Tag Archives: T2

Daily Delivery

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We’re into the last week of BrickNerd and TLCB’s Festival of Mundanity competition. There have been over fifty entries so far, with two today bringing the hum-drum world of daily deliveries to the brick.

First up (above) is ABrickDreamer‘s Piaggio Ape, which might seem interesting to our American readers, but in rural Italy (or India) these scooter-based pick-up trucks are everywhere, hauling improbable loads with as little as 50cc.

In production since 1948, the latest Apes can be fitted with 200cc petrol or 400cc diesel engines (although 50cc versions are still on sale!), and continue to be a common sight performing the most mundane of tasks, usually with a wearing-looking moustachioed driver on board perpetually wishing he had an extra 200cc.

A common sight in much of the world too is today’s second contest entry, the Volkswagen Transporter. An no, it’s not a camper.

Still in use by the thousand in South America, most Volkswagen T2s are not cool campers, surf buses or hippy time machines, they’re just… vans. And outdated noisy ones at that.

This splendid brick-built Transporter is transporting eggs, and comes from PalBenglat, who has captured its unpretentious simplicity beautifully.

There’s more to see of Pal’s Volkswagen Transporter van and BrickDreamer’s Piaggio Ape at their respective photostreams via the links, and there’s still time to get your Festival of Mundanity entry in, and be in with a chance of winning an awesome BuWizz Pro bluetooth battery (which we’ll be reviewing here very soon) along with some other fantastic prizes!

LEGO Creator 10279 Volkswagen T2 Camper | Set Preview

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The crack team of Elven ‘volunteers’ fired over The LEGO Company’s HQ permitter wall tasked with uncovering this summer’s new sets had – we thought – all returned/been eaten by guard dogs, but no! Today one last bedraggled Elf returned home to TLCB Towers with a final new-for-2021 LEGO set, at it’s a great one…

This is the brand new Creator Expert 10279 Volkswagen T2 Camper Van, LEGO’s officially licensed successor to the wonderful 10220 Volkswagen T1 Camper Van that has been on sale for almost a decade (making it one of the longest serving LEGO sets ever).

Improving on the 10220 set is no mean feat – it achieved a full 10/10 review here at TLCB – and LEGO have certainly gone all-out, nearly doubling the parts count to a whopping 2,207 pieces.

Many of these are tiles too, as a new building technique deploys outward facing ‘SNOT’ to construct the bodywork in place of the original set’s traditional stacked bricks.

A fully detailed interior complete with a canvas pop-top, opening cabinets, a fridge, a stove (with all important tea pot), and a sink is included, whilst a brick-built surfboard (first seen on the 10252 Volkswagen Beetle set) along with two folding deck chairs ensure the T2 is suitably beachy.

Working steering, a sliding door, a brand new windscreen piece, and an opening engine cover add to the realism, whilst period-correct (and hippy default) ‘Peace’ and ‘Love’ decals ensure the model reflects the late ’60s – early ’70s era that still defines the T2 today.

Expect the new LEGO Creator Expert 10279 Volkswagen T2 Camper Van to cost around $180/£150 when it hits stores later this year, and LEGO’s successful Volkswagen Camper story to continue for some time yet. A T3 set in 10 years’ time? We wouldn’t bet against it!

Volkswagen Pride

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It’s Pride Month, which used to be Pride Week and before that Pride Day, but – like that girl in the office who drags her birthday out over three separate weekends – it seems to have become wildly and unnecessarily long. Because really there shouldn’t be the need for Pride anything at all.

However, the fact that when the Volkswagen Type 2 Transporter was launched the government of TLCB’s home nation determined which sexualities were acceptable and which were not, and in many other countries the government still decides which sexualities are acceptable and which are not, probably explains the continuing need for Pride and the fight for equal rights.

Cue 1saac W.‘s excellent Volkswagen T2, pictured here in both monochrome, and a rather more rainbowy paint scheme in support of Pride Day/Week/Month. Click the link above to see more, whether you’re monochrome, rainbow, or anything in between.

