Flickr’s Stefan Johansson has appeared here several times this year with his meticulously recreated Saab aircraft. His latest is one of Saab Aero’s newer offerings – the fearsome JA37 Viggen – and this time Stefan has branched away from his usual stealthy grey to brick-build a full camouflage livery. There’s more to see on Flickr at Stefan’s photostream – click the link above to take off.
Another day and another Elf returns to TLCB Towers in the hope of receiving a meal token and a Smartie. A hope realised, as this remote control Technic Scania truck is just the sort of model that this blog was created for. Built by newcomer Fig850 it features RC drive, steering and tilting cab (powered by an L motor each), a remotely operated three-speed gearbox, a V8 piston engine and working front and rear suspension. You can see more via Eurobricks at the link above whilst we dispense a yellow Smartie to a happy Elf.
Remote control models have become incredibly popular since the introduction of LEGO’s excellent Power Functions motors and infrared control system. This Corvettesque creation, the latest build by Chade of Flickr and Eurobricks, packs in the full suite of Power Functions components underneath its beautifully neat bodywork. Two L Motors drive the rear wheels whilst a Servo allows for precise steering control, the on-board battery is hidden within the chassis, and LEDs are utilised to give the front lights realism.
The whole package has been very thoroughly engineered by Chade, making this creation one of the neatest RC builds we’ve seen in a while. There’s lots more to see, including images of the chassis and drivetrain, on both Flickr and Eurbricks – click the links above to make the jump.
This superb DAF CF 460 Space Cab ‘combinatie’ truck and trailer was discovered by one of our Elves on Flickr. It’s the work of DAF-building specialist and previous bloggee Arian Janssens, who churns out DAF truck models of the highest quality and a prodigious rate. There’s lots more to see of Arian’s latest build, which includes a variety of load and trailer colour schemes and combinations, via his Flickr photostream – click the link above to make the jump.
This glorious contraption is apparently a Cargo SkyBoat, and it’s utterly wonderful in every single way. Not knowing anything about Cargo SkyBoats, and having pinched this from Bricknerd, we’ll leave it there, but you can see lots more courtesy of Alexis Dos Santos on Flickr. Click on these words to get airborne.
TLCB Elves are great fans of remotely controlled creations. If they’re large and/or fast enough they can even be used to smush unsuspecting co-workers.
Today’s Elf needs to go back to school though, as its find – paave‘s brilliant Technic school bus – is neither large nor fast. Unfortunately this meant that the group of Elves it was targeting heard the bus coming, jumped out of the way, overturned it in a rare moment of Elven cooperation, and then chased the controlling Elf out of the office. As your Mom would say, size matters.
Anyhoo, in this case it’s actually the creation’s diminutive size that makes it more impressive, as squeezed inside are a full remote control drivetrain and a working motorised door, all in a model that’s only about 10 studs wide.
You can see more of paave’s Technic school bus on MOCpages, Brickshelf, and Eurobricks, where there’s also a video showing the cunningness within.
The Lego Car Blog Elves, as has been well documented on these pages, like bright colours, shiny things, and remote control. Today therefore, was a Good Day, as one of their number rode triumphantly into the office atop this; a stunning fully remote controlled Peterbilt 379 complete with a working MAC end dump trailer.
It’s the work of Master MOCer Dennis Glaasker aka Bricksonwheels, who returns to truck building after some time away from his most favoured subject. Built from around 5,000 LEGO bricks (over 500 of which have been beautifully chromed) and measuring well over a metre long it’s one of the larger models that we feature here at TLCB, and such impressive scale allows for some simply incredible detailing.
It also enabled us to give some of the Elves a ride around the office in the trailer, which they enjoyed immensely, before we dumped them all in a strategically placed bowl of soapy water (it’s for their own good, honest). You can check out more of Dennis’ spectacular build on Flickr via the link above (you won’t end up in bowl of soapy water, we promise), and you can also check out Dennis’ excellent book ‘The Art of Lego Scale Modeling’, which features other models like this one, by clicking here. You could even win it and other goodies as part of TLCB’s ‘Review My Set Competition’ – click here to learn how!
…First you must finish. Unfortunately for Nissan their strikingly designed 1989 R89C Group C racer was uncharacteristically un-Japanese when it came to reliability, with all three Le Mans entries retiring before the race was over. Sadly the R89C fared little better in the World Sports Car and Japan Sports Prototype Championships, suffering from chassis and engine issues throughout the season.
The R89C is not exactly a legend of endurance racing then, but just look at it! Making almost 1,000bhp from its twin-turbo 3.5litre V8 engine the R89C packed quite a punch when it was working too.
This gorgeous Model Team replica of the classic Nissan racing car is the work of Alexander Paschoaletto and he’s recreated the R89C’s magical shape (and Nissan’s famous late ’80s – early ’90s livery) beautifully in brick form. You can see more of his build on both Flickr and MOCpages – click on the links to take the trip to ’89.
This three-wheeled oddity is a Grinnall Scorpion III, a BMW-bike engined track-car built by one of the UK’s many weird sports car companies that most people have never heard of. Well this one isn’t of course, it’s a Lego version, built by Flickr’s James Tillson, and it’s quite a neat bit of kit. With all-wheel-suspension, RC steering and a Buggy Motor driving the single rear wheel James’ Scorpion replica looks like a riot to drive on a slippy lino floor. You can see more images of the Grinnall on Flickr here, and you can see it in action on a slippy lino floor at Eurobricks here.
Every so often we receive a suggestion here at TLCB that makes the whole office stop what it’s doing (which today seemed to mostly be Google-imaging attractive Rio Olympics athletes) to gaze in wonder at the creation/s found. This was definitely one of those moments.
