[MOC] 1:8 Spania GTA Spano motorized hypercar

[Zerobricks]

I present you the most accurate, functional and highest performing supercar I've ever made, the BuWizz GTA Spano:

The main goal behind this scale version was to be as faithful to the design and configuration of the real GTA Spano as possible while maintaining a high degree of performance and functionality.

This 1:8 scale model car has been designed, developed and manufactured in close collaboration with Spania GTA and has a total of 3,880 LEGO pieces, ten BuWizz Motors for propulsion, five motors for other functions and five BuWizz 3.0 Pro controllers, which allow it to reach a maximum speed of 36.5 km/h, a new world record for such a heavy and accurate model.

It features the following functions:

• 10 BuWizz motors used for the rear wheel drive with vector control
• 1 PU L motor used for steering and rotating the steering wheel
• 1 PU M motor used to lift and tilt the rear spoiler
• 1 PU M motor used for the fake V10 engine
• 2 PU M motors used to open the doors
• Full independent suspension on all wheels
• Opening hood, engine cover and the rear trunk

Today I’m going to go a bit deeper into the design process and technical details of the model. First in order to achieve the required level of realism I imported the manufacturer’s 3D file of the car's body in LDD and used it as a reference, here in blue:

 

 

As mentioned before, the power is supplied by 10 BuWizz motors which use the outer outputs geared up using 40 and 24 tooth gears giving a 1.67x gear ratio on the rear drive wheels. Without load, the wheels can spin with up to 50 km/h. Power is transmitted to the rear drive wheels using the new heavy duty CV joints.

To support so many motors and BuWizz bricks, the rear axle was designed to support a weight of over 2,5 kilograms. Here the shape of the BuWizz motors was of a high advantage, since you can easily stack them on the same drive axle. As you can see on the following image, the rear axle is one of the densest; most interconnected and complicated parts of the whole car.

 

 

 

The front axle is designed to feature a positive caster angle, which gives the model additional stability when driving at high speeds. The steering uses double steering links in order to reduce the play of the system. A single PU L motor steers the wheels and the steering wheel.

 

 

 

Along with the 3D model of the exterior, I also used the 3D model of the interior to design…well, the interior. I took great care to model the seats so they are in proper scale and very detailed using a combination of studless and studded bricks.

 

 

For highly accurate details, custom stickers were used for the gauges, central console and of course the logo:

 

As with the interior, the engine bay also uses a combination of studded and studless parts in order to match the real one as close as possible. I also used tiles in Light Bright Orange color to represent the space grade gold foil heat shield of the real car:

 

 

The wheels are custom elements which I personally designed and 3D printed. A big challenge was to design them in a way to be accurate to the original source, yet strong enough to support this 4+ kg model at speeds over 35 km/h.

 

 

With all the mechanical and functional parts completed, it was time to create an accurate representation of the bodywork. As mentioned before, using the 3D CAD model came really handy in capturing all the organic shapes and curves of the original model. Here are some highlights:

 

 

Analog to the real car, this representation also features a lot of opening surfaces. The doors and the rear spoiler are motorized while the front boot, rear engine cover and the rear trunk can be opened manually:

 

To summarize, the whole project took some 6 months to complete from receiving the 3D files to the speed-breaking final version of the model. For me, this was a really nice learning experience and I’m proud to say it’s one of the best models I’ve designed so far. If you are interested to know more about not just the model, but also the cooperation between BuWizz and Spania GTA, please check the following video:

 

Edited October 22, 2021 by Zerobricks

[Jeroen Ottens]

Wow, that is a beauty!

Amazing how you were able to cram that many motors in and still have space to do the bodywork, the interior, suspension, motorized doors and spoiler and a working fake engine!  It's just mindblowing

[astyanax]

What's that silence? Oh, it's everyone watching a friggin' one-hour movie!

Seriously though, this was my exact first reaction: "DUDE WTF?!"

Okay I'm still processing this, I'll return after putting back together the blown-out pieces of my mind...

[suffocation]

Jaw-droppingly mind-boggling. Easily up there with the very, very best Lego supercars & hypercars ever designed.

[astyanax]

So is the virtual model a GWP with an order of 10 BuWizz motors and 5 BuWizz 3.0 Pro bricks?

[Hrafn]

I don't have time to watch the whole video - is there anything in there discussing how you built the car strong enough to keep it from self-destructing at those speeds?  I did scan through and see a couple of times where it went into grass and lost parts - did you reinforce it after that happened?  

The shaping on this is great.  Is there a reason you went with black for the plates and slopes at the bottom of the wheel well?

Edited October 22, 2021 by Hrafn

[LvdH]

That is absolutely insane. One of the most mind-blowing creations out there. Congrats!

