General Part Discussion

[Erik Leppen]

3 hours ago, Zerobricks said:

About time! And I bet some of these parts will be used in the upcoming supercar too. 

Now you say this, I think you're correct! It would be really strange if the next 8-speed-gearbox supercar wouldn't use this new system.

Remains to be seen though how you made 8 gears of this. The system really seems catered to having 4 gears maximum right now (16-20, 20-16, 24-12, 28-8), with the purple numbers being the round-hole gears (if the 28t will even fit). Allowing any more different gear ratios using this system would need more different gear types. And I don't expect them to add intermediate teeth counts (18, 22). I think that would make things way too difficult for casual builders.

In any case, I might wait a bit before buying stuff... With the recent Ferrari not having my interest, I was still on the fence for the Sian, but I might postpone buying that and wait what next year's 1:8 supercar offering will be.

[howitzer]

4 minutes ago, Erik Leppen said:

Now you say this, I think you're correct! It would be really strange if the next 8-speed-gearbox supercar wouldn't use this new system.

Remains to be seen though how you made 8 gears of this. The system really seems catered to having 4 gears maximum right now (16-20, 20-16, 24-12, 28-8), with the purple numbers being the round-hole gears (if the 28t will even fit). Allowing any more different gear ratios using this system would need more different gear types. And I don't expect them to add intermediate teeth counts (18, 22). I think that would make things way too difficult for casual builders.

In any case, I might wait a bit before buying stuff... With the recent Ferrari not having my interest, I was still on the fence for the Sian, but I might postpone buying that and wait what next year's 1:8 supercar offering will be.

TLG really should make a gear that has teeth number divisible by two but not by four, so we could have a pair of them mesh so that their axleholes are symmetrical relative to each other.

[allanp]

4 hours ago, Bensch55 said:

It looks like they finally got some engineers from the car/bike industry working in their parts development. Those parts look a lot more similar to the real thing than anything we had before. Finally a step in the right directions in my opinion, now they just have to manage their prices a bit.

Or maybe they saw my gearbox videos?

Say what you will but I am 69% convinced these new parts were inspired by mine, and I am very happy with it!!! Sure they could do with adding a few more gear sizes but how many new parts can we expect in one year? 

Edited July 7, 2023 by allanp

[kolbjha]

4 hours ago, howitzer said:

TLG really should make a gear that has teeth number divisible by two but not by four, so we could have a pair of them mesh so that their axleholes are symmetrical relative to each other.

Or perhaps introduce an offset of quarter of a tooth, like they did on the old toothed half bushings.

But I see the benefit of your idea, it would serve two purposes; alignment with racks etc. (like today), and meshing the way you describe.

Edit: when thinking about it, introducing an offset of quarter of a tooth is a terrible idea. I support the idea of @howitzer.

Edited July 7, 2023 by kolbjha

[nerdsforprez]

1 hour ago, allanp said:

69% convinced

this is a very specific estimate... care to elaborate? 

 

[allanp]

9 minutes ago, nerdsforprez said:

this is a very specific estimate... care to elaborate? 

 

 

[Jay Psi]

13 hours ago, allanp said:

Say what you will but I am 69% convinced these new parts were inspired by mine, and I am very happy with it!!! Sure they could do with adding a few more gear sizes but how many new parts can we expect in one year? 

That's a nice percentage.

On a more serious note, there's a small but non-trivial chance you're right, depending on the lead-in times for new parts. Regardless, exciting times are ahead. The rotary catch was a huge step as well, but it's been a while since that came out and we're overdue the next step.

[allanp]

3 minutes ago, Jay Psi said:

That's a nice percentage.

On a more serious note, there's a small but non-trivial chance you're right, depending on the lead-in times for new parts. Regardless, exciting times are ahead. The rotary catch was a huge step as well, but it's been a while since that came out and we're overdue the next step.

I think I'm actually more sure than that (but it is a nice number!). If you look at the rotary cam AND the 8 position indexing wheel and compare them to mine, I mean, it's gotta be....right? These parts are nothing like the Cada parts in comparison. 3D printing has greatly sped up the prototyping stage. From being annoyed at the Ferraris lack of innovation compared to the Sian, to having what you see in my videos of my gearbox working was literally only a couple of weeks. The parts just worked first try (except the shifter fork which took 2 tries), so if I can do that I am sure they can, especially Marcus who I think is in charge of new parts? And it wouldn't be the first time coughpheumaticsmk2cough! But I love it, it really does confirm to me that they do listen to this small group of passionate enthusiasts. 

