Tag Archives: 1950s

D-Cup

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Exactly half-way between the death of King Edward VII and Salad Fingers came this, the glorious 1957 Jaguar D-Type.

Launched in 1955 the D-Type was specifically designed to win the Le Mans 24 Hours, with a 3.4 litre straight-six and a host of aeronautical inspired innovations – most notably the tail-fin to provide stability for the (then un-chicaned) Mulsanne Straight.

The result was an outright win in ‘55, ‘56, and most dominantly in ‘57, when 250,000 spectators watched the D-Type – now with an enlarged 3.8 litre engine – take first, second, third, fourth, and sixth places.

This lovely Speed Champions recreation of the ‘57 Le Mans winner comes from regular bloggee SFH_Bricks, with custom stickers from Brickstickershop and building instructions available too.

There’s more of the model to see at SFH’s photostream, and you can head down the Mulsanne Straight in 1957 via the link above.

Eurovision

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The Lego Car Blog’s home nation has just come last in the Eurovision Song Contest. Again.

Yes the nation of Adele, The Beatles, The Cure, Dire Straits, ELO, Florence & the Machine… and that’s just the first six letters of the alphabet… can’t beat any disposable European electropop.

So to cheer ourselves up we’re heading back seven decades to when the UK could actually beat Europe at something, and this glorious 1951 Talbot-Lago T26 and 1959 Aston Martin DBR1.

The gorgeous Talbot-Lago isn’t British of course but French, and it came second at Le Mans in 1951 to a Jaguar, which supports our patriotic narrative, whilst the DBR1 beat Ferrari to win at Le Mans in 1959.

Each superb Speed Champions creation comes from SFH_Bricks of Flickr, and you can jump back to when Britain could win at something in Europe via the link above.

Wood n’ Wax

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Exactly half way between the Second Boer War and the iPhone 11 came this, the Cadillac Eldorado  ‘Woodie’. Although perhaps it never really existed at all, as the imagery available today seems to be more of a Hot Wheels toy than a real car.

Whether a genuine vehicle or not, the ‘59 Eldorado station wagon looks unarguably fantastic though, with this tremendous brick-built version capturing the Hot Wheels toy beautifully, complete with its surfboards protruding from the rear. 1saac W. is its maker and you can take a closer look on Flickr via the link.

Hill & Biens

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We’re sticking with classic cars today, and this lovely Speed Champions 1958 Ferrari 250 Testa Rossa, that won Le Mans in the hands of Phil Hill and Oliver Gendebien.

Created by SFH_Bricks, this beautifully presented model captures the iconic Ferrari racer superbly, and you can join Hill and Gendebien in France in ‘58 via the link.

A Proper Porsche

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Porsche are in big trouble. Despite the success of their EVs (and perhaps because of it…), Porsche are currently undertaking a rapid de-electrification of their future models. Because whilst a tax-avoiding businessman may want his luxury sedan to be electric, the sports car customer wants an engine. Cue a 92% drop in Porsche’s operating profit and a knock-on effect elsewhere in the Volkswagen empire, as the cancellation of Porsche EV platforms hits other brands.

But fear not readers, because today we have a real Porsche. Open-top, combustion-powered, rear-wheel-drive, and the only thing the battery does is start the engine. This is of course a 1950s Porsche-Diesel tractor.

Built by MP LEGO Technic Creations, this gorgeous recreation of the vintage Porsche features working steering, a single-cylinder piston engine connected to the rear wheels with a selectable power-take-off, a high/low gearbox, and a functional rear hitch.

Both constructed and presented beautifully there’s lots more of MP’s wonderful model to see on Flickr, and you can get back to a proper Porsche via the link above.

