Tag Archives: Classic Car

Check Mate

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New York had the coolest taxis. Built from the late ’50s until the early ’80s, the Checker A9-A12 was as synonymous with NYC as the Black Cab was with London. However with awful air quality both cities have since replaced their taxi fleets with standard passenger hybrids like the Toyota Prius, which are far less polluting, but far less soulful too. It makes us think that perhaps their could be a market for retro-fitting an EV powertrain to a classic cab – we’d be the first to hail a ride. Until then we’ll look wistfully at this beautiful classic Checker cab by regular bloggee Ralph Savelsberg, and try to forget what would be coming out of the tailpipe…

Lead Sled

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The Elves are happy today. Not only has one of their number found a shiny red hot rod, but there’s a scantily clad girl too. Cue Elven giggling. We have Master MOCer and previous bloggee Redfern1950s to thank for our sniggering workforce of mythical little turds, and his ’50s Mercury-based ‘lead sled’ built in his trademark style.

Smooth curves (the car, not the girl) and chrome embellishments (again…) complete the look, and there’s more to see of Red’s Lead Sled at his vehicle-packed photostream. Click the link above to head to Flickr for a closer look, but no giggling!

My Other Car’s a Fiat

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LEGO’s brilliant 10265 Ford Mustang set has been turned into all sorts of B-Models by the enterprising online community. So too has the equally marvellous 10271 Fiat 500 set, but this is the first time one set has been used to create the vehicle from the other!

This excellent 1960s Ford Mustang fastback comes from Flickr’s Gerald Cacas, and it’s been built only from the parts found within the 10271 Fiat 500 set. Like the official LEGO version Gerald’s model includes opening doors, trunk and hood, under which there’s the option of fitting a gloriously oversized hood-protruding engine. Combine that with it being both yellow and adorned with racing stripes and you have a car almost made for TLCB Elves.

There’s more of the creation to see of Gerald’s Ford Mustang 10271 Alternate Build album, where you can also enquire about building instructions should you wish to convert your own 10271 Fiat into Ford’s iconic ’60s pony car.

Now if only someone could build a Fiat 500 from the 10265 Ford Mustang set to complete the circularity…

Airborne Anglia

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Harry and Ron are heading back to school, thanks to Ron’s Dad’s 1960s Ford Anglia 105E and a sprinkling of magic. TLCB regular Jonathan Elliott has recreated the flying Ford beautifully and there’s more to see at his photostream. Head to Hogwarts via the link above.

Scorpion King

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Notable only for being Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson’s first lead role, the 2002 fantasy adventure ‘The Scorpion King’ is an appalling turd of a movie. A spin off from ‘The Mummy’ franchise, it took the shonkily CGI-ed character from the second Mummy instalment (itself only worth watching for Rachel Weisz) and dragged it out over ninety stupefying minutes.

However some scorpion spin-offs are worth a look, and the car in this post is one of them.

The Autobianchi A112 was created through collaboration by Fiat, tyre-maker Pirelli, and bicycle manufacturer Bianchi, launching in 1969 and being – as most Italian cars of the time were – rather excellent.

Over a million Autobianchi A112s were produced before the brand was eventually merged into Lancia, with the design also forming the basis of the rather good Fiat 127, the less good Seat 127, the pretty bad Polski-Fiat 127, and the miserable Yugo 45.

Of course being effectively a Fiat, Italian tuners Abarth got their hands on the A112 too, and uprated the tiny 900cc engine to 1,050cc, taking power from around 45bhp to a mighty 70 in the process.

Today’s post is an A112 in Abarth flavour, as built by previous bloggee Zeta Racing in full ‘Technic Supercar’ specification. Capturing the look of the real car brilliantly, Zeta has engineered his Lego replica with a working engine, gearbox, steering, and suspension, along with opening doors, hood, and hatchback. Zeta’s model also includes fully remotely controlled Power Functions drivetrain, with motors powering both the front-wheel-drive and steering, the gearbox, and equipping the car with working brakes.

It’s a fantastic build, presented beautifully, and enhanced with few choice decals (including the famous Abarth scorpion), and there’s much more of Zeta’s Autobianchi A112 Abarth to see at his photostream. Click the link above to check out one Scorpion King worth viewing.

