Tag Archives: Off-Road

MAZing Through the Snow

We may not be the most professional, well connected, articulate, or competent Lego blog, but we sure do have the most tenuous Christmas titles!

Continuing the Christmassy nonsense is this, Danifill’s marvellous MAZ 5316 4×4 truck, complete with BuWizz power, Servo steering, remotely locking pneumatically-controlled differentials, live-axle suspension, a tilting cab, and working LED head and tail lights.

Danifill has taken his MAZ into the snow to show what it can do, and you can read more about the model and watch a video of it in action at the Eurobricks forum here.

Yule Logs

We’re back on track! With today’s other posts being a vehicle we vehemently hate and one with no tenuous Christmas link whatsoever, here’s one that ticks both boxes.

We love the classic ’70s Mercedes-Benz Unimog, and Lego recreations of it surely don’t come any better than this; proran’s beautiful Christmas-coloured Model Team U406 tipper, a creation five years in the making.

One image in particular caught our eye, in which proran has replicated a real-world U406 beside a log pile with wonderful attention to detail. We rarely publish images of real vehicles, but this is such a gorgeous composition we simply had too. Plus it makes the title work.

Alongside the stunning exterior, proran has faithfully recreated the Unimog U406’s mechanicals too, with solid-axle suspension, working steering via the wheel, four-wheel-drive linked to a 4-cylinder engine, a tipping bed, and front and rear PTOs selectable from within the cab.

A Power Functions motor can be applied to demonstrate the model’s functions, which you can watch via the excellent video at the end of this post, and an extensive gallery of imagery is available showing proran’s creation and the real-world U406 that inspired it via Bricksafe.

Click the link above to take a closer look, or here to visit the Eurobricks forum for full build details and to join the discussion.

YouTube Video

BRX(mas)

Desert travel before the steam or combustion engine was a slow and sometimes dangerous business. The wise men may have taken a very long time to reach the baby Jesus, with no thanks to meeting a megalomaniacal king on route.

Today desert crossing could even be considered easy, thanks to vehicles like this; the Prodrive BRX Hunter. A purpose built Dakar rally buggy, the BRX is designed specifically to cross the desert as quickly and easily as possible, thanks to carbon-fibre construction and a mid-mounted V6 engine.

Inspired by the BRX is Martin Vala’s ‘BX T1+’, a stunning desert-crossing buggy complete with gull-wing doors, a gold roll cage, and the best brick-built chassis we have ever seen.

Due to our Christmas break, The Brothers Brick beat us to posting this (it’s a Christmas miracle!), but the Elves are now back on their travels once again, so normal service should be resumed. And their search shouldn’t be delayed by any megalomaniacal kings.

There’s more to see of Martin’s incredible Prodrive BRX-inspired ‘BX T1+’ on Flickr by clicking here, and we’ll be back soon with more tenuous Lego-based links to Christmas!

Moggy Christmas

It’s only two more sleeps ’til Christmas! Which means as the Elves have returned to TLCB Towers they’ve been placed back into their cages for their enforced Christmas ‘break’. They don’t mind working over Christmas of course, but we’d rather be down the pub, er… we mean ‘working at the homeless shelter’, so they’re confinement is necessary if we aren’t to come back to the office to find all the glue sticks have been eaten.

Seriously though, Christmas is far more important than this dumpster fire of the internet, so this is the last creation to appear here before we pause for a few days. It’s a really good one though!

Built by previous bloggee Wigboldly/Thirdwigg, this brilliant Mercedes-Benz Unimog U430 is everything we like to see in a Technic creation. There’s working steering and suspension, all-wheel-drive, a 4-cylinder engine underneath a tilting cab, a tipping load bed, and front and rear power-take-offs with the option of pneumatic attachments.

All in it’s really not far off the much larger official Technic 8110 Mercedes-Benz Unimog set, so if you missed your chance to buy that when it was on sale, Thirdwigg’s U430 is an excellent alternative you can build at home. Yup, he’s even made instructions available too.

