We all need a little lift now and again, and that’s what we have here. Built in ‘Miniland’ scale, newcomer Joey Klusnick‘s Hyster forklift captures the real deal brilliantly, alongside which it’s pictured too. Fork your way over to Flickr for all the photos.
Judging the near one-hundred entries submitted to BrickNerd and TLCB’s Festival of Mundanity is underway, but before we reveal the winners there’s time for a few entries that snuck in before the deadline.
First up, and managing to span both the ‘Object’ and ‘Vehicle’ categories, is Caleb Flutur‘s ‘3x Upscale 6654’. “A mundane set, in a mundane theme, from a mundane year” to quote Caleb, his digital super-sized 6654 doesn’t just inflate the scale of the model, but each individual brick used in its creation.
A monumentally clever undertaking, this competition entry is both appropriately mundane and fascinating in its construction. With Caleb vowing to build his design in real super-sized bricks soon, we’ve never been so intrigued by something so dull. Big points.
Equally clever yet unexciting is Sberwing007’s Festival of Mundanity entry, that most forgotten of vehicles; the scissor-lift.
Not just a dull machine, but a dull machine designed to enable dull tasks, Saberwing’s Technic scissor lift captures the dreariness of the real thing beautifully, including its operation, with working tight-radius steering, an extending platform, and – of course – a linear actuator operated lifting mechanism.
There’s more to see of Saberwing007’s scissor lift at both Flickr and the Eurobricks discussion forum, where further details and images of the creation’s really rather clever mechanisms can also be found.
Click the links above to complete such boring tasks as changing a lightbulb, de-leafing the gutter, and removing that dead pigeon from the air-conditioning duct.
Before we sign-off our final Festival of Mundanity post prior to the Winner’s Announcement (and a review of the awesome BuWizz 3.0 Pro prize on offer), here’s a secret bonus link to an entry which recreated the most boring vehicle of all time. Every single one of us will have ridden in this vehicle, multiple times, and yet we’ve never once thought about it. Maximum mundane points!
Besides Megan Fox, TLCB Elves’ greatest televisual delight is ‘Mad Max – Fury Road’. Although they haven’t seen ‘Death Race’ yet.
The combination of wild vehicle chases and considerable violence ticks all the Elves’ boxes, albeit there are only two (wild vehicle chases and considerable violence).
Recreating the mechanised mayhem from Mad Max in miniature is the aptly-named iluvkillerobots of Flickr, who is here making their TLCB debut with suite of ‘Fury Road’ vehicles.
Despite their small size, all are immediately recognisable as their movie-star counterparts, and include the incredible ‘War Rig’ (top), the tracked Howe & Howe Ripsaw ‘Peacemaker’ (middle), and the ‘People Eaters Limousine’ (below).
There’s more to see of all killerobots’ creations at his ‘Fury Road’ album on Flickr. Click the link above to join the Elves imagining post-apoc vehicle chases and considerable violence. Only smaller.
It’s well documented that TLCB isn’t madly in love with Star Wars, but even ardent fans of the franchise must admit Han Solo is funny. Insert your own teenage joke.
Anyway, when Han wasn’t Soloing he did get to drive (fly?) some cool stuff, such as this marvellous M68 Landspeeder from the move ‘Solo – A Star Wars Story’, as recreated brilliantly in brick form by Aliencat! of Flickr.
Constructed in LEGO’s ‘Ultimate Collector Series’ style, Aliencat’s Landspeeder includes extensive greebling, racy checkered seats, and excellent presentation, and there’s much more to see at his ‘UCS Han Solo’s M68 Landspeeder’ album.
Click the link above to beat your bishop, burp your worm, audition your hand puppet, ooze your noodle, badger the witness, and blow your own horn. Sorry, we’re done now.
War is once again raging in Europe. However despite the shock of one country invading another in 2022, Europe has been involved in conflict almost constantly. From fear of nuclear annihilation during the Cold War (which this TLCB Writer fears may be about to return) to involvement in far-away combat, war is sadly never distant.
Today’s models remind us of this past, with the first (above) the undoubtedly beautiful but rather sinister Handley-Page Victor nuclear bomber.
Built as part of the UK’s nuclear defence in the late 1950s, the Victor was part of a long line of V-Bombers (that also included the incredible Avro Vulcan), before it was repurposed for high altitude reconnaissance and later air-to-air refuelling.
This wonderful recreation of the Victor comes from previous bloggee Henrik Jensen, who has recreated its amazing shape beautifully in brick form. A full description of the build and further imagery can be found at Henrik’s photostream, and you can bomb on over via the link above.