Comparing their polished final design to my quick and dirty proof of concept I think there are positives and negatives, but mostly positives. To get the negatives out the way, the rotary cams and drive rings are 2 module wide as opposed to my 1 module wide, so theirs is slightly bigger and less compact, however it is only 4 extra studs longer for a complete 8 speed gearbox, and as the indexing is done inside the gearbox itself instead of having a bulky mechanism behind the steering wheel, things should still be more compact and definitely more realistic and with way less friction than previous supercars. The longer shaft however does decrease the max torque a non reinforced gearbox can take, but for non motorised models it fine. For motorised models just add a beam between gear pairs and it'll be fine. As for the positives, a potential improvement over my concept is that the shift fork no longer has a tiny pip to engage with the rotary cam. Instead it can now accept a much stronger tow ball and it can also accept any kind of pin, which should make it easier to interface with other kinds of shifting mechanisms (like you get in stick shift cars which we are definitely missing in technic). These new parts also work with the already in production gears (mine would have needed all new gears). Finally, I'm not sure if this is better or worse yet, but the shift positions are 45 degrees apart on my rotary cams, but 135 degrees apart on theirs. Their rotary cam also appears to have the axle hole on each side offset by 45 degrees (as spotted by @ord in the Yamaha thread). You could stack 4 of mine on an axle to easily get all 8 positions, flipping them wouldn't matter. Theirs however might possibly take a bit more thought to get all 8, but I suspect that might have been done to increase shifting reliability, in case the rotary cams don't rotate close enough to 45 degrees.

 

[zoo]

So, when are we getting dedicated stepper units? :)

[gyenesvi]

This is like the most interesting and surprising news of the year! Totally blown! Thanks TLG!

As much as I'd like to believe that the design of @allanp inspired this, I tend to think that the timespan would have been too short to develop and test it. I'd rather believe that they had been experimenting this for many years, and now the time finally came, though they may have been pushed by the negative feedback on the Ferrari, the ideas here on EB and also the developments at Cada to finally turn it into an actual product. I could also imagine that they did plan it for the Ferrari but it was not yet ready. I was wondering why it is first introduced in a motorcycle and not a car. Sure it's a good way to convince many fans to buy the motorcycle even if they are not interested in the subject otherwise (like maybe myself).

[zoo]

26 minutes ago, gyenesvi said:

I was wondering why it is first introduced in a motorcycle and not a car. Sure it's a good way to convince many fans to buy the motorcycle even if they are not interested in the subject otherwise (like maybe myself).

I'd say it makes more sense being introduced in a 1:5 MC due to the fact space is more limited here than in a 1:8 car. But sure, it might very well have been developed with the initial intention to fit it into one of the supercars.

[allanp]

31 minutes ago, gyenesvi said:

This is like the most interesting and surprising news of the year! Totally blown! Thanks TLG!

As much as I'd like to believe that the design of @allanp inspired this, I tend to think that the timespan would have been too short to develop and test it. I'd rather believe that they had been experimenting this for many years, and now the time finally came, though they may have been pushed by the negative feedback on the Ferrari, the ideas here on EB and also the developments at Cada to finally turn it into an actual product. I could also imagine that they did plan it for the Ferrari but it was not yet ready. I was wondering why it is first introduced in a motorcycle and not a car. Sure it's a good way to convince many fans to buy the motorcycle even if they are not interested in the subject otherwise (like maybe myself).

Of course you could absolutely be right, and I might be letting excitement cloud my judgement. But didn't the book detailing the design of the Ferrari say that they only really intended to change the outside of the car from the Sian, or something like that?

[howitzer]

3 hours ago, gyenesvi said:

This is like the most interesting and surprising news of the year! Totally blown! Thanks TLG!

As much as I'd like to believe that the design of @allanp inspired this, I tend to think that the timespan would have been too short to develop and test it. I'd rather believe that they had been experimenting this for many years, and now the time finally came, though they may have been pushed by the negative feedback on the Ferrari, the ideas here on EB and also the developments at Cada to finally turn it into an actual product. I could also imagine that they did plan it for the Ferrari but it was not yet ready. I was wondering why it is first introduced in a motorcycle and not a car. Sure it's a good way to convince many fans to buy the motorcycle even if they are not interested in the subject otherwise (like maybe myself).