There’s more of Thirdwigg’s build to see at his ‘U430’ album on Flickr, and you can check out his equally good Technic Unimog U500 and Unimog U400 models that have appeared here previously via the bonus links.

Click the coloured words in the text above to make the jumps to all things Unimoggy.

My Other Car’s Also a Classic Truck

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.

I Feel the Need…

The sad state of cinema at the moment means that the only films that currently get made are sequels, prequels, re-boots, or all three, as part of some ‘cinematic universe’ bollocks (we’re looking at you Marvel).

Cue next year’s ‘Top Gun: Maverick’ release, an unnecessary sequel arriving some three decades after the (magnificent) ’80s original. Still, at least it provides the opportunity for a repeat homo-erotic beach volleyball scene to an astoundingly suggestive soundtrack.

More interesting to TLCB than yet another movie reboot is this Maverick; the Can-Am Maverick RS, a wild off-road buggy built to take on the Dakar Rally.

Well, this one hasn’t been built to take on the Dakar Rally, being rather smaller. And constructed from Lego. But it is still more interesting.

Martin Vala is the builder behind it, and he’s recreated the Can-Am Maverick RS in wonderful detail, right down to the steering and suspension, which are brick-built from System pieces.

Authentic decals and stunning presentation complete the build, and there’s lots more to see of Martin’s Maverick at his ‘Maverick RS’ album on Flickr. Click the link above to feel the need for speed.

What’s in a Name?

This is the Mitsubishi Pajero. Except in Spanish-speaking countries, where it’s definitely not.

Nor is it in TLCB’s home nation, where ‘Pajero’ isn’t an exceptionally rude word, but where ‘Shogun’ just sounds cooler.

Anyway, whatever it’s called, this Lego recreation of the ’90s Pajero/Shogun/Montero by regular bloggee SP_LINEUP is rather excellent, and there’s more of it to see at his photostream.

Click the link above to take a look. Unless you’re Spanish.

Want a Lift?

Lifted trucks, a favoured vehicle for a subset of the American populous that we mock regularly on these pages, are resolutely awful.

Even though the suspension is raised, the lowest point of the chassis (usually a differential) is unchanged, thus ground clearance remains exactly the same. Only now the handling, fuel economy, and refinement are worse.

The Lego Car Blog Elves of course, having very small brains indeed, absolutely love lifted trucks.

This one comes from JLiu15, and – despite it being much too slow to run any Elves over – the Elf that found it seems rather pleased.

Remote control all-wheel-drive, three-mode steering (front wheels, four wheels, and crab), a V6 piston engine, and – most notably – ludicrously lifted suspension all feature, and there’s lots more to see at the Eurobricks discussion forum. Click the link above to take a look.

Discotheque

Before unnecessary off-centre number plates and fake vents, the Land Rover Discovery looked like this. Which is infinitely better than the new one. Recreating the iconic ‘Disco 3’ is Jonathan Elliott, who has miniaturised it perfectly in Speed Champions form. Despite the Disco 3’s squareness, it’s actually not an easy thing to build well from LEGO, but Jonathan has nailed it. See more at the link.

Smushed

It’s been a while since the last Elven smushing event. This is partly because TLCB Elves are marginally wiser these days, after years of running one another over, but mostly it’s because they hadn’t found a suitable vehicle. They did today.

This Technic Baja truck comes from Teo LEGO Technic, and it was discovered by one of our Elves on Eurobricks.

Lightweight, with independent front and live axle rear suspension, return-to-centre steering, and – importantly – Buggy Motor propulsion with BuWizz power, Teo’s Baja truck is a fast, agile, and easily capable of bouncing over a moderate number of fleeing TLCB Elves.

Which is of course exactly what happened when the Elf that found it returned to TLCB Towers.

