept cars were all the rage, and were often powered by a variety of unusual fuels, including gas turbines, electricity and yes, even nuclear reaction.
Nico’s brilliant Technic concept car perfectly captures the ambitions of the age, and it’s clever too, featuring remote control drive and steering, electronically opening doors and a sliding roof canopy, plus working suspension and lights.
Control of the electrically-powered functions is taken care of thanks to a third-party BuWizz bluetooth unit, which allows graduated control via a bluetooth device and delivers up to 8x more power to the motors than LEGO’s own system.
You can see all of the build details and the full image gallery courtesy of Nico71’s excellent website by clicking here, and you watch the nuclear concept car in action (which is worth doing for the roof mechanism alone!) via the excellent video below.
YouTube Video:
The Lego Car Blog Elves are clearly in a spacey mood today, as we have no less than three sci-fi creations to share. This gives us a headache because, as regular readers will know, we’re useless with anything science-fictiony. Oh well, here goes…
First up, pictured above, is perig perig‘s ‘The Tiny Whale’, which looks like a boat, an airship and tow truck have been involved in a forceful accident. Still, it is, even to us here at TLCB, a deeply cool build, and you can see more at the link above.
Next up is this mean looking tri-pedal mech from Flickr’s Sunder_59. This TLCB writer’s Better Half has informed him that pastel colours are in, which explains why Sunder’s creation looks so good. There’s more to see at the builder’s photostream – click the link above to take a look.
And finally, something with wheels! We still don’t really know it’s for though, seeing as it’s also a sci-fi build, but if we were a mini-figure we’d love to drive it to the shops. Volker Brodkorb is the builder behind it, it’s called a ‘DooM Inc. Troop Support Vehicle’, and there’s lot more to see on Flickr via the link above.
You can see more of all three builds via the links in the text above, and normal car-related service will resume here at TLCB shortly…
We often feature Technic trucks here at The Lego Car Blog, but what they’re designed to pull less so. Even if a trailer is built, it’s often just a rolling slab of Danish plastic without any functionality whatsoever. Not so with Trawson21‘s latest creation, which packs realistic working features into both ends of the build.
Up front the truck includes remote control drive and steering, pendular suspension, and a working piston engine, whilst the huge trailer in tow includes pneumatically operated support legs and access ramps operated via a manual pump and pneumatic switch.
There’s more to see at Trawson’s Brickshelf gallery, where you can also find a link to a video of the model in action – click the link above to check it out.