The lack of innovation in the Ferrari lends me to believe that you're right in that they could've had this system in the works but it just wasn't ready yet and it was easier to basically repeat the Sian with different bodywork and hope that the new shock absorbers would be enough of technical innovation, along with the new panels.

[Mikdun]

This is really great looking set. And containing so many interesting pieces! Cannot wait for full reviews.

[Davidz90]

I'm very excited for these new pieces, but not for gearbox reasons. For example, the new 24T gear can be used for a very compact clock hands assembly like this:

Hands by David_Z1, on Flickr

where minute hand is on the axle and hours hand (with 1:12 reduction) would be attached to the new gear (20T placeholder is used in the image).

 

Now if only they could finally make 32T gear... 

Edited July 10, 2023 by Davidz90

[R0Sch]

Glad the LEGO shift drum + shift fork design (this is the correct technical term) turned out totally different to the CaDA version, otherwise we'd see the same patent dispute as was the case with the orange changeover catch. Hope both companies will file for patents individually. The 24 tooth spur gear is also cool. Now we only need 14T and 18T gears and it will be gearbox galore.

[thekoRngear]

Guys, below are the two "versions" of a 3L Bush Pin (#32054) in black. The left one is the usual black one. Howevr, out of all the 50+ black bush pins I have the right one in the picture is different. It is not glossy. It is matte. It has that same mushiness/clutching experience that we get from a red 3L Axle pin (#11214).

This brings this question to me- is this a different mold? Or just an accident? 

[LvdH]

Yes that is new. I first saw them in the 488 GTE but I believe they are slightly older than that.

[thekoRngear]

6 minutes ago, LvdH said:

Yes that is new. I first saw them in the 488 GTE but I believe they are slightly older than that.

Thanks. My black Bush pins come from 2x 42110 and my Sian. Since the 42110 (first one) and 42115 were bought by 2020 I think this one came from the other 42110 which was bought in mid 2022. According to 42110's inventory- it has 13 Black bush pins. This one happens to be one of them I think. I guess they are slowly becoming available.

[vascolp]

And a different material too. Notice that in the old version there are two small holes near the bush that don't exist in the new one. This is most probably because the new material is a bit softer.

I also think that parts in the new material are less resistent to warm, Sometime ago I bought a lot of lego that included 42050 and 42123 and washed everything as I always did, in warm water... Usually I use too warm water because I never had problems with that... but this time, many of the axles and bushes, half bushes, connecters etc in the new materials became too loose, they don't stay in place...

Did anybody else had the same experience?

 

[R0Sch]

On 7/17/2023 at 8:50 PM, vascolp said:

And a different material too. Notice that in the old version there are two small holes near the bush that don't exist in the new one. This is most probably because the new material is a bit softer.

I also think that parts in the new material are less resistent to warm, Sometime ago I bought a lot of lego that included 42050 and 42123 and washed everything as I always did, in warm water... Usually I use too warm water because I never had problems with that... but this time, many of the axles and bushes, half bushes, connecters etc in the new materials became too loose, they don't stay in place...

Did anybody else had the same experience?

They definetly changed the materials of the pins (probably from POM to PA). The newest 2L, 3L pins are not only softer but much more slippery, making them easier to use in aligning assemblies (like modular buildings) but they also have less friction and pulling them out is therefore more difficult by hand.
Here is a good article about all the different materials LEGO uses in it's portfolio:
https://bricknerd.com/home/every-type-of-plastic-used-by-lego-5-20-22

[N-4K0]

I sincerely hate the current 2L axle/pinhole liftarms (+o) because of the change in plastic, cos the axlehole in the ones I have basically have no friction, they might as well be frictionless.

I don't really mind the new pins, though I prefer to keep them separated from the old ones.

[captainmib]

I have a question about 3x19 frame:

I was wondering why the center holes in the middle aren't in the length orientation - like the center holes on the outside?

This would made it possible to have an axle run through the entire length of the frame.

Seems to me that would be a very useful function of such a frame...

 

[Zerobricks]

Just now, captainmib said:

I have a question about 3x19 frame:

I was wondering why the center holes in the middle aren't in the length orientation - like the center holes on the outside?

This would made it possible to have an axle run through the entire length of the frame.

Seems to me that would be a very useful function of such a frame...

 

Because of moulding limitations. You'd have to slide a rod across entire length tof the part o make the holes, which would be very unstable and tricky.

[captainmib]

Hmm, didn't think of production limitations. Makes sense.