Today’s second military creation (below) recreates a scene from countless Vietnam War movies, with a Bell ‘Huey’ helicopter in front of a (superbly built) shell-damaged building. The Bell and background come from Nicholas Goodman, who – like Henrik above – has deployed a few custom pieces to enhance authenticity.
There’s more to see of Nicholas’ ‘Battle of Hue, February 1968’ on Flickr. Click the link above to fight a pointless war that ends in failure and retreat. In that respect we hope that history is about to repeat itself.
We’re not sure if ‘Oshkonoggin’ cheese from the 1987 movie ‘Planes, Trains and Automobiles’ is real, but gosh we hope it is.
SPOOKY MONKEY‘s ace Model Team trailer truck from the aforementioned comedy would be full the delicious hardened cow juice if it were (well, in brick form, which is probably less delicious), and there’s more to see of his homage to Steve Martin and the late John Candy’s chaotic road trip on Flickr.
Cut yourself a slice of classic movie cheese via the link above, whilst we raid TLCB fridge.
Like all the best mundane things, like heading to the shop for milk and finding it shut, BrickNerd and TLCB’s Festival of Mundanity is now closed!
Around one hundred creations have been entered across the two categories (Objects and Vehicles, with a few cunningly spanning both!), many of which can be viewed at the Flickr Group of Mundanity here.
We’ll be rounding up some of the recent vehicular entries shortly, before judging begins (and some really rather excellent prizes are handed out).
Until then, thank you to each and every brilliantly boring, delightfully dull, and magnificently mundane entry, and best of luck!
Wealthy criminals, Dubai-based influencers, rappers, and oil sheiks – this is your car.
The Mercedes-Benz AMG G63 6×6 is probably the most pointless vehicle produced today. OK, apart from this one, but the brief is pretty much the same; be an Ostentatious Asshat.
Still, if you’re reading this and you’re seven, a TLCB Elf, or one of the aforementioned Ostentatious Asshats, here at TLCB we cater to all tastes.
Cue w35wvi’s rather excellent recreation of Mercedes-Benz’s most improbable vehicle, which captures the absurdity wonderfully, and – rather appropriately – it’s presented in some kind of over-the-top underground garage too.
Instructions are available and there’s more to see at w35wvi’s ‘Mercedes-Benz AMG G63 6×6’ album on Flickr. Join us and other Ostentatious Asshats via the link!
Porsche have made dozens of sports cars beginning with a ‘9’, although most are forgotten due to the dominance if the one that ends in an ’11’. Including this one, which we’d forgotten about too, and we’re a car blog.
The 906 (or ‘Carrera 6’) was a mid-’60s homologation racing car, with 50 examples built for road use to allow the design to compete in Group 4 Sports Cars.
Powered by a 2.0 litre flat-6, the 906 certainly wasn’t powerful, but weighing just half-a-ton meant it outperformed even the V12-engined Ferraris of the day.
This neat 8-wide Speed Champions version comes from Laszlo Torma utilising LEGO’s brilliantly versatile cockpit piece, and he’s made building instructions available too. Check it (and them) out via the link!
Russia, and its puppet regime next door in Belarus, really know how to make a heavy duty off-road truck. It’s just a shame they’re currently using them for such evil.
Nevertheless, the Belarusian-made MAZ-537 8×8 military truck is a seriously impressive piece of equipment, and so too is gkurkowski‘s spectacular recently updated remote controlled Model Team version, which captures the real thing brilliantly.
A suite of Powered-Up components equip the model with an accurate 8×8 fully suspended drivetrain, along with a powered V12 piston engine underneath the detailed cab too.
An extensive gallery of images display the MAZ-537 on-location and in render, and you can take a closer look at this amazing machine on Brickshelf via the link above.
And finally, if you’d like to help the Ukrainians affected by the Russian MAZs like this one that have brought war to their home, please do take a look at the Disasters Emergency Committee, the Red Cross Ukraine Crisis Appeal and the UN Refugee Agency Appeal, where donations are desperately needed.
The British and French don’t often collaborate. In fact over much of their history it’s been quite the opposite, with the two countries regularly trying to blow one another up.
These days (and post-Brexit) there’s just a simmering dislike that only manifests itself in sport and stealing one another’s scallops, but despite this there have been some notable (and remarkable) collaborations between the two nations.
The longest under-sea tunnel in the world, the world’s first supersonic airliner, and Kristin Scott-Thomas are all worthy partnerships, and back in the 1930s Britain and France worked together on cars too.
