Lego Technic Sticker Discussion

[plethorabricks]

Hopefully this topic will serve as a good place to discuss stickers as they relate specifically to Technic models.

Here are three thoughts from me to start off. Feel free to comment on them:

1) I like that 42042 Crawler Crane uses actual pieces for the vents on its cab, where even a set as good as 8043 has its vents only in sticker form. I think stickers should add something to the model that otherwise isn't possible in piece form in the design or the scale. The 42022 Hot Rod stickers are a good example of this.

2) I'm not yet sure how I feel about stickers with a dominant color supplanting the color of the piece that they are stuck on (transparent pieces excepted). The 42021 Snowmobile, 42025 Cargo Plane and 42040 Fire Plane are good examples of this. They all do a good job rounding out the color scheme of the finished model, but to go on to use those pieces you need to be able to live with the stickers' designs.

3) I've noticed that a few stickers, one on 42025 Cargo Plane (front landing gear), and two on 42035 Mining Truck (rear tail) contain drawings of lights. Headlights and taillights on official Technic models have typically been built from LEGO pieces, and more often than not look good and pop out nicely, yet on these models they are flat stickers. I don't have either model right now to make an in-the-room confirmation, but it feels to me to like a disappointing compromise in the appearance of the model, even if 1x1 studs are too large for the scale of the model.

[nerdsforprez]

Personally, I am not a fan of stickers for my Lego sets. I work really hard to convince my kids, wife and others that my hobby is just as manly ("but Dad, it says ages 11-16 on the box"......."Those are just suggestions!!" - The Lego Movie) as the guy next door who fixes up motorcycles, cars, etc for his hobby. Stickers really, really, really make that job difficult :laugh:

[allanp]

I don't really mind stickers, I prefer them to printed pieces because you have the choice of using that design on the piece or not, and if you want to use the piece elsewhere in a MOC and the design doesn't look good you can peel the design off. Brick built details are obviously better but my main focus is on the technical aspects of the model, it is Technic after all, so whatever. If it makes the model look better on the shelves which makes the kiddies buy more Technic which in turn leads to TLG giving more to the Technic line then great

[trekman]

Quite a lot of stickers in my sets have not been applied. I am a poor lego builder, and the parts, particularly panels have to be reused elsewhere on other models. There is one thing having "lego soup" on a model, but it gets even more of an eyesore when it is lego soup with stickers. Excessive stickers as in the crawler have put me off purchasing, as the model looks too plain without them.

[Rijkvv]

What do you mean with lego soup?

I get the feeling a set without stickers is rare in general nowadays, except for a theme like Creator. In my favourite era of sets, the '90s, Technic sets often used stickers for headlights etc but still I think they weren't used as often as today. I mean, the Unimog has a sticker on the underside of the frame, what's the purpose of that?

I prefer printed bricks over stickers. A print is more durable, especially since the sticker quality isn't great.

[zux]

While I like printed parts over stickers ones I thought it is still good to have stickers sometimes. In Technic the most often sticker-ed parts probably are panels. I imagine we could end up missing plain panels in some colors. That wouldn't be great either.

[Lyichir]

I'm fine with stickers in Technic sets, though as the OP notes, some are better than others. I certainly wouldn't want the sets to go entirely without stickers, that's for sure—they're pretty much essential for complex sets like the Unimog, if only to label what functions are controlled by each switch. And while sets like the 24-Hours Race Car look fine without stickers, the stickers really help the car to look more like a real race car would by adding things like numbering and sponsorships.

The biggest problem I have with stickers in Technic sets is the choice of whether or not to apply them to rare or uniquely-colored parts. But in that case, printing would be even worse—at least stickers give me a choice.

Personally, I am not a fan of stickers for my Lego sets. I work really hard to convince my kids, wife and others that my hobby is just as manly ("but Dad, it says ages 11-16 on the box"......."Those are just suggestions!!" - The Lego Movie) as the guy next door who fixes up motorcycles, cars, etc for his hobby. Stickers really, really, really make that job difficult :laugh:

Do they really give you grief over the stickers? Growing up, I kind of always thought of the stickers on sets to be an adult thing—I'd give the sets I'd build to my dad to sticker just so that they could be applied as expertly as possible. Plenty of professional-grade model kits feature stickers or decals, so I don't see why they would make Lego seem any more childish than it would otherwise.

[paul_delahaye]

Personally I'd pay a premium to have printed pieces, however, I'd also be happy with stickers like the ones from the 80's. They are all still on my sets, and should I warm up the bricks, they peel off and can be repossitioned. I would rather Lego go back to this type of stickers if we are to have them at all.

I try not to apply the current stickers on my sets.

Edited September 27, 2015 by paul_delahaye

[6ix]

Yeah, I would also pay more for all printed pieces. Not in the last place because I'm not that good at applying them *and* I'm a bit autistic. I believe printed bricks are more durable and also look better.

[plethorabricks]

Over the years I think studless beams get stickered most often in Technic sets, with regular use of the red-and-white-stripe caution pattern on one end of a beam. It makes rebuilding sets later a bit of a challenge, to reserve the stickered part for the right location.