Turn Right to Go Left

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Wait, haven’t we featured this Hudson Hornet already? Well, yes…. but we’ve all been waiting for it to get stickers! Flickr’s SFH_Bricks has now done just that, turning his previously blogged Hudson into the NASCAR that made it so famous. More specifically SFH has created ‘Doc. Hudson’, the Disney Pixar ‘Cars’ movie character that paid homage to that most iconic of NASCAR racers. The beautifully replicated decals come courtesy of Brickstickershop, building instructions are available, and you can turn right to go left via the link above.

A Fabulous Hudson Hornet

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The ‘Fabulous’ Hudson Hornet wasn’t just an all-conquering stock car racer. You could buy one for the road too. Available with two doors or four, as coupe, sedan, hardtop or convertible, and powered by a five-litre inline-6 with twin-carburettors, the Hornet could produce over 200bhp with minimal modifications.

It also featured a clever ‘step-down’ design, where – even though it was built on a separate chassis – the floor-pan sat between the chassis rails, lowering the centre of gravity and enabling beautiful streamlined bodywork. Flickr’s SFH_Bricks has recreated the Hornet’s fabulous shape beautifully, and there’s more of his superb small-scale homage to the classic Hudson to see via the link above.

Small Saab

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Today Saab is solely an aerospace and defence company. And before 1949 it was too. But in the middle it also made cars. Some of them wonderful. And this is their first.

Launched in 1949, the Saab 92 featured a 25hp 764cc two-cylinder two-stroke engine based on a German DKW design (Sweden was closer to Germany’s Nazi regime than they’d probably like to admit), a three-speed gearbox, front-wheel-drive, an aerodynamic body pressed from a single piece of sheet metal, and paint left over from the company’s aeroplane division.

Over 20,000 92s were produced, with the car becoming something of a rally legend during its production run, and later evolving to feature a trunk (with an opening lid!) and paint options other than military-surplus.

This lovely (and rather cleverly constructed) Saab 92 comes from SvenJ., who has packed front and rear fenders, door handles and mirrors, and even a split windshield into the pretty 7-wide bodywork.

You can take a closer look at Sven’s Saab 92 at his photostream, click the link above to make the jump.

On the Wings of an… um, Seagull

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Seagulls are roundly disliked in TLCB’s home nation. Found on rubbish dumps or in British seaside resorts (which amount to the same thing), they make irritating ‘CAAAW!’ noises, crap all over the place, and mug people for their chips. However in car form, they’re rather wonderful…

This is the mid-’50s Mercedes-Benz 300SL ‘Gullwing’, perhaps the only time a coupe has been more desirable than the roadster, thanks entirely to those magnificent doors.

This splendid Speed Champions version, complete with the aforementioned gullwing doors, comes from previous bloggee SFH_Bricks, and with building instructions available you can recreate it for yourself. There’s more to see at SFH’s ‘1954 Mercedes-Benz 300SL’ album and you can CAAAW, crap all over the place, and steal someone’s chips via the link above.

Beetle Built Different

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Hope, magic, and more than a little ingenuity. The Lego Car Blog staff have built a great many things, but none have deployed antenna ball-joints as fenders. There’s so much going on in 1saac W.‘s Volkswagen Beetle there is genuine bafflement here at TLCB Towers as to how it all holds together. Join us trying in vain to figure it out at 1saac’s photostream via the link above.

Decking Vietnam

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This is a Vought F-8E Crusader II, one of the first supersonic carrier-based fighters, and it flew from the decks of U.S aircraft carriers from the late-‘50s right up until the mid-‘70s. Which of course meant it served in the Vietnam War, where it earned the nickname ‘MiG Killer’ because it, well… killed MiGs, with an astonishing 19:3 kill ratio.

This exceptional brick-built replica of the F-8E is the work of Flickr’s Juliusz D., and includes working landing gear, the Crusader’s trick variable incidence and folding wings, an opening cockpit, a deployable air-brake, functioning flaps, a full compliment of missiles and bombs, and phenomenally accurate period-correct markings.

It’s one of the finest Lego fighters we’ve ever featured, and you can take flight from a carrier deck somewhere in the South China Sea in 1967 via the link above.

