And the 2020s it seems, as the once fairly unfashionable Ferrari Testarossa is now a bonafide millionaires’ toy, worth much much more than the entire contents TLCB office car park.
This one comes from Technic-building legend Lachlan Cameron (aka LoxLego), whose Technic recreation of the ’80s supercar includes a full remote control drivetrain, LED lights, custom (and really rather accurate) wheels, working suspension, a flat-12 engine, pop-up headlights, and opening doors, front trunk and engine cover.
Or so say people over the age of forty. For Ferrari, with whom we have a love/hate relationship here at TLCB Towers, Enzo decided to celebrate his brand’s big 4-0 with a spectacular present to itself; a carbon-fibre, twin-turbocharged racing car for the road.
This was back in 1987 too, so the F40 was nothing short of a sensation. 35 years later and Ferrari’s big launch is an SUV…
Still, we suppose it’s not Ferrari’s fault that the best selling Lamborghini (by miles) is an SUV, the best selling Bentley (by miles) is an SUV, and the best selling Porsche (by miles) is an SUV, but the future of cars is looking bleaker by the day.
Which is probably why classic cars like the F40 are worth astronomical sums these days, as people rail against the SUVness of everything new.
Flickr’s LN TEKNIK is the builder giving us license to reminisce about ‘how things were better in the olden days’, with this gorgeous 1:10 scale Technic Ferrari F40.
Equipped with the full suite of Technic Supercar functions, LN’s recreation of the definitive Ferrari includes working steering, suspension, gearbox and engine, plus pop-up headlights, opening doors, and front and rear clam-shells. And some slightly dodgy looking non-LEGO wheels.
Which means in this post we’ve moaned about SUVs, non-standard wheels, and declared that things aren’t as good as they used to be. And the TLCB is only 10 – imagine how grumpy we’ll be in 30 years! Still, life begins then…
Perhaps Mr. Bean’s greatest moment, driving a Mini via string and a mop from a chair mounted on the roof, has featured a here fewtimes in Lego from. None have used this many bricks though!
Certified LEGO Professional Ryan McNaught has used over five thousand pieces to recreate the iconic TV scene, with Bean’s Mini, new armchair, and the man himself all wonderfully captured in brick.
Ryan’s build is part of ‘Brickvention 22’, and a host of other models from the Lego Show – built by a variety of talented creators – join Mr. Bean’s Mini in Ryan’s ‘Brickvention 2022’ album.
Click the link above to take a look at the Mini and the other Brickvention builds, and we’ll be featuring another of our favourites from the show here shortly!
This beautiful blue creation is a Lada 1200 Combi / VAZ-2102, one of the defining cars of the communist-era Soviet Union and – in it’s earlier years at least – not actually a bad one.
Produced from 1970 until 1988, the Lada 1200 / VAZ-2102 was based on the Fiat 124, itself still in production and rather good too.
For the licensed version the Soviet engineers raised the Fiat’s ride height, strengthened the chassis, and increased the thickness of the bodywork steel to ensure the car could cope with Russian roads and winters, and replaced the rear disc brakes with aluminium drums, because… er, we don’t know. They were worse.
Anyway, the car was a success, with a million built in the the first three years alone, and exported to many markets where the Fiat version wasn’t already on sale (Fiat didn’t permit Lada/VAZ to compete directly with its own product).
TLCB’s home nation got the Lada 1200 in 1974, when the Fiat 124 was replaced by the newer 131, becoming the first Lada on sale in the market, and likely a brave purchase by consumers during the Cold War.
A thousand Lada jokes would follow, which was a bit unfair as the 1200 was fine, but many were probably as much to do with anti-communist sentiment as they were with automotive quality.
This lovely Model Team recreation of the Lada 1200 Combi / VAZ-2102 comes from Flickr’s Legostalgie, whose wonderful Lego replicas of Communist cars have appeared here numerous times so far. His latest captures the Lada brilliantly, with superbly accurate bodywork, opening doors, hood and tailgate, a life-like interior and engine, and even a trunk on the roof-rack.
There’s lots more to see Legostalgie’s ‘Lada 1200 Combi / VAZ-2102’ album on Flickr, and you can head to the Communist-era Soviet Union (or the United Kingdom) c1974 via the link in the text above.
Let’s get the obvious bit out of the way. Those are not official LEGO wheels. But they are excellent. And the model riding atop them is even more so.