These incredible Model Team classic Formula 1 replicas have all been built by newcomer Idihnab Szalab from Hungary, and he’s uploaded all four to MOCpages in one go. Each is an exquisitely detailed creation that perfectly captures one of the Formula 1’s most famous and iconic cars in Lego form.
From top to bottom Idihnab has built; the dominant 1972-75 Lotus-Ford 72D in John Player Special livery, Ferrari’s 1989 640, the double World Championship-winning 1986-87 Williams-Honda FW11, and lastly the beautiful Lotus-Ford 72C from 1970-71 in magnificent Gold Leaf livery.
We can’t recommend paying Idihnab’s MOCpage a visit enough – click here to view all four incredible creations and to step back in time to Formula 1’s greatest era.
The Lego Car Blog Set Review Library is packed with over seventy sets, but we want mooooah! This is where you come in, as we’re looking for TLCB readers to add their own sets to the Review Library, and in doing so you could even win some loot! You also get to become a TLCB writer for the day, with literally none of the privileges that you’d expect this to offer you. Still, this hasn’t put off friend of TLCB Thirdwigg, who has joined us here at TLCB Towers to add one of his favourite sets to the Review Library. Yes, we said favourite. We’ll let Thirdwigg explain…
8081 Extreme Cruiser gets a bad rap. It’s not extreme. It’s not a 4×4. It has a funny engine. It’s black. On and on it goes. Blah Blah Blah.
I love it.
But it took me some time. When I bought it for $60 through LEGO, I tagged it onto my 8110 order as an afterthought. I was decidedly more excited about 8110. After 8110, I got to work on 8081. Opening the box, you find a number of bags, wheels and tires, and a number of loose instructions books (ugh). There are a lot of black parts, and some red parts, but the set really has no new parts among the 590 included. However some interesting pieces include the newer frames, four pistons and cylinders, suspension parts, a bunch of black panels. There are also instructions included for a B Model. You’ll like A better.
The builds starts with the frame of the 4×4. LEGO uses red for the chassis, which seems silly at this point. You add the knob gears for the steering, and add the rear suspension. The suspension is a single pivot design like we saw in the car from 8042. But there is a differential (clap, clap), and the structure is solid. We can let it slide. You then build the engine and the front suspension. You build a V4?! What is this, a motorcycle? Then the front suspension. Independent setup with no drive?! On an Extreme Cruiser? Who named this set?
Yep, no four wheel drive, and an anemic engine.
The bodywork comes next with the second bag, and the model is finished with bag three. Redemption for 8081 is starting. The structure is solid and cohesive. The black works well, and the execution comes together as the Technic panels fill gaps and lead your eyes to a quite a pleasing overall shape. The hood is long, as is the roofline, and 8081’s stance looks great; balanced and not too heavy. The tires fill out the wheel wells appropriately. The doors, hood, and tailgate all open – simple, nice features to include. The blue seats are basic, yet they look good and compliment the aforementioned red, which highlights the chassis well.
When it’s all done you cannot help but like the cute little SUV. Continue reading
The Lego Car Blog Elves didn’t find any cars for us to blog today, but they did find this; a lovely Town-scale replica of a German BR23 Epoch II steam locomotive. It’s been built by omega3108, it’s driven by Power Functions, and there’s more to see via the link above.
This magnificent Dassault Rafale-M complete with carrier-deck was found on Flickr today. Previous bloggee Kenneth Vaessen is the builder and he’s recreated France’s current maritime fighter beautifully in brick-form.
Designed to replace France’s various military aircraft with a single multi-role fighter, the Rafale was introduced in 2001 and it’s been in action over Syria, Iraq, Libya and Afghanistan since, most notably launching strikes on the utter shitbags that are Daesh (otherwise known as Islamic State).
There’s lots more to see of Kenneth’s top-quality recreation of the French fighter at his Flickr photostream – click the link above to take off.
This beautiful machine is a Stalowa Wola L34 front loader, built from the mid-70s until the 2000 in Poland and now recreated in stunning accuracy by Zbiczasty of Brickshelf.
Featuring Power Functions all wheel drive, articulated steering and a pneumatically operable front bucket Zbiczasty’s model is much more than a detailed display piece. Zbiczasty has also created the Stalowa Wola L34’s front-mounted grab which can be fitted in place of the bucket, allowing the vehicle to become a foresting tractor.
There’s lots more of this hugely impressive model to see via Zbiczasty’s Brickshelf gallery, where there are nearly twenty spectacularly good photographs available. Click the link above to make the jump to Brickshelf.
This is the Peel P50, built on the Isle of Man between 1962 and ’65, and pretty much an unknown ’60s oddity until Top Gear decided to feature the car in 2007 (although this TLCB writer was sad enough to know about it).
Said film instantly turned the P50 into one of the most famous vehicles on the planet, and values have since skyrocketed – if you have one of the 47 P50s made squirrelled away somewhere then send Jeremy Clarkson a Thank You card!
This dinky Lego recreation of the world’s smallest production car is the work of previous bloggee vmln8r, and it’s a miracle of packaging. Concealed (mostly) inside are a drive motor, steering motor, battery box and infrared receiver, giving vmln8r’s P50 full remote control drive and – being so small – grin-inducing manoeuvrability.
It’s so small in fact, that when the Elf responsible for discovering this model ploughed it into a group of its unsuspecting colleagues in the office today they all just got up and ran after it, rather than having to be scraped up by TLCB Team and taken to the ‘Elf Hospital’, aka the toilet flush.*
There’s lots more of vmln8r’s Peel P50 to see at his Flickr photostream or via the Eurobricks forum, where there’s also a video available of the model in action. But that’s not the only Peel P50 video you want to see…
*Not really. We wouldn’t do that. Unless things were really bad.