Building the Emerald Night via Bricklink?

[timmyc1983]

As an AFOL just recently coming out of my dark ages, i missed out on a lot of sets i would have probably not thought twice about buying (as i did with the Grand Emporium and Fire Brigade a few weeks ago), the Emerald Night obviously being one of these sets...

So, I look on bricklink and eBay and all the sets are very expensive. So i wonder whether the price warrants buying the bits on bricklink to make the train or whether by the time i pay for postage as well as the bricks, i'll end up spending more, not to mention the stickers too.

I am a collector for purposes of building an awesome city, as opposed to collecting the sets with a perfect box and instructions, i'm more interested in the finished train and how it will look in my city :D

So my questions, has anyone built the EN via bricklink? What are the bricks which are difficult to come by? (I checked bricklink for the dark green slopes with gold decorations and they are average .30c per piece, i was expecting these to be very expensive). If anyone has built it via bricklink, was it worth doing it this way or would it be easier/cheaper to just buy a set...?

Any help appreciated, thanks :D

Tim.

[spzero]

well if you part out a new EN on bricklink at average past 6 months prices its worth £150.00 about the same as a set, maybe a bit cheeper, factor in postage multiple orders, etc etc and its probably not worth it used is about £112.00 so again not much cheeper, if you can get all the parts in a few orders it might be worth a try,

[timmyc1983]

hmmm thanks for the reply! My limited bricklink experience tells me that being in Australia postage is an absolute killer so it's probably just best to find a second hand set somehow... that is until their price goes up....

More LEGO to spend my money on

[domboy]

Not the same set, but awhile back I decided to "Bricklink" a train set from scratch myself. I wanted a 10133 BNSF, but had a hard time swallowing the going rate on the used market. When it was all said and done I calculated I ended up spending around $170 IIRC, which at the time ended up being close to price I could have gotten one already complete. Maybe $5-10 less. That said, it was a fun processes, and it's ended up being a lot more personal than if I had just bought it straight up. Another thing is I strung the cost out over several months, so it was a bit more affordable in that sense. I guess I could have just saved up instead...

Edited April 3, 2013 by domboy

[GregD]

Not even train related, but just last week I finished my bricklinked Market Street, but ended up at close to the going rate on eBay - I had something like 15 orders - however set feels more personal to me, and also I specified nearly all new bricks which has made a big difference to how the set looks for me. A very small percentage of 'new' bricks I bought are not new. For expensive rare bricks I settled on used ones where the seller noted good condition, and they were truthful comments. Hope that helps a little!

[peterab]

I think a major problem will be this window, other rare parts of the carriage might also be troublesome.

You might be able to build just the engine and tender cheaper since many people wanted more carriages, so the engine only is less in demand.

[timmyc1983]

Thanks for all the advice guys, very helpful. I just finished building the Cafe Corner via bricklink and gained some extremely helpful experience from doing that. And i agree with Dom and Greg, it is fun to collect all the bricks and feels like it's a little more special when it all comes together. I'm not that flush for cash atm so spreading the cost out would be helpful too, altho i have other projects which would probably take precedence over this one atm, i can always be on the look out for EN bricks while i'm sourcing the other projects...

I think a major problem will be this window, other rare parts of the carriage might also be troublesome.

I was trying to figure out which bricks were going to be expensive ( i think i mentioned in a previous post) and wondered about those windows.... but wow! Didn't expect them to be that much!! I was thinking as well, if i went ahead and bricklinked EN, i would be able to add an extra carriage for aesthetics a lot easier than if i bought a set and then added the carriage, same with power functions (i have the Passenger train and love that with the power functions, so would probs want to have the same with EN).... I suppose i have to put individual brick prices out of my head to a degree and work out if the average brick price would be fair or not....

Thanks so much for all the advice, i'll have a bit more of a think before i decide :D

[Darkdragon]

Buying the parts on BL vs. buying the set is usually not going to save you any money. The only way it really saves is if you have no timeline and you just add the parts if a store has any of them and you are already shopping there (thus the shipping wouldn't really be part of the "cost" for these parts).

The reason it doesn't work is that the set's price is basically based off of the parts price. So there are only a few ways to actually save money in the long run. One way is to figure out what rare parts are making the set so expensive and try to get those somewhere else (normally an ebay lot) for much cheaper. The other way to save money is to substitute parts (like cafe corner old white panels @$3/each vs new white panels @0.12/each). And lastly, filling in any basic parts with what you already have which some consider "free" because you don't have to buy them specifically (though that wouldn't be as big of a hit with a train as it is with a modular building).

Hope that info helps a little. It can be fun to piece a set together over time and then one day finally have all the parts and get to build it. I did it with Cafe Corner and the building means a little more to me than if I'd just gone to the store to buy it off the shelf.

[timmyc1983]

Thanks for the reply DarkDragon! I just completed a bricklinked Cafe Corner myself and it is very rewarding!! I substituted the white panels as you suggested in the previous post and have currently got red windows in the top floor (as i had them already) rather than the expensive white ones...

I'd quite like to have a second carriage so maybe i will bricklink one carriage and find a second hand set somehow :D thanks for all the help, it's much appreciated!

Edited April 4, 2013 by timmyc1983

[Werlu Ulcur]

I never BLed a whole complex set like the EN, but from what I read of other people's experience you do save a little in terms of money in the end, so financially speaking I don't think it would be really worthwhile. What you do get that doesn't come with a stock set is the pleasure of doing it yourself and of course the challenge of the whole process. And you don't need to spend all the cash in one hit.

I'm also drooling over an EN set, but for me it's financially impractical to BL the whole set because of the expenses I would have with S&H. So if all goes well next week I'll just order the stock set. From BL, of course .

