Review: 40094 Snowplough (w) -- January 2014 Monthly Mini Build

[ResIpsaLoquitur]

It's that time again! The first Tuesday of the month means that the Lego Brick-and-Mortar Stores have put out their Monthly Mini Builds for the kids. The Stores do these once a month (at least) to get you into the store and spending money. However, you do walk out with some free bricks and a possibly functional model.

I recently reviewed all of 2013's MMB's in this article. If you're sad because you don't have a Lego Store near you, that's ok, because Lego publishes the instructions for each month's builds on their website. Uh, except for this month. They seem to have a glitch as of this writing, as they have instructions for January 2013's MMB, not 2014's. Oops. Well, if you read through this review, you'll know what to build without Lego's help.

Set Title: Snowplough

Set #: 40094-1

Theme: Monthly Mini Build

Pieces: 43

Minifigures: None

Year of Release: 2014

Price at release: Free! FREE!

So this month is a snowplough. That's what Bricklink is calling it, anyway. Here in the States, we tend to call them "snowplows," as we like a "w" more than a "gh." Either way, it's a truck with a shovel in the front. First things first, my daughter and I got in line at the store and received this card:

That's your ticket into the store to attend the build. Stores only give out 150 of these, so get in line early if you want to play. My local store wasn't too packed today (probably because it was absurdly cold, and nobody wanted to go out), but I've seen at least one other store with a very long line. Plan accordingly.

Here you get a single two-sided sheet of instructions. Sometimes, they've just had the instructions tacked to the wall, but lately they've been letting the kids take the instructions home. I appreciate this, as I'm not sure we could recreate some of these builds from memory.

Parts inventory, with three spares (an orange and red 1 x 1 plate, and a trans-yellow cheese). So this is 43 pieces, plus the three spares. It's a nice selection with some parts I haven't seen too often, like the yellow wheel wells and the 2 x 4 SNOT piece. One thing I enjoy about the builds is when you get some "symmetry": more than one of a single piece, so the build looks the same on both sides. I like that here, we'll have a consistently-shaped object with the same wheel well in the front and back.

Here's the initial chassis of the truck. All this is built on top of the 2 x 8 light bley plate. This was probably the trickiest part of the build for my daughter, as there's two 2 x 3 yellow bricks between the wheel wells sitting astride the 2 x 8 plate. They easily popped off as she was trying to get it together. Definitely build this part on a flat surface.

Here's the first part of how the "plow/plough" will attach: two hinge bricks on the SNOT plate under the headlights. I love how functional this will be with a clever use of SNOT pieces.

Ahhh...here, the truck is definitely coming together. Note that the yellow angled plates come over the SNOT plate. Both my daughter and I made the mistake of putting them against the dark bley plates, which isn't correct. You need to leave a 1 x 4 space so the last 1 x 4 yellow plate can go back there.

Sorry, this picture turned out fuzzy for some reason. I did want to give you a good look at the truck, pre-plow attachment, for one specific reason....

Here comes the plow! It's a simple combination of two hinge plates with a 1 x 4 plate and an edged tile. I think a 1 x 4 flat tile would have worked better than a plate, but maybe you could attach white bricks to the plate to show "snow" being moved by the truck.

Ta-da! The finished product is a very cute little truck. The only weird thing is that because of how the plow/ough attaches, the headlights are now covered. In real life, the driver isn't going to be able to see where he's going. Snowplows often operate at night and in the dark, so this isn't the safest way to do it. Well, drive safely.

I put it next to last year's Toys R' Us Police Car (which I reviewed here) for comparative purposes. They look great together. I don't know why Lego doesn't do more small-sized cars for the kids, particularly since 4-wide vehicles are out and six-wide vehicles are all the rage for minifigures. They still seem to be using the molds for 4-wide models, and I think smaller, non-minifig scale cars would be a hit with the kids. I'm tempted to build some more to go with these two.

CONCLUSION

Design: 9/10. This thing looks exactly like it should. The only thing I don't like is how the yellow angled plates go slightly under the trans-slopes that make up the windows.

Parts: 9/10. A great selection of pieces where a lot of clever builds make this into an accurate mini-model.

Build: 7/10; it's an easy build, but my daughter struggled with it some.

Minifigs: N/A. I downgraded the TRU Police Car specifically because it was advertised as a "City" vehicle but couldn't hold a minifig. This vehicle makes no pretentions about what it is, so I won't downgrade it.

Playability: 10/10. It's a moveable toy, and the plow is actually functional. Dump a bunch of white bricks on the floor and let your kids get to moving them.

Price: 10/10. It was free!

Overall: 45/50. That's about 90% of perfection, folks.

Unfortunately, we don't yet know what the rest of this year's MMB lineup will be. Next month will be...oh yes...a Micro Manager from The Lego Movie, and it looks to be in-scale with the main toy line. The rest of the year is still unknown. They tend to be seasonal, so expect some spring themes for March-May, summer themes for June-August, and holiday themes for October, November, and December. Still, this model is a GREAT start to the year! As I always say, if you can get out to the store for these, they're awesome.

Edited January 8, 2014 by ResIpsaLoquitur

[jodawill]

I love that police car. It looks like it's straight from a 1980s City set.

[robt]

Great review, ResIpsaLoquitur.

Is there any complete list of all monthly mini-builds released since 2009?

Thanks.

EDIT: Nevermind. Just found it at http://lego.wikia.com/wiki/Monthly_Mini_Model_Build

I don't know why Lego doesn't do more small-sized cars for the kids, particularly since 4-wide vehicles are out and six-wide vehicles are all the rage for minifigures. They still seem to be using the molds for 4-wide models, and I think smaller, non-minifig scale cars would be a hit with the kids.

You can find a lot of 4-wide vehicles in Creator 3-in-1 canisters and bags.

http://www.brickset.com/search/advanced/run/?q=1188

I collected all of them and are perfect for playing with my 3 years old son.

Edited January 8, 2014 by robt

[cmg]

I'm also working to keep a page up-to-date with all of these builds - and am adding the free builds done at other stores over the years (not quite complete on this part yet). I have links to instructions, and part counts, along with notes of interest. See:

http://monthlyminimodelbuild.weebly.com

I hope someone finds this helpful.

[rollermonkey]

I love that police car. It looks like it's straight from a 1980s City set.

Tell me about it. Really shows how far the sets have come!

[meyerc13]

The only weird thing is that because of how the plow/ough attaches, the headlights are now covered. In real life, the driver isn't going to be able to see where he's going. Snowplows often operate at night and in the dark, so this isn't the safest way to do it.

This isn't that unusual, in most cases the plow covers the truck's headlights, but generally they mount a light kit onto the brackets that hold the plow to the truck. This model is missing that, but there is only so much you can do in this scale without sacrificing stability.

Thanks for posting this, though! I live 100 miles from the closest store, so it doesn't really work for my kids to attend these events except in summer.

Edited January 9, 2014 by meyerc13

[ResIpsaLoquitur]

This isn't that unusual, in most cases the plow covers the truck's headlights, but generally they mount a light kit onto the brackets that hold the plow to the truck. This model is missing that, but there is only so much you can do in this scale without sacrificing stability.

Thanks for posting this, though! I live 100 miles from the closest store, so it doesn't really work for my kids to attend these events except in summer.

Too bad! Take the day off in February and get the kids out to the store--the Micro Manager is the next model! (I do wish the minibuilds fell on a Friday or Saturday...)

[brickitect]

The PDF of the instructions is now available

http://cache.lego.com/downloads/shop/minibuilds/2014/01-14-plow-40094.pdf

[ResIpsaLoquitur]

Yay! Thanks for updating that.