This is the Bugatti Type 41 Park Ward, a luxurious grand limousine from the golden era of coach-building.
Park Ward, better known for re-bodying Rolls Royces, created this beautifully opulent vehicle upon Bugatti’s fourth Type 41 (Royale) chassis for Captain Cuthbert W. Foster, a department store heir, in 1933.
Still to this day one of the largest cars ever built, the car now resides in a museum in France, where it’s worth more than all the scallops in the English channel.
Fortunately Flickr’s 1corn has created one that – at 1:25 scale – is rather more attainable, and there’s more to see of his wonderful brick-built Bugatti Type 41 at his photostream; Click the link above to take the Channel Tunnel and fight over some marine molluscs.
We’re into the last week of BrickNerd and TLCB’s Festival of Mundanity competition. There have been over fifty entries so far, with two today bringing the hum-drum world of daily deliveries to the brick.
First up (above) is ABrickDreamer‘s Piaggio Ape, which might seem interesting to our American readers, but in rural Italy (or India) these scooter-based pick-up trucks are everywhere, hauling improbable loads with as little as 50cc.
In production since 1948, the latest Apes can be fitted with 200cc petrol or 400cc diesel engines (although 50cc versions are still on sale!), and continue to be a common sight performing the most mundane of tasks, usually with a wearing-looking moustachioed driver on board perpetually wishing he had an extra 200cc.
A common sight in much of the world too is today’s second contest entry, the Volkswagen Transporter. An no, it’s not a camper.
Still in use by the thousand in South America, most Volkswagen T2s are not cool campers, surf buses or hippy time machines, they’re just… vans. And outdated noisy ones at that.
This splendid brick-built Transporter is transporting eggs, and comes from PalBenglat, who has captured its unpretentious simplicity beautifully.
There’s more to see of Pal’s Volkswagen Transporter van and BrickDreamer’s Piaggio Ape at their respective photostreams via the links, and there’s still time to get your Festival of Mundanity entry in, and be in with a chance of winning an awesome BuWizz Pro bluetooth battery (which we’ll be reviewing here very soon) along with some other fantastic prizes!
It’s the action movie favourite! Escalating explosions, an elaborate Michael Bay camera pan, and the hero shouting an expletive can only mean one thing, the SWAT team are here!
This TLCB Writer doesn’t live in America, so he doesn’t actually know what SWAT are or what they do, besides arriving late and looking cool in action movies, but he’d happily use de-marco‘s ace SWAT van to recreate said scenes in miniature in TLCB office.
Instructions are available so you can be Michael Bay at home too (click here for a ‘how to’ inspiration guide), and you can find out more at de-marco’s photostream via the link above.
Aaand here it is. The blandest, most uninspiring, default vehicular category of the 2020s; the crossover SUV.
This is the Hyundai Venue, part of the Hyundai/Kia group SUV line-up that includes the Bayon, Kona, Tuscon, Sante Fe, Palisade, Niro, Sportage, Xceed, Soul, Stonic, Seltos, Sorento, Carnival, Telluride… and that’s before we even get to the electric ones.
Forget counting sheep, Korean crossovers work twice as well.
Here in TLCB’s home market small SUVs often include the jazziest of styling cues. Big wheels, contrast roofs, absurd LED lighting signatures – all in the hope of elevating a particular nameplate above the infinite sea of rival crossovers that are all also deploying big wheels, contrast roofs and absurd lighting signatures…
There is nothing more automotively bland, which makes the modern small crossover SUV the perfect choice for the current Festival of Mundanity competition.
Tim Inman is the creator of soporific Hyundai Venue pictured here, and a marvellous job he’s done too! A superbly detailed exterior, life-like interior, realistic engine, and four opening doors create an excellent brick-built version of one of the most insipid vehicles in existence, and we love it!
There’s more of the Venue to see at Tim’s photostream here, just don’t start counting the images whilst operating heavy machinery.
There’s just one week to go in BrickNerd and TLCB’s Festival of Mundanity!
We’re looking for your builds of boring vehicles. No Lamborghinis, Ferraris or Porsches here! There have been over forty competition entries so far, including a white Toyota Corolla, a Geo Tracker, a Hertz rental car lot, and a (rather inspired) shopping trolley.
There are some awesome prizes on offer for the winners including Game of Bricks lighting kits, iDisplayIt display stands, and a BuWizz Pro programmable bluetooth control!
To be in with a chance of scooping the swag get your mundane entry uploaded before the end of March 2022!