Lancia Delta HF Integrale – Picture Special

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The most remarkable Italian car manufacturer is not Ferrari. Lancia’s story is one of incredible technical innovation, fantastic racing cars, an appalling corrosion scandal, and now – effectively – their death at the hands of a parent company that really should try harder.

However even during Lancia’s painful decline they still produced the best cars in the world. This is one of them, the amazing Delta HF Integrale.

Based on Lancia’s 1980 ‘European Car of the Year’-winning family hatchback, the HF Integrale added turbocharging and all-wheel-drive, and in doing so became the most successful rally car in history. By the time it was retired the HF Integrale had won six consecutive Constructors World Championships (a record that is still unbeaten), fuelling the sales of over forty thousand road-going versions.

These two incredible recreations of the HF Integrale are the work of newcomer Zeta Racing, and they are – without doubt – some of the best Technic Supercars that we have ever published.

Each is spectacularly detailed both inside and out, merging both Technic and System parts to create an almost unbelievable level of realism. Stunning period-correct decals add to the authenticity, yet the exteriors – astonishing though they are – aren’t the most impressive aspect of Zeta Racing’s builds. For that you need to look underneath…

Hidden within each build is some of the most brilliant Technic engineering we’ve seen, with both Deltas qualifying for ‘Technic Supercar’ status, with working steering, gearboxes, highly detailed transversely-mounted inline 4-cylinder engines, and working suspension. But the functionally does not stop there.

Each model is also fully remote controlled thanks to LEGO Power Functions motors, operating the drive, steering, gears, and – if we’ve interpreted the images correctly – equipping Zeta’s creations with working brakes too.

It seems that in Zeta Racing we may have found our favourite new builder of 2020, and if you agree you can take a look at both his white and black Lancia Delta HF Integrales via the links, where you can also add yourself to his current ‘follower’ count of one (which is only us at present).

Zeta Racing has also uploaded several other astonishing Technic Supercars alongside these two incredible HF Integales, mostly of the Italian hatchback variety, which we’ll be publishing here over the coming days. Check back here for more soon, including some you may never have heard of…

Wet Nellie

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The second most famous Bond Car of all time is actually the best. Discuss. This is ‘Wet Nellie’, the Lotus Esprit S1 from 1977’s ‘The Spy Who Loved Me’, that ‘transformed’ – by the push of a button – into a submarine. And nothing in the world is cooler than that.

Suggested by a reader, this is Paul Nicholson‘s fantastic recreation of the aquatic sports car, and not only does it look absolutely spot-on, it transforms too, with the wheels tucking in to reveal submarining fins, and the rear fins and propellers also folding out from within. Of course it wouldn’t be a classic Bond Car without some evasive weaponry too, and Paul’s Esprit duly replicates the front missile launcher, mine layer, and the rear missiles (that really fire) used by Roger Moore to escape Karl Stromberg’s henchmen.

It all adds up to something that would make a superb official LEGO set, and whilst LEGO don’t have a Lotus license, they do have a 007 one, with Paul’s model constructed in a matching scale to the 10262 Aston Martin DB5 ‘Goldfinger’ set. Plus how cool would it be to add Lotus to LEGO’s ever growing list of vehicle manufacturer partners?

There’s much more to see of Paul’s incredible creation at his Flickr photostream, where you can ask him to add it to LEGO Ideas where it would surely get 10,000 votes so we can all buy it one day. For what it’s worth TLCB would be at the front of the queue. Get wet via the link above.

Scuderia Stirling

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What? A green Ferrari? Despite TLCB competition winner James Tillson’s previous form, this magnificent Technic Ferrari 250 GTO isn’t built in a  colour that would make the Tifosi throw things at their screens. Because Ferrari really did make a green one, and only one, for the late racing legend Sir Stirling Moss. Which makes it probably the coolest 250 GTO of them all.

Featuring an accurately replicated V12 engine linked to a five-speed gearbox, working steering and suspension, plus opening doors, hood and trunk, James’ Technic 250 GTO is a truly beautiful thing, and – unlike the real car – you don’t have to be Sir Stirling Moss to get your hands on one, as James has made building instructions available.

There’s more to see of this stunning creation at James’s photostream and on Eurobricks, where you can watch a video demonstrating the model’s features and find a link to the instructions so that you can build it for yourself.

