Tag Archives: Technic

The Peoples’ Choice

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Lego 41999 Alternative B Model

Technic Man is our kind of builder; his MOCpage is full of properly engineered Technic vehicles. His latest prompted several of you to contact us via The Lego Car Blog Feedback page to ask if it could be featured here, so here it is!

This MAN TGX truck is a good model in its own right, but is even more impressive when you discover it’s built solely from the parts of LEGO’s 2013 41999 Rock Crawler. And for that, we like Technic Man even more, as many of LEGO’s 41999 sets will stay unopened in the basements of speculators and collectors, never to see the light of day or feel the hands they were designed for.

You can read our review of 41999 here, and if you own one, take a leaf out of Technic Man’s book, and have some fun with it!

Telehandler

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Technic TelehandlerThis good old-fashioned Technic telehandler was discovered by the Elves on Flickr. Bobofrutx has included 4-wheel steering and of course a telescopic bucket arm for all that telehandling. See more at the link. Just don’t let the Elves follow you – we’re not rescuing any more from the bucket.

Bags of Fun

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Lego Technic LamborghiniThis Lamborghini SV by Brickshelf’s Spiderbrick features all the usual Technic goodies (suspension, all-wheel-drive etc.), but it also features something we’ve never seen before; working airbags. Yes, this car really will deploy both driver and passenger airbags in the event of a frontal collision. Controlled by a Mindstorms NXT and pneumatic system, we’re not sure whether the ‘bags inflate suddenly via stored pressure, or whether the driver will knock themselves out on the steering wheel and awake to find a gradually inflating balloon pressing against their gentleman’s area, but either way it’s one of the most innovative ideas we’ve seen in Lego form. Check out the system and the vehicle it’s fitted to at the link above.

FREE Supercar Instructions!

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Crowkillers Instructions Free

Designing and sharing creations is what the Lego Community is all about. ‘MOCing’ as it’s known is what makes LEGO the world’s best toy. There’s no trick to it; put a pile a bricks in front of a 3 year old (or a Lego Car Blog Elf) and they will instinctively and intuitively begin to build, although staff here don’t blog their own MOCs, as then you’d know who we are!

Besides MOCing however, many members of the Lego Community would love to build and own some of the amazing creations that have been designed by builders who don’t work for The Lego Group. Creations such as Crowkillers‘ Lamborghini Gallardo above and this incredible remote control Tow Truck by Dirk Klijn shown below.

Lego Tow Truck

Well now you can!

Dirk has made instructions for his spectacular creation available through crowkillers.com, where it’s joined by another 9 amazing models by Paul Boratko (aka Crowkillers), Nathanel Kuipers and Jennifer Clark. Pricing ranges from free to $15 and instructions come in the form of a PDF download.

Click here to see the full range of model instructions currently available.

Paul ‘Crowkillers’ Boratko has also very kindly accepted a visit by our Elves, who thrust a Master MOCers voice recorder under his nose.

Read Crowkillers’s story in the fourth instalment of TLCB’s Master MOCers series here.

Crowkillers.com

True Blue

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Lego Ecurie Ecosse Transporter
Today’s post is by Nils O, who makes his second appearance as a guest blogger (thank you Nils for both your suggested creation and for your writing talent). If you’re reading this and think you’d like to have a go too, contact us, TLCB is one of the most accessible Lego blogs around.

This is the latest addition to the big common project “Classic Race Teams” founded two years ago by Ape Fight on MOCpages. Nick Barrett started his LEGO version of the “Ecurie Ecosse” team in November 2011 with the fanstastic 1959 Commer team transporter and added a matching Jaguar D Type one year later.

Now he’s completed the team with a second Jaguar D Type, four team members and a lot of equipment. The stars of the team are, of course, the cars and the transporter. The Jaguars are packed with all the Technic functions you need: Engine, transmission, suspension and steering, whilst the transporter has a powered main ramp, a working engine, steering with two different HOG mechanisms and a complete interior.

Check out the completed team on MOCpages and don’t forget to look at the details of the transporter and the Jag too.

Nick will be exhibiting his complete team at the 2013 Great Western Lego Show (GWLS) at STEAM in Swindon, UK on the 5th and 6th of October. Type ‘Great Western Lego Show’ into your search engine to find out more and book tickets. If you’re really (un)lucky you may even see a TLCB Elf…
Lego Ecurie Ecosse Jaguar

Liebherr LTM

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Lego Mobile CraneLEGO’s Technic mobile cranes have always been firm favourites with builders (read TLCB’s reviews of the official sets here), but are less common as MOCs. When done well though, crane MOCs can be more than a match for LEGO’s own efforts. Today’s comes from TLCB veteran mbmc137 on Brickshelf. His Liebherr LTM 1090 features a huge array of remote control functions including drive, steering, boom raising/lowering, rotation and extension, winch and outriggers. Even LEGO’s own sets don’t fit all that in! See more at the link above or join in the discussion on Eurobricks.

Giant Panda

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Lego Fiat Panda 4x4Our American readers may laugh at Fiat’s tiny off-roader, but mock at your peril; the original Panda 4×4 will beat a Hummer off-road on a typical snowy European farm-track. Piterx’s Technic version of the little Fiat is remotely controlled and includes all-wheel-drive. See it in action at his blog, or join in the discussion on Eurobricks.