Edited April 4, 2013 by Werlu Ulcur

[1974]

You can also just sit tight and wait. This is one set that resellers have horded like there's no tomorrow. Lots of people allready have it so I expect prices to actually fall when the resellers can't get rid of their stock at 2x retail or whatever

You could also join your local LUG as sales amongst members tend to be friendly. I've gotten quite a few big sets that way (like Diagon Alley 30% below retail even when it was still available at LEGO.com, 6991 monorail at half BL prices and many more luvly sets)

LEGO freinds are LEGO friends

[1974]

You might be able to build just the engine and tender cheaper since many people wanted more carriages, so the engine only is less in demand.

If you just want the loco, you could buy a complete set right now and sell the carriages for a real good price on ebay and thus get a loco somewhat cheaper than BL'ing it

It would not be hard - or expensive - to build multiple carriages in different colours than tan/brown

[Andy D]

The EN. Is still available at only a little over double the original cost. When I BL'ed a Cafe Corner they were still available for bertween $400 - $500, I spent at least $350 on BL and I had to substitute parts that were either not available in quantity or cost more than I felt was reasonable. As much as I learned/enjoyed the experience, if I had it to do agin I would most likely fork over the cash and get it in a box.

Back to your EN dilema, if you want it, get it. Playng the waiting game may work, but there's always a chance that it won't and prices for the whole set will just keep going up.

Just MHO,

Andy D

[jonwil]

Actually, the grey slopes for the carriage roof aren't all that rare (especially if you buy the version with the bottom tubes which is more common and is listed as an alternate for the Emerald Night set on BL)

The rare/expensive parts in the set are the sticker sheet, the wagon base for the carriage (which is only expensive because its big), the aforementioned windows and maybe the minifigs.

[Werlu Ulcur]

Back to your EN dilema, if you want it, get it. Playng the waiting game may work, but there's always a chance that it won't and prices for the whole set will just keep going up.

I've been eyeing the EN since the beginning of March, and from then until now prices have gone up on BL .

[zephyr1934]

If you just have to have an EN, but you don't care that much about it being a perfect match to the set, you could try doing it in a different color. Personally, I liked the design, but not enough to use all that dark green. So I built mine in red and skipped the stickers. One of these days I might go back and change the fenders over the drivers from black to red too. That's one of the great things about lego, customize it to your own personal tastes. There are also several small tweaks one could easily do to make it a better engine. Start with the mechanical improvements listed in the Railbricks article. Then the loco would look better with a bigger tender. I also think extending the side rod to connect with the middle driver does a LOT to improve the aesthetics (you do not have to use custom rods to do it, you could use technic axles and connectors, might be cheaper to do in gray, but...?)

[Werlu Ulcur]

...might be cheaper to do in gray, but...?)

But you have to go with black .

[timmyc1983]

So I built mine in red

Wow, that's really striking in red!! It really comes out at you. Now i'm torn between an original dark green or a red one haha. Did you make any carriages to go with it? did you change the colours of the carriage to match?

It's really interesting hearing everybody's opinions on this, thanks so much for all the replies :D

[zephyr1934]

Wow, that's really striking in red!! It really comes out at you. Now i'm torn between an original dark green or a red one haha. Did you make any carriages to go with it? did you change the colours of the carriage to match?

I've also seen it repainted in black. Assuming the curved slopes are the rarest part, it looks like reddish brown might be the cheapest color to build it in, but blue would be striking as well.

No, I wasn't much interested in the coach. While I liked the brick built doors, I've already got 50+ passenger cars and I'm moving towards smaller windows, non-opening doors, and slightly smaller than minifig scale in my designs.

Still, with the EN car, I would think even minor experimentation for the windows and at least selective color substitution could yield a much cheaper build for the cars. Perhaps,

or if you can figure out how to make purple work, those train windows are dirt cheap.

Or heck, if you wanted to keep the 1x4x3 dimensions of the windows, I'd try a 1x2 trans brick on top of a 1x2x2 trans panel and put them in pairs.

[oddjob]

How much cheaper did you find bricklinking the red EN compared to bricklinking the green EN?

Edited April 5, 2013 by oddjob

[timmyc1983]

Still, with the EN car, I would think even minor experimentation for the windows and at least selective color substitution could yield a much cheaper build for the cars. Perhaps,

or if you can figure out how to make purple work, those train windows are dirt cheap.

You're a genius!!!! I tried the purple windows first with a few colour combos but nothing looked right to fit with the engine, IMO anyway. So i moved to the green flat front windows as you suggested and came up with this:

I think it keeps the classic look the whole train has while making it about 100 times cheaper :D

Any thoughts/suggestions??

Or possibly:

I think i prefer this version......

[kibosh]

If you just have to have an EN, but you don't care that much about it being a perfect match to the set, you could try doing it in a different color. Personally, I liked the design, but not enough to use all that dark green. So I built mine in red and skipped the stickers. One of these days I might go back and change the fenders over the drivers from black to red too. That's one of the great things about lego, customize it to your own personal tastes.

Agreed. I have the EN, and I still want to do an all black version as well. Find a color scheme you like, that is cheaper, and go with that. I could make the carriage car build cheaper as well. Do you plan on only displaying the model, or actually running it? You might be able to get away with just building the engine.

And that does look great in red!

[L@go]

Or you could always try an entirely different colour. Like I did.

Although the taste police still hasn't decided on that one... ;)

Edited April 5, 2013 by L@go

[1974]

That's damn right ugly And, I'm a fan of Thomas too

[Locomotive Annie]

Or you could always try an entirely different colour. Like I did.

Although the taste police still hasn't decided on that one... ;)

That's almost similar to LNER Apple Green which was the colour that the A1/A3 Pacifics had as their original livery.