Silver Snail

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Small cars are different depending on where you live. Today’s other small car, a revolution in gas-guzzling America, had an engine more than three times the size of France’s equivalent.

France was in a rather different place after the Second World War though. Well, it was in the same place as it is now, but economically and infrastructurally it couldn’t have been more different from America, thanks to seeing the worst of the conflict.

The country therefore needed a small, cheap, reliable car that used the minimum of materials and ‘could cross a ploughed field’, or – we suspect more relevantly – a road network blown to bits by years of war.

With a two-cylinder engine around half a litre or less, easy maintenance, and minimal material costs, Citroen produced nearly 4 million 2CVs over a forty year production run, and – effectively – remobilised France.

This brilliant Town-scale replica of the ‘tin snail’ captures the iconic peoples’ car superbly, and it comes form previous bloggee Jonathan Elliott of Flickr. A myriad of curved plates has been deployed to capture a shape that was easy to make in metal, but fiendishly difficult to create in bricks, and bar the inappropriate tyres (get yourself some ’80s Town tyres Jonathan!) the result is about as good as it’s possible to get at this scale.

There’s more to see of Jonathan’s Citroen 2CV on Flickr, where this build and a host of other brilliant Town vehicles can be found. Click the link above to make the jump.

Metropolitan Revolution

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Cities can be wonderfully diverse places, where different cultures, races, and even languages mix together to create a greater whole. The automotive industry is rather similar, although these days certain quarters see this as some kind of evil globalisation, rather than countries making what they’re best at to, again, create a greater whole.

However back in the 1950s sharing production between countries wasn’t really a thing yet, until Nash came along with their design for a new sort of car (in the U.S. at least), railing against ‘bigger is better’ by making something… smaller. Their revolutionary mindset continued to production, which wouldn’t have been profitable in the U.S.

Instead Nash turned to Austin/Rover in England, who were selected to produce the car on behalf of Nash and fitted it with their own B-Series engine. The car became the ‘Metropolitan’ upon it’s return to the U.S where, in yet more revolutionary thinking, it became the first post-war American car marketed specifically to women.

The Nash Metropolitan received mixed reviews from an American motoring press rather unwilling to try anything that wasn’t sixteen feet long, but these proved to be rather different when people bought the Metropolitan and actually used it, whereupon it surpassed expectations.

It wouldn’t be until the oil crisis of the 1970s that America really took small cars seriously though, and marketing to women was probably further behind that even, yet Nash and Austin’s collaboration had proved the concept some two decades earlier.

Fast forward to today and we seem to be in some sort of ‘Tenet’ style inversion, as ’50s style ‘bigger is better’ and ‘not foreign’ are climbing America’s agenda once again. We’ll stick with the little ’50s Nash Metropolitan though, a revolution ahead, and now perhaps behind, the times…

Oh yeah, Lego… This beautiful little 4-wide recreation of the Metropolitan comes from previous bloggee 1saac W., and there’s more to see at his photostream. Click the link to join the revolution.

Waterloo Station. And Make it Quick!

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Black Cabs are absolutely not fast. They are filthy smog spreading abominations though, and fortunately London has had enough and decreed only EVs and PHEVs now qualify to become Black Cabs. Fortunately the newly-renamed London Electric Vehicle Company, now owned by Geely (Volvo’s deep-pocketed owners), have built a new black cab fit for the 21st century, and it’s a delight. Plus it’s not poisoning us all like the last Black Cabs were, with a 1.5 litre Volvo petrol engine never driving the wheels, instead providing a range extension to the EV batteries.

Whilst we won’t mourn the loss of the soot-spewing old taxis, TLCB favourite and Master MOCer Redfern 1950s seems to, having created this ‘V8 Drag Car’ that to us looks a lot like an old Hackney Carriage (the technical term for London’s cabs) with an enormous V8 shoved in it.

It sure wouldn’t meet London’s new licensed-hire emissions rules, but we bet it’d get us across London a heck of lot faster. Actually that’s not true, crossing London is about as quick on a push-bike as it is in a Porsche, but it would be more fun! There’s more to see of of Red’s ‘V8 Drag Car’ (aka ‘Hackney Rod’, as named by us just now) at his photostream, plus you can learn how he creates brilliant models like this one at his Master MOCers interview via the link in the text above.