Green Space

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Volkswagen’s T1 ‘Transporter’ has been many things. Hippy camper, fire engine, pick-up, and covered van, the versatile VW has been used for all manner of tasks, however not – to our knowledge at least – as a medium duty dropside truck.

Thank the miserable 1200cc-1600cc air-cooled engine for that. Still, if you’re going to turn a T1 into a truck, you’re going to need to move the rear-mounted engine anyway, so upgrading it is going to be the least of your problems.

Flickr’s Tony Bovkoon has done just that though, with his lime green wooden drop-sided T1 hot rod truck, complete with a mid-mounted engine that is presumably somewhat beefier than the tiny flat four that originally hung out the back.

We’re not sure what to make of Tony’s VW T1 hot rod truck arrangement but you join us in pondering its existence at his Flickr album by clicking here.

#Van Life(Size)

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Lego Volkswagen T2 Transporter Life-Size

Once the preserve of smelly hippies, the Volkswagen Transporter Camper has unfortunately now become the default vehicle of insufferable YouTube/Instagrammers promoting #vanlife and #adventure (but mostly themselves), all whilst never being further than fifty feet from a Starbucks’ free WiFi.

Still, that’s not the Transporter’s fault, and today we’re successfully dodging all of the T2’s millennial baggage because, despite the real Volkswagen wheels, this incredible van has been built from 400,000 LEGO bricks by Certified LEGO Professionals Rene Hoffmeister and Pascal Lenhard in just 6 weeks!

Lego Volkswagen T2 Transporter Life-Size

Weighing over 1,500lbs/700kgs and measuring 16ft long Rene Hoffmeister and Pascal Lenhard’s creation is an exact 1:1 scale replica of Volkswagen’s iconic 1960/70s T2 Transporter Camper. There’s even a superbly replicated interior inside the working sliding door, complete with a kitchenette, a functional pop-up roof, and some groovy artwork on the walls. And with no insufferable YouTubers around there’s not an all-natural-vegan-organic-peace-crisp-packet in sight!

Rene and Pascal’s amazing life-size T2 Camper is on show now at the F.re.e Travel and Leisure Fair in Munich (alongside a few real ones), and if you fancy your own LEGO Volkswagen Camper (although a bit smaller) you can check out our review of the official LEGO 10220 Creator Expert Volkswagen Camper set here.

Life-Size LEGO Volkswagen T2 Camper

Lost the Plot

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Lego Volkswagen Camper Lost

Lost. The most cynical, the most money-grabbing, and very probably the worst series of nonsensical shite ever shown on television. Yes, even more so than ‘Keeping up with the Kardashians’.

Originally a fairly clever and intriguing J. J. Abrams idea, Lost ended up being painfully dragged over 121 episodes, by which point almost half the audience had stopped watching. And for some reason there was a Volkswagen T2 van. No we don’t know why either.

Nevertheless Flickr’s Ralph Savelsberg has decided to add the dilapidated T2 to his ever-increasing roster of TV vehicles, thoroughly undeserving though it is. It’s a lovely build though, complete with sliding doors, rusty panels, and a Lost character whom we neither know nor care about.

There’s more to see of Ralph’s Lost Volkswagen at his photostream – head back to the island via the link above, and you can watch an angry four-and-a-half minutes of Lost’s utterly pointless plot holes, abandoned storylines and shamefully obvious filler content by clicking here.

Anti-Hippy

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Lego VW T2 Pick-Up

Dour grey, hard working, utilitarian… not words you’d usually use to describe a 1960s Volkswagen Transporter. Bought as the default vehicle by trendy hippy types looking to be individual (which is gloriously ironic), the VW Type 2 is typically a vibrant and colourful affair used to ferry people to posh festivals.

However this Volkswagen T2 ‘Doka’ by Jonathan Elliott is the very antithesis of the classic Transporter’s normal role in modern Western society, and for that we absolutely love it.

There’s more to see of Jonathan’s 6-wide Volkswagen T2 pick-up at his photostream – click the link above to check it out.