This spectacular Technic Lamborghini Countach LP500s is the work of Polo-Freak of Brickshelf, and it’s about as accurate a Lego Lamborghini as we’ve ever seen.
Polo’s incredible creation utilises Technic panels, System bricks, and those custom golden wheels to beautifully replicate the real ’80s supercar, including a brick-built replica of the Countach’s V12 engine and its signature scissor doors.
Over thirty high quality images can be found at Polo’s ‘Lamborghini Countach LP500S’ Brickshelf album and you can take a look at all of his rolled gold via the link above.
Delivering tofu in a Japanese economy car doesn’t sound like the type of story to create an automotive legend, but then stranger things have happened. The Toyota Corolla AE86 Trueno did indeed become an automotive all-star thanks to a cartoon tofu delivery driver, and they’re now worth approximately a $billion.
This wonderfully accurate 8-wide Speed Champions version by Jerry Builds Bricks captures the famous two-tone Trueno superbly, and there’s more to see of his Initial D legend on Flickr. Click the link above to place your order. What even is tofu anyway?
If there’s something strange
In the neighbourhood
Putin’s gonna call…
Ghostbusters!
If there’s someone gay
Or gender misunderstood
Putin’s gonna call…
Ghostbusters!
He ain’t ‘fraid of no ghost
He ain’t ‘fraid of no ghost
But he’s hearing things
That should not be said
Putin’s gonna call…
Ghostbusters!
A political threat?
Then you’ll end up dead!
Ow, Putin’s gonna call…
Ghostbusters!
Have we butchered the classic Ghostbusters theme song by Ray Parker Jr. just to tenuously link to Vladimir Putin’s human rights record? Yup! But to be fair it’s been ages since we received a good death threat.
Plus, of course, this rather wonderful creation is a VAZ/Lada 2104 estate that has been brilliantly converted into a Soviet Ecto-1, which makes re-writing that song almost mandatory.
We also happen to think it might just be cooler than the original Ghostbusters’ Cadillac ambulance. OK, no it isn’t, but it is a Lada converted into an Ecto-1, which does probably make it the coolest Lada ever.
Flickr’s Tony Bovkoon is the builder who has brought Ghostbusting to Russia, and there’s more to see of his fantastic Lada Ecto-1 on Flickr.
This is a UAZ 452-3303, one of many imaginatively named Soviet off-road van truck thingies designed during the Communist era.
The UAZ 452 was launched in 1965 with a 75bhp 2.45 litre petrol engine that could run on fuel as low as 72 octane (basically spicy water), and it’s still in production today, with nine different variants available.
This one, the 3303 dropside pick-up truck, is affectionally know as the ‘tadpole’, because it looks rather like one, and has been recreated beautifully in brick form by ArtemyZotov of Eurobricks.
It also continues our run of B-Models, being constructed entirely from the 10290 Creator Pickup Truck set. Opening doors, dropping bed sides, and a load of fruit and veg all feature, and there’s more to see – including a link to building instructions – at the Eurobricks forum via the link above.
This is a Trabant 601 Combi, one of the great mobilisers of the people, and it comes from Eurobricks’ PsychoWard666 who has constructed it solely from the parts found within another historic people mover, the 10258 London Bus.
Both the Trabant and the AEC Routemaster bus are icons of their time and location, and – despite being rather different classes of vehicle – are more similar that you might think.
Each was designed to mobilise as many people as possible, and thus had a monopoly in its respective market, and both designs endured long beyond their intended lifespans, with the Trabant produced from 1960 right up until the fall of the Berlin Wall, whilst the Routemaster remained in service until 2005, outlasting far more modern bus designs.
Of course whilst this meant each became a symbol of the society they mobilised, they were also seen as polluting, noisy, uncomfortable, and dangerous by the end of their lives. And if you don’t think a Routemaster is dangerous you’ve never been on one at 2am. Although to be fair that applies to all of London’s buses.
Back to the model, and PsychoWard’s Trabant 601 captures the East German peoples’ car beautifully, particularly considering the parts limitation of the 10258 donor set. Building instructions are available too, so if you own the 10258 London Bus set and you’d like to turn one classic transportation icon into another you can find out how to do so at the Eurobricks forum – Click the link above to take a look.
A recent post here at TLCB was less than complimentary about the new Lamborghini ‘Countach’. We weren’t that complimentary about the original either, but – in its early form at least – the 1970s Gandini design was an absolute masterpiece.