The Boss

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The muscle car market has gone mad in recent years. Upwards of 700bhp is now available from stock, and whilst many modern muscles cars have now added revolutionary new technologies such as ‘steering’ and ‘suspension’, we suspect actually using all that power is a difficult thing to do. Resulting in happenings like this. And this. And this. And this.

Things were little different back in the late ’60s, when the first power race between muscle car makers began. This was one of Ford’s efforts from the time; the Mustang Boss 429. The ‘429’ moniker stood for the V8 engine’s cubic inch capacity, which translates to seven litres. Seven. Most European cars at the time made do with just over one.

Of course the Boss’s steering, braking and suspension were – in true muscle car tradition – woefully inadequate, meaning that morons-with-daddy’s-money in 1969 could plow their new car into a street light in much the same way as they do today, only without the event being captured on YouTube.

Today though, we’re joining the muscle car crashing fraternity too, thanks to Hogwartus, and this superb SBrick-powered remote control Technic Boss 429.

Driven by two L Motors, with a Medium Motor turning the steering and another controlling the four-speed sequential gearbox, Hogwartus’s creation is a riot to drive. That is until we spun it into a kitchen cabinet. We’ll blame the Mustang-accurate torsion bar rear suspension for that faux-par. The front suspension is independent though, and the model also includes opening and locking doors, hood and trunk, a replica 7-litre V8 engine (that turns via the drive motors), sliding seats, and LED headlights.

There’s more to see of Hogwartus’s stunning Technic ’69 Mustang Boss 429 at the Eurobricks forum by clicking here, plus via the truly excellent video below, which must be one of the few Mustang videos on YouTube that don’t end like this.

YouTube Video

Lime Horse

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Painting a Ferrari in Lamborghini green will probably get you a ‘Cease and Desist‘ letter from Ferrari’s over-zealous legal department, but seeing as this one is constructed from left over bits of Lamborghini, it makes sense. Flickr’s James Tillson is the builder behind this lime green Ferrari Dino 246, and he has form, winning TLCB’s Lock-Down B-Model Competition with his previous Lamborghini-to-Ferrari conversion. His Ferrari Dino features the usual Technic Supercar functions and there’s more of the build to see at his photostream – click here to take a look before Ferrari write him an angry letter.

A Sight to Behold(en)

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This is a Holden Torana A9X, Australia’s late-’70s muscle car and dominator of the Touring Car Championship. The ‘A9X’ option added the race V8 motor usually reserved for the sedan to the hatchback body style, with just 100 units produced in this combination. Now worth around $500k AUS, the Torana A9X is a ridiculously sought-after car, but fortunately we have one today that’s far more attainable.

Built by TLCB Master MOCer Lachlan Cameron (aka Lox Lego) as commissioned model, this stunning Technic recreation of the Torana A9X captures the real ’70s muscle car in spectacular fashion, with a full remote control drivetrain and BuWizz bluetooth brick, LED lights, accurate live axle rear and torsion beam front suspension, custom chrome pieces, opening doors, hood and trunk, and – of course – a replica of the A9X’s famous five-litre V8 engine.

It’s one of our favourite cars of the year so far and there’s plenty more to see of Lachlan’s incredible creation his ‘Holden Torana A9X’ album on Flickr and the Eurobricks discussion forum. Click the links above to set the lap record at Bathurst in 1979.

Soviet Station Wagon

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The Soviets may have hated America, but they sure liked its cars. This is the GAZ-24, specifically the 2402 station wagon produced from 1971 all the way up until the mid ’80s, despite looking like something straight out of America in 1963.

Powered by either a 2.5 litre four cylinder or an American-aping 5.5 litre V8, the GAZ-24 was famed for its toughness, and whilst limited numbers were exported, it wasn’t really available to the common Russian man, being reserved only for those with a special permit that allowed its purchase. Because Communism.

Matthew Terentev has got himself a 2402 though, by building this most excellent Technic recreation, complete with accurate leaf-spring rear and independent front suspension, a working inline 4-cylinder engine under the opening hood, ‘Hand of God’ steering and a working steering wheel, plus opening doors and tailgate.

There’s lots more to see of Matthew’s superb Soviet station wagon at his photostream on Flickr – grab your special permit, click the link, and pretend you’re a 1980s Russian pretending they’re a 1960s American.