Don’t Show Me The Money

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Lego Technic 41999 Review

The story so far…

The LEGO Company make the 9398 Technic remote control Crawler. It works well and looks awful. LEGO launch a competition to design a prettier body. Said contest is won by a talented Russian gentleman called Egor Karshiev, whose ‘Boss Crawler’ design gets the nod. LEGO announce they will only make 20,000 of these sets, with many unique elements and extra features, and sell them for the same price as the standard 9398…

Cue the most ridiculous speculator-driven feeding frenzy since Beanie Babies tanked…

As I write, just one month after 41999 was released, these change hands, sealed, on eBay for around £350; or nearly three times RRP. Many are being bought by the same UK-based buyer (not me!) in the hope they’ll keep climbing.

I’ve just got the one, bought from LEGO for a very reasonable price, for the purpose of building it, displaying it, even *gasp* playing with it… I’m willing to bet that more than half of these plastic building toys will remain forever sealed in their boxes in the hands of collectors or, worse, speculators; unbuilt and unloved. A shame, because it’s a really good set, and here’s why:

Lego Technic 41999 4x4 Crawler

The box is pretty special. A simple, elegant design on the front showing a close-up of the distinctive dark blue panels that so lift this model; it’s made of sterner stuff than usual, too. Inside this treasure chest it’s fairly tightly packed with lots of good stuff; enough for a few hours of leisurely, pleasurable building.

There are four instruction books which are easy to follow, as we’ve come to expect, and there are no mistakes. The build is relatively straightforward, but there’s no shortage of cool features: Continue reading →

Hors Route

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Lego Technic Power Functions BuggyNo, not a roadtrip by Snoop Dogg, but Google’s (incorrect) French for ‘Off Road’. This awesome Power Functions controlled Technic buggy is the work of Charbel, who has his own website showing how it’s built and with videos of it in action. His site is in French though, so if your grasp of the language is a bit merde you can check it out in English via the Eurobricks forum.

Here Be Monsters

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Lego Monster TruckPaul Boratko (aka Crowkillers) is one of our favourite builders here at The Lego Car Blog. His models look and function brilliantly, but it’s they way they’re built which sets them apart; they’re as easy to build as a LEGO set. His latest, entitled ‘Some kind of monster’ is another beautifully engineered modular build, and one that can be easily modified with Power Functions motors. See the gallery and be inspired on MOCpages.

Bertone

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Lego Scania TruckThe Italian designer Bertone penned all manner of beautiful exotic cars (and the Vauxhall Astra Convertible), so it was a moment of brilliance by Scandinavian truck maker Scania to employ the company to design their new truck in 1996. An instant success, European truck drivers split into two camps; those that drove a Scania and those that wanted to. Sadly Bertone himself died just a year later and the Bertone company was absorbed into the FIAT group. Norton74 pays tribute the design great with his superbly recreated Scania 164G trucks. See more of his creations on either Flickr or MOCpages.

Motorway Maintenance

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Lego Scania TruckWe’re kicking off the week here at TLCB with some big creations. First up is this colossal Scania R124G complete with low-lowder trailer and excavator. Built by Dennis Bosman aka ‘legotrucks’ you can see more of the rig here. Next is one of the more unusual vehicles that we’ve featured, but without which all the others here would have nowhere to drive. They’re a pair of grader/scrapers, used for removing old tarmac before new is laid. Suggested to us via the Feedback and Submission Suggestions page they’ve been built by bricklington on Brickshelf, and you can see the full gallery via the link above.

Lego Grader

50% Extra Free!

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Lego Mercedes-Benz G-Class 6x6There’s more to this Mercedes-Benz G-Wagon by Tim Inman than meets the eye. 50% more in fact. See why on Flickr.

“My Mother Warned Me About Getting Into Cars With Strange Men”…

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Lego Batman Batwing Dark Knight Rises…”This isn’t a car”. We continue our run of movie vehicles with this; the superb ‘Bat’ from The Dark Knight Rises, built by LEGO genius Sariel on MOCpages.

Powered by LEGO’s Power Functions motors and LED lights it’s probably the coolest creation we’ve featured this month. It’s not the first Bat Wing built from little plastic bricks though as that accolade goes to the equally brilliant Mahjqa. Both builders have devised ways for their creations to ‘fly’, but they take rather different approaches. See how Sariel achieved it in his video via the first link, and watch Mahjqa’s film in the second. Neither fixed the autopilot though.

Lego Bat Dark Knight

8479 Technic Barcode Truck Review

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Lego 8479It’s a Review day here at The Lego Car Blog, and with much of LEGO’s latest product line-up covered we’re going to take a journey back to 1997, and to one of LEGO’s forgotten gems; the 8479 Technic Barcode Truck.

LEGO had successfully produced programable robotic models as far back as 1990 with the marvellous Control Centre and its mark II follow-up in 1995. Both sets allowed children to control a Technic model via a joypad and to program a series of functions into the system so that movements could be repeated. The only drawback was that the ‘brain’ control brick was a large black box that remained external to the models under its control.

For 1997 LEGO designed its first robot where the control brick and memory were integrated into the model itself, allowed by the continuing compacting of computer storage technology. Called the ‘Code Pilot’ it’s a neat handheld battery pack containing the model’s power source, memory, control buttons, and – rather inventively – a barcode scanner, just like you’ll find by the till in any shop. In short, this is LEGO Mindstorms’ genesis. Continue reading →