My Baby Drove Up In a Pixel Cadillac*

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“Why don’t you post digital creations?” we get asked here at TLCB. Well mostly it’s because they rarely look like this.

These two spectacular ’59 Cadillacs come from serial bloggee 1saac W., who has put down his real pieces to painstakingly build each design in Studio before rendering it in Blender. As you can see here, the results look phenomenal, with ingenious parts choices and some deeply complex ‘SNOT’ techniques used in their creation.

Inevitably AI will soon be producing ‘Lego’ creations by the thousand that look like this, so enjoy the talent in these two at 1ssac’s photostream by clicking these words. These Caddies may be digital, but they’re no less magnificent for it.

*Today’s slightly butchered but nevertheless excellent title song.

Humble Beginnings

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The Lego Car Blog is a site with humble beginnings. We’re not famous Lego Show exhibitors, Lego User Group leaders, or even upstanding members of the Online Lego Community. Nope, this site was created by idiots, but look how far we’ve co… Wait, that probably isn’t a good example.

But there are great examples of automotive humble beginnings, including two now-titans of the German motor industry; Porsche and BMW.

Porsche’s first car (depicted above) was the 356, which looked a lot like the Volkswagen Beetle, because… well, it kinda was one. BMW on the other hand began by making aero engines during both World Wars. Fortunately for this site’s home nation, the military machine to whom they were supplied didn’t win either of them, and strict metal rationing after Germany’s defeat meant creating cars like the one depicted below, the tiny BMW Isetta ‘bubble car’.

They were simple, slow, and not very expensive, and both shown here are the work of TLCB debutant Filippos Tsialidis, who has created them rather humbly too, using just a handful of pieces for each. They join a host of other classic cars at his ‘Cars’ Flickr album, and you can take a look at beginning of Porsche, BMW, and many others too via the link above.

Stuck in a Moment*

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It’s ‘Liberation Day’! Yes, President Trump’s tariffs – though at the time of writing we know not what they are – begin today, when it’s expected that you’ll need to pay 25% more for a vehicle not made in the U.S (amongst many other things). And, because that’s not how global markets work, more for vehicles that are made in the U.S too.

The idea of course, is that we’ll all Buy American, even if American is… worse. Take this beautiful 1954 Mack LT truck by Flickr’s Legorigs, which looks, well… exactly the same as a modern Mack truck. And that’s despite the fact that these days Mack are owned by Swedish truck-maker Volvo, whose European trucks are vastly more modern, more powerful, more refined, and more comfortable.

Still, if Trump wants us to jump back to the 1950s, we’re happy to oblige, because Legorigs’ ’54 Mack is absolutely gorgeous. Based on a real show truck, the model features custom chrome and decals, a double-hinged hood, and a superbly detailed engine, drivetrain, and sleeper-cab interior.

There’s much more of the Mack to see at Legorigs’ ‘Mack LT 1954’ album, and you can get stuck in the ’50s via the link above. Or by driving any brand new American truck…

*Today’s title song.

Speed in the ’50s

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The fastest cars in the world weren’t always million-pound Bugattis, Koenigseggs or Hennesseys. They used to be Jaguars.

Launched in 1954, the XK140 was an evolution of the equally gorgeous XK120, a car that held the production car top speed record for six years, even though it only cost relatively normal sports car money.

This beautiful replica of Jaguar’s fabulous mid-’50s sports car has been created by the hands of the legendary Firas Abu-Jaber, who has captured its graceful shape brilliantly in brick.

Ingenious building techniques, working steering, a life-like interior, and the finest presentation in the Lego Community make Firas’ Jaguar a jaw-dropping build, and there are more stunning images to see on Flickr.

Click these words to visit Firas’ ‘Jaguar XK140’ album for the complete gallery, plus you can find out about the man behind the model via his Master MOCers interview by clicking here.