[Gray Gear]

I didn't know this car company even existed, and I thought this was one of these "lookalike" cars from the videogame GTA at first  

First of all: I don't think the real car is good looking. Looks like a GTA car for real.

But I do think you recreated the real car's shape pretty well. Custom prints and custom wheels are very nice, and that you made the wheels yourself... +Respect.

But what this is really about is the electronics inside. 10 Buggy motors is absolutely insane, that engine assembly is crazy! With so much power you should be able to pull real rwd drifts and do donuts and all the other fun stuff one can do with exessive RWD power 

I honestly think this is way past what Lego bricks were designed for. I would be very interested to see how the Lego bricks inside handle the power over a longer period of time. Will bricks start to melt before the buwizz run out of juice if you just keep the foot down? How much plastic dust is inside the wheel hubs after a top speed run? 

[Lipko]

I'll be honest. I just didn't expect this from you.

While I think your mechanical skills are amazing and you're one of the few trial truck legends from before Lego was cool (and one of my inspirators to get into Lego), looks was not your strongest skill.

But this model is gorgeous. I'm a little lost for words. Congratulations!

Edited October 22, 2021 by Lipko

[nerdsforprez]

I had the same reaction as @Lipko. Pretty much word for word.  Your builds are fantastic, but looks have always been lacking. This build rewrites that narrative. Well done. I'm about ten minutes in the video... but I just had to comment. 

[gyenesvi]

Wow, this is just another level of MOC-ing. Amazing build in itself, but the cooperation with the real car manufacturer just elevates it even more! Congratulations!

10 motors is just crazy, I mean how did you even arrive to that number? Was it like, you tried 8 and it wasn’t fast enough? :) Or was it like 10 was the most you could cram in there?

3 hours ago, Gray Gear said:

I would be very interested to see how the Lego bricks inside handle the power over a longer period of time. Will bricks start to melt before the buwizz run out of juice if you just keep the foot down? How much plastic dust is inside the wheel hubs after a top speed run?

+1 for that

[astyanax]

13 minutes ago, gyenesvi said:

10 motors is just crazy, I mean how did you even arrive to that number? Was it like, you tried 8 and it wasn’t fast enough? :) Or was it like 10 was the most you could cram in there?

From the video I understand it's because the real car is a V10...

[Stuartn]

Absolutely brilliant build, the speed achieved is incredible, but the design and aesthetics itself, regardless of performance is brilliant. The video is excellent, I haven't watched all of it, but amazing work.

[2GodBDGlory]

Very nice work! I love the way that Buwizz can do "marketing stunts" that really engage with fans--including ones that demonstrate serious building capability like this one. Great job! Do you think that removing a lot of the strictly unnecessary weight (door and spoiler mechanism, interior, etc.) would get you a faster record, or would the lowered weight lower grip enough to make the handling at such high speeds essentially impossible?

[Gray Gear]

@2GodBDGlory I doubt too little weight would be a problem with 11 motors and 5 BuWizz units inside + the weight of the car itself.

[emielroumen]

It looks neat!

Although I consider it cost prohibitive due to the excess of electrical, proprietary components.

[Jundis]

No doubt this is a highend premium MOC and definetely deserved to be frontpaged!

My question is: Are 10 motors really necessary? 4 or even 6 are enough in my opinion... I mean, we are talking about 290€ just for driving motors... I already see parts parts flying and twisting when going 36 km/h...

[piterx]

dude that's fantastic :) i will watch the whole video later in the evening!

[Zerobricks]

23 hours ago, Hrafn said:

I don't have time to watch the whole video - is there anything in there discussing how you built the car strong enough to keep it from self-destructing at those speeds?  I did scan through and see a couple of times where it went into grass and lost parts - did you reinforce it after that happened?  

The shaping on this is great.  Is there a reason you went with black for the plates and slopes at the bottom of the wheel well?

Yes, because the wheel arch is actually from the 42125 and is therefore smaller than usual at this scale. This is why I used plates in order to keep the wheel from touching the bodywork when steering.

21 hours ago, Gray Gear said:

I didn't know this car company even existed, and I thought this was one of these "lookalike" cars from the videogame GTA at first  

First of all: I don't think the real car is good looking. Looks like a GTA car for real.

But I do think you recreated the real car's shape pretty well. Custom prints and custom wheels are very nice, and that you made the wheels yourself... +Respect.

But what this is really about is the electronics inside. 10 Buggy motors is absolutely insane, that engine assembly is crazy! With so much power you should be able to pull real rwd drifts and do donuts and all the other fun stuff one can do with exessive RWD power 

I honestly think this is way past what Lego bricks were designed for. I would be very interested to see how the Lego bricks inside handle the power over a longer period of time. Will bricks start to melt before the buwizz run out of juice if you just keep the foot down? How much plastic dust is inside the wheel hubs after a top speed run? 