[Erik Leppen]

I hate stickers.

I think it shows a weakness from the designer's perspective if one needs many stickers to sell a model. Also, most stickers are model-specific. If you look at sticker-rich models, almost none of the large panel-filling stickers can be used in another configuration meaningfully. It heavily restricts a part's usage options.

Sure, I can understand a 1x4 tile with a licence plate sticker, or a 2x2 tile with some emblem. These are totally fine. They can add to a model while at the same time adding an interesting part to the collection that can be used anywhere. However, the stickers like the ones a set like 42039 is plastered with, I'd really like to see LEGO stop using those, and just use proper parts to create a multicolor scheme.

[dr_spock]

I am ok with stickers. I go with look of the model. If it looks good without stickers than I don't apply them. If it looks bad without stickers, then they are applied. I also make my own stickers for my MOCs when required. I do dislike the LEGO stickers that break apart when you try to carefully peel them off the sets to reuse parts. The stickers from the 2009 Mars Mission sets or the ones on the 8258 Crane Truck were especially bad for that.

[Freekysch]

Stickers are ok in my opinion, there are some sets that would look empty without them - eg: F1 Williams 8461 or Tow Truck 8285. The bad part is that the stickers eventually crack and we are put in the situation of buying them at insane prices. I think that TLG should give the renders so people can print themselves.

[Ngoc Nguyen]

Haven't seen this discussed anywhere, so I think it's appropriate to bring it up here.

I need help with repairing the stickers. I want to make them stick again. What should I use? Does dry glue work?

[Andman]

Is the sticky layer gone or did it got dirty? Glue would probably work, but I'm not sure if you get a flat surface. Another thing which comes to my mind is adhesion. Has anyone tried this?

 

And last: Why not ordering new one from bricklink if they are not available form TLG?

[Ngoc Nguyen]

1 hour ago, Andman said:

Is the sticky layer gone or did it got dirty?

The stickers are still there. The corners are peeled up. They lose the stickiness.

[Maaboo the Witch]

55 minutes ago, Ngoc Nguyen said:

The stickers are still there. The corners are peeled up. They lose the stickiness.

I used a Pritt stick to hold down one of the stickers on 8295 (my copy came with a fairly mangled sheet and one of the "AP4WS" stickers would peel up a bit at the end). Should work for you.

[1gor]

I use it stickers that are not to specific, like chevrons or manufacturer (Brand) name, but not for models because I usually build MOCs of real machines...so I did not have a need to remove sticker from part... 

[RocketPuppy]

I don't mind stickers at smaller scales or lower price points. 

They work wonders on the Speed Champions line, though not Technic, to give the cars detail that would not be possible at that scale with bricks.  They also keep the price down. 

I know most of us prefer printed pieces, but the print quality on pieces is inferior to the print quality on stickers. This also matters less as things scale up. 

On the Chiron I absolutely loathed stickers on a flagship set. Especially the not full brick length brake caliper stickers. 

With Corvette ZR1 I kind of wish they hadn't tried to brick build the headlights, and just used panels to sculpt the shape better and use stickers for the headlights.  That set isn't a bad Technic set, but its barely recognizable as a Corvette. 

[howitzer]

Over the years there has been a huge variance in the quality of stickers, some are good after 30 years of play, while others have started peeling and cracking after a couple of years on shelf. Prints on the other hand usually last much longer and when they wear they fade rather than peel or crack like stickers, so it's not as big problem.

I've made the choice of not applying stickers on my Technic sets, except for those that direct functions. This is because I want my parts to be usable in MOCs and I can't afford to buy more parts to replace panels and such, just so that the original set looks slightly better. I have of course kept the sticker sheets with unapplied stickers, in case I ever wanted to sell my Legos as a set, instead of just loose parts.

As said, stickers have their place in smaller sets, as they can make them look a lot better than what's possible with bricks only and they help to keep the cost down, as printed pieces are much more expensive. For flagship-level sets I'd expect prints, and it was a delight to see this happening with the Sian. Stickers on Chiron on the other had made it feel much cheaper than the price point would suggest and according to some reviews, even the quality wasn't exactly great either.

[Pauls Technic]

As I MOC, I prefer no stickers.

[Arie]

I don't like stickers (or too specific parts for that matter), with a few exceptions:

- On small common parts, used for cool detailing, like license plates, or logos

- On (e.g.) tiles to explain functions 

I especially don't like stickers on bigger parts, and what is really the worst is stickers spanning multiple parts, but I haven't seen that since my childhood 

[Maaboo the Witch]

The sticker that really acquires my caprine mammal is the one in 8283, seen here:

It's stuck over two thin beams, both of which are connected by a pin. This setup, unfortunately, isn't used in the B-model; luckily, there's a workaround - rotate one liftarm off the sticker and thus remove the pin, then reattach the beam with a 3L pin (used in both models) when it's needed. Still a pain though, and completely unnecessary.

Edited June 12, 2020 by Maaboo35