We now have to remember the optimum sequence of cleaning products for the removal Elf blood and vomit from the office carpet, so whilst we do that you can check out more of Teo’s truck at both the Eurobricks discussion forum and the extensive Brickshelf gallery. Click the links above to make the jump.

Bah Humbug!

Civilian Hummers are rubbish. Whether a lightly adapted military transport or a re-bodied Chevrolet Tahoe, they’re enjoyed principally by conspiracy-theorising, climate-change denying, ‘Freedom!’-shouting blancmanges. And TLCB Elves.

Hence why we have one here today, otherwise we’d have had an Elven riot to quash, and also – begrudgingly – it is absolutely brilliant.

Built by Michael217, this beautifully presented Hummer H1 features a Power Functions remote controlled 4×4 drivetrain and steering, all-wheel independent suspension, opening doors and hood, plus a highly detailed engine bay and interior, which is so realistic we half expected to see a gun rack and ‘MAGA’ flag.

An extensive gallery of images available to view at Michael’s ‘Hummer H1’ Bricksafe page, plus there’s more to see at the Eurobricks discussion forum. Grab your ‘MAGA’ flag and storm the Capitol via the links above!

Water on Mars

Mars. Our closest neighbour that isn’t orbiting us, and bleak desolate planet where water turns directly from a solid to a vapour, and back again.

Cue BobDeQuatre‘s ‘Dionysus’ armoured water tanker, a nuclear-powered transport, capable of carrying large quantities of water from remote extraction sites back to Mars Corporation outposts. Or something like that.

Bluetooth remote control via an SBrick and a rather snazzy paint-job caught our attention, and there’s more to see of Bob’s water-carrying martian on Flickr via the link.

My Other Jeep’s a Truck

LEGO’s 42129 Technic Mercedes-Benz Zetros set offers the chance to get a fully remote controlled ‘truck trial’-capable model off-the-shelf. And we like that.

What we like even more is taking the ready-to-go RC components and off-road hardware from the official set, and using them to create something entirely new. It’s what LEGO is all about.

Cue gyenesvi of Eurobricks, who has dismantled his 42129 Mercedes-Benz Zetros set, repurposing the pieces within it to create this; a splendid Jeep Wrangler Rubicon alternate.

LEGO of course already make an official Technic Jeep Wrangler Rubicon set, but it’s nowhere near as capable as this one. And nor does it look as good.

Gyenesvi’s 42129 B-model includes floating axle suspension front and rear, remote control drive and steering (operating via the Control+ app), a high/low range gearbox with selectable four-wheel-drive, opening doors, hood and trunk, and a detachable hardtop.

All in, it’s a far more convincing Technic Jeep than LEGO’s version, and if you own the 42129 Mercedes-Benz Zetros set you can create it for yourself, as building instructions are available.

Find out more via the link to Eurobricks above, plus you can watch gyenesvi’s 42129 alternate in action via the video below.

YouTube Video

Iraqi Attacky

Iraq. It seems to be known more as war than an actual country where people live, work, and study.

But it is a country, and a beautiful one at that, despite the seemingly endless shenanigans it continually endures, whether that’s at the hands of despotic dictators, western invaders, or the cancer within it.

Still, one bastion of Iraqi freedom lies in the north, where the Kurdish Pershmerga resisted Saddam Hussain, were instrumental in the (probably temporary) defeat of of Islamic State, and, for complicated reasons, are sworn enemies of Turkey.

For even more complicated reasons, despite their sacrifice, the Peshmerga have since been largely abandoned by the west, but they have at least been left with some cool hardware with which to defend their territory.

This neat Peshmerga-issue Humvee comes from Evan M of Flickr, who has equipped it with a variety of equipment, chief among which is an enormous TOW missile mounted on the roof, which could probably reduce most things to a smoking crater if required.

Head to Northern Iraq courtesy of Evan’s photostream via the link above. The bits the aren’t smoking craters really are lovely.

UMM Alter II | Picture Special

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.