All the moving parts were lubricated during assembly. Even with that the wheel hubs turned out to be weak links. The reason the wheels failed off in the video was not in the wheels, but hubs simply failing when being pulled out at such high speeds and heavy load.

19 hours ago, Lipko said:

I'll be honest. I just didn't expect this from you.

While I think your mechanical skills are amazing and you're one of the few trial truck legends from before Lego was cool (and one of my inspirators to get into Lego), looks was not your strongest skill.

But this model is gorgeous. I'm a little lost for words. Congratulations!

Thank you for the praise. I was fully aware I was lacking in my aesthetics skills, so for last year or two I worked hard on improving them, as you can see.

16 hours ago, 2GodBDGlory said:

Very nice work! I love the way that Buwizz can do "marketing stunts" that really engage with fans--including ones that demonstrate serious building capability like this one. Great job! Do you think that removing a lot of the strictly unnecessary weight (door and spoiler mechanism, interior, etc.) would get you a faster record, or would the lowered weight lower grip enough to make the handling at such high speeds essentially impossible?

Removing the weight would reduce friction and increase performance, a bare naked model could easily reach 50 km/h with proper gearing.

2 hours ago, Jundis said:

No doubt this is a highend premium MOC and definetely deserved to be frontpaged!

My question is: Are 10 motors really necessary? 4 or even 6 are enough in my opinion... I mean, we are talking about 290€ just for driving motors... I already see parts parts flying and twisting when going 36 km/h...

Yes, they are because the wheels are actually geared up and besides the speed we also require sufficient torque to overcome the friction and air resistance. Of course the model is not designed to constantly drive at such high speeds.

[1gor]

You made a great job; lines are captured in best way possible with Lego (despite I don't like "modern" lines)

[langko]

Never heard of this car before, so thank you for bringing it too my attention! I will be sure to watch the video when I can spare an hour, it looks very interesting.

The car looks amazing and I'm sure it performs even better. I always like models were lots of things can open up, and this definitely ticks the box there. Favourite part of the bodywork is the rear arches, they way you have positioned the curved 3x13 over the mudguard piece looks great. I've played around with the idea before but it hasn't suited any of my models, I've wondered though if the rear of Bruno's P1 could be modified to do something similar...

[2GodBDGlory]

10 hours ago, Zerobricks said:

Removing the weight would reduce friction and increase performance, a bare naked model could easily reach 50 km/h with proper gearing.

Do you have any plans to try something like that? The fastest Buwizz powered car I recall seeing was around 40km/h, so I'd love to see you really push the limits!

[Jerry LEGO Creations]

Wow... absolutely amazing!

It looks really good, when you see it you don't even expect 10 motors to be in there :D

Awesome model!

[brunojj1]

@Zerobricks Jerry, you are blowing everything away with this spectacular story! Congratulations for all the achievements you got with this so impressive hypercar model! I finally got the time to watch the entrire video. This is the sporty kind of joint venture where all the pieces fit together and your baby is playing the major role in the movie.

The original cars´ long wheelbase allows you to put all the motors and even a pair of BuWizz between the seats and rear wheels, so it was perfect to be the role model for that. And I love how this time you have paid so much attention to aesthetic details. What I don´t like so much, is the rims color and design, but that´s obviously a personal taste.

Why do you prefer to use a M motor for steering over a servo in this extreme setup? How would a normal Lego servo respond to the new generation battery/app?

Why is the model so parts-intensive, considering so much of the space is used up by all the devices?

Edited October 24, 2021 by brunojj1

[Mr Jos]

Incredible! I'm not a car fan with Lego usually, as it's not very technic, just drive and steer at most. Or even multi gearbox designed for pushing. I'm more for real performing designs, and this does that. Having a big amount of power for the drive, and still being able to have powered doors/spoiler etc. Yet from the outside it looks like a regular Lego hypercar, meaning no motors at all.

Only point of concern would be the steering, it seems that there is no centering programmed. I tried to see in the design how you do the steering and I didn't manage to see it very good, but looks like there is a clutch gear? Meaning if it would click you lose your position, and can not really pufet the slider in middle to be sure you're at 0° angle. I saw this inside the building when you were driving ( a lot in reverse also ) the slider was centered, but the wheels steering angle still around 15° on the car. 

This would make the model really hard to handle, certainly at 30+ km/h. (Hence why it ended it the grass a few times)

But it's been a nice movie, interesting to watch and see why you have chosen 10motors for driving.