You don’t need a million LEGO bricks to be blogged. Because clever parts usage and imaginative presentation can go a very a long way, as proven by Bobofrutx and this splendid little backhoe. Pictured on some gnarly pavement, Bobo’s backhoe can raise its bucket, extend and rotate its rear arm, and deploy its stabilisers just like the real thing, and you can head to a road in need of repair via the link above.
It’s a few weeks before Christmas
And all through LEGO’s HQ
TLCB Elves have been sneaking
Finding sets to preview.
Yes it’s that time of year once again, when a crack team of ‘volunteer’ Elves are thrown over the LEGO Company’s perimeter wall to uncover next year’s new Technic sets. This is the complete H1 2025 Technic line-up!
We kick off the 2025 Technic range with this, the new 42197 Backhoe Loader. A neat counterpart to last year’s 42163 Heavy-Duty Bulldozer, 42197 includes a raising front bucket via a worm gear and a roof mounted cog, a posable backhoe, and deployable stabilisers. Just 104 pieces are needed, it’s aimed at ages 7+, and it fulfils the starter-set brief beautifully.
Trebling the piece-count is the 42198 Bush Plane, a welcome and too-rare foray into fixed wing aircraft.
Aimed at ages 8+, 42198 includes a flat-4 piston engine linked to the propellor and powered – we think – by an intriguing push-beam mechanism that simultaneously operates working ailerons (flaps) that flip in opposing directions to make turns.
Besides the rather clunky-looking landing gear, 42198 looks like an excellent small-scale set, with zebra-stripe stickerage and some good parts too, including propellor blades, new white beams, and a surprising number of gears. We like.
After a short break away from Monster Jam for the Pull-Backs, LEGO is returning to the partnership for 2025. And that’s no bad thing, as these sets are really only designed for one purpose; being launched down a hallway and over a ramp made of books and a cereal box.
42199 Monster Jam DIGatron and 42200 Monster Jam ThunderROARus will no doubt perform said task admirably, and – outfitted with both stickers and teeth – they’re perfect for their 7+ target.
On to one of 2025’s most unusual Technic sets, the 413-piece 42201 Deep-Sea Research Submarine. Reminiscent of the largely forgotten 1997 Divers sub-theme, 42201 looks rather un-Technic-y, despite being constructed almost exclusively from Technic pieces. A selection of cogs operate the pitch of the propellors and the grab-arm, and you’ll be able to scoop up the remnants of the Ocean Gate Titan when 42201 dives into stores from January 2025.
Wait, haven’t we done this already? Almost.
The 42202 Ducati Panigale V4 S moves one letter down the alphabet from 2020’s 42107 Ducati Panigale V4 R, and in doing so ups the piece-count by a thousand, the target age by eight, and the price by $100.
Measuring over 40cm long, the new 1,600-piece Ducati will arrive with a foot-operated three-speed (plus neutral) gearbox, a V4 engine chain-linked to the rear wheel, functioning steering, and working suspension, plus some spectacular looking bodywork.
Joining LEGO’s previous 1:5 scale Technic motorcycles (the 42159 Yamaha MT-10 SP and 42130 BMW M 1000 RR), the new 42202 Ducati Panigale V4 S is expected to cost around £170/$200 when it arrives next year, and whilst it does look to somewhat repeat its smaller 42017 brother, there have been dozens of red Ferrari sets to date, so a second (and much larger) Ducati is fine by us.
We complete* the new 2025 Technic line-up with a neat mid-size truck of the type LEGO has built for decades. The new 462-piece 42203 Tipping Dump Truck features ‘HOG’ steering, and hand-cranked tipper, and, um… that’s it. Perhaps for £45 we’d have hoped for some basic oscillating suspension or something, but we’re in the minority. LEGO know it’s aesthetics that sell their products today, even Technic ones, and thus 42203 likely loses that extra feature in favour of decals and visual detail. And on those counts it scores rather well.
Aimed at ages 9+, the new 42203 Tipping Dump Truck will join the rest of the new Technic range in stores from early next year, with a few of the new sets (including this one) available to pre-order via the official LEGO website from now.
*Plus of course the 42204 Fast & Furious Toyota Supra Mk4, 42205 Chevrolet Corvette Stingray and 42206 Oracle Red Bull Racing RB20 F1 car sets already revealed here at The Lego Car Blog, and the enormous new LEGO Formula 1 line-up of which the latter is part.
We love alternative builds here at TLCB. They’re at the very core of what LEGO is all about, turning the pieces used to create one thing into another thing entirely.
Flickr’s Dyen’s Creations earns our admiration today, having flipped their 42122 Jeep Wrangler Rubicon into something altogether different, creating this excellent (and operational) Technic backhoe loader from only the parts found within the 42122 set.
There’s a working front arm complete with a tilting brick-built bucket, an unfurling rear arm, working stabilisers and functioning steering too.
We think we might like it even more than the set upon which it’s based, and if you agree you can take a look at Dyen’s ‘LEGO 42122 – Backhoe Loader’ album via the link above, plus you can check out all the other things that the 42122 Jeep Wrangler Rubicon set has become by clicking this bonus B-Model link!
LEGO’s 42081 Volvo Autonomous Loader set thoroughly perplexed us when it was revealed a few years ago. It still does really, but tungpham of Eurobricks saw greater potential in the Technic oddity than we did, turning his 42081 set into this fantastic backhoe loader.
Looking considerably better than the set on which it’s based, tungpham’s 42081 B-Model includes a raising and tilting front bucket, in-cab steering and rear arm skewing control, stabilising legs, and a rotating driver’s seat.
It also features some of the finest presentation we’ve ever seen on a LEGO model, mimicking LEGO’s own box, catalogue and digital imagery with superb photography and editing.
Building instructions are available and there’s more to see of tungpham’s incredible alternate at the Eurobricks forum – click the link above for a B-Side that’s better than the Single.
Large, potentially dangerous, and full of air. No, not the 2020 U.S Presidential Candidates, but this excellent Technic backhoe loader from Shimon Bogomolov. Unlike the aforementioned angry old men, Shimon’s impressive creation uses the air within it for constructive purposes, with a working pneumatic front bucket and rear excavating arm. Air pressure can be generated manually or via a motorised compressor, plus there are working pneumatic stabiliser legs, steering, all-wheel-drive, and a 4-cylinder piston engine too. A complete gallery of images is available to view at Shimon’s ‘Pneumatic Backhoe’ album on Flickr, plus you can join the discussion at the Eurobricks forum by clicking here.