Not so by the 1980s, when the Countach had become considerably fatter and more overblown, losing its striking lines and spectacular angles under a preposterously excessive bodykit. Which of course suited the decade it found itself in perfectly.
Cue previous bloggee Jerry Builds Bricks, who has recreated the ’80s Countach wonderfully in Speed Champions form, building his Lego version in ‘Wolf of Wall Street’ spec, which is about as ’80s as it gets.
Take some over-strength pills and crash it into everything on the way home via the link above!
The DeLorean-based time machine from the ‘Back to the Future’ movie franchise has been built so many times in Lego form it ironically feels like we’re in a time loop.
Still, there’s always time for another, particularly when it looks as good as this one.
Flickr’s Jerry Builds Bricks is the latest creator to have a crack at Doc Brown’s flying DMC-12, producing the rather excellent Lego version pictured here.
Take a look via the link above, or alternatively travel back in time to our post charting the remarkable story of the real car here, which features more cocaine than you might expect…
The definitive 1980s supercar, the Ferrari F40 has become – like most old vehicles – ludicrously expensive. Of course it was ludicrously expensive when new too, but fortunately we have a thoroughly more attainable version of Ferrari’s 40th birthday present to itself here today.
Built by previous bloggee paave, this excellent Technic F40 includes plenty of features found on the real car, including independent suspension, a working V8 engine, and pop-up headlights, plus Power Functions remote control drive and steering.
Modular construction and opening doors, front clamshell and rear engine cover allow all of the above to be easily accessed, and paave has produced building instructions so that you can create your very own remote control Technic Ferrari F40 at home.
There’s more to see at both Eurobricks and Bricksafe, and you can take a look and find the link to recreate paave’s F40 for yourself by clicking the hyperlinked words above.
Renualt’s humble 5 was a shopping-car favourite in the 1980s. And a joke by the 1990s. Now that most have been thrown away though, they are properly cool. Particularly in ‘Turbo’ flavour, from back when a whole model could simply be called ‘Turbo’ and nothing else, as it was clearly the most important bit.
Cue Darren Thew’s wonderful Renault 5 Turbo rally car, in tarmac ‘Tour de Corse’ specification, and sporting some fantastically accurate decals (which the Elves seem to really like too for some reason).
Blending Technic and System parts beautifully, Darren’s Renault 5 includes a detailed interior, complete with roll cage and harnesses, plus a highly accurate dashboard and controls, whilst under the opening hood is superb replica of the 5’s four-cylinder engine, including the famed forced-induction component that the whole car was named after.
The UMM Alter II is surely one of the most tragic looking off-roaders ever conceived. Designed in France, but then sold to Portugal presumably for being too ugly, the UMM was a pretty decent off-roader, and found a reasonable following around the Mediterranean with militaries, utility companies, and civilians.
Simple, easy to work on, and powered by common Peugeot engines, around 10,000 Alter IIs were produced in an eight year production run beginning in 1986, with many still in use today.
Most don’t look like this though.
Ricky.Silva’s Model Team UMM Alter II is in ‘v.Sport’ specification, and it looks a lot cooler than standard 4×4. Chunky wheels under working suspension, an external cage, roof lights, fender flairs, and snorkel all feature, plus the model features a detailed interior behind opening doors and a highly realistic engine under an opening hood.
Ricky’s UMM Alter II is presented beautifully too, and there’s lots more to see of the build at his ‘UMM Alter II v.Sport’ album on Flickr. Click the link above to take a closer look at the coolest UMM there is.
Military things, like cars, are often named after exciting or deadly animals. Unless they’re from the Soviet Union of course, in which case an array of numbers and letters was sufficient.
Cue the Sikorsky RH-53D ‘Sea Stallion’, so called because ‘Sea Horse’ was already taken by another Sikorsky aircraft, but mostly because ‘Stallion’ sounds far more masculine.
The RH-35D was operated by the U.S Navy Marines from 1975 until 1997, primarily for mine clearing and heavy lifting, and it’s been recreated in incredible detail in Lego form by previous bloggee [Maks].
At 1:40 scale, [Maks]’s Sea Stallion measures 80cm across, and took almost a year to complete, with his spectacular attention to detail further enhanced by some beautifully authentic decals.
There’s a whole lot more of the Sikorsky RH-35D to see at [Maks]’s ‘RH-53D Sea Stallion’ Flickr album, including imagery showing those enormous rotor blades cleverly folded, and you can take a look via the link above. Just don’t call it a horse.
