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April 2023 Update: I've made some changes to the Midi Republic Gunship, more info further down and on the Rebrickable page, here's a quick comparison and below is my original post.

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May 2022 Original Post: I've wanted an LAAT of my own for a long time, I missed the opportunity to get one of the Lego sets during my dark-ages and have absolutely nowhere to put a UCS sized pile of plastic, so I thought I'd continue the midi-scale thing and try to make something bookshelf friendly. This isn't intended to be any particular scale, just roughly the same size as the midi-sized Slave 1 (75312) with room for figures and strong enough to be played with. The cockpit bubble looks oversized and there’s obviously only one of them so I had to throw accuracy to the wind there, but I’ve squeezed in as many other recognisable details as I could. The roof opens up to allow access to the cockpit which has just enough room for two Clone Troopers/Pilots to get cozy. There’s a small weapons locker in the area between the front hatches, though it' mostly for decoration as its very hard to acces, and the side doors hinge outwards and fold back so that four Clones can be seated inside. There isn't enough headroom to have them hanging by a handrail but some fearless perching before deployment is definitely doable. Finally I squeezed a stupidly small BARC speeder up the back end of the ship.

Overall the Republic Gunship is a 28cm long (including the guns), 27cm wide and weighs 410g. Instructions are on Rebrickable, I've only used common and cheap parts so the whole MOC with stand will cost around £45 for the 608 pieces. https://rebrickable.com/mocs/MOC-107732/ron_mcphatty/midi-republic-gunship

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And here's my other midi-scale efforts.

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Edited by mcphatty

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Cute indeed! I really like this scale, minifigs are "cute" rendtion of humans, and this is kinda-sorta similar approach to the original ship. I like how it is fully playable even though it is much smaller than it should be. Or even more playable, considering how it is lighter and probably more durable. Great job!

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@MaximillianRebo thanks. The door isn’t the strongest and relies on the tolerance of a 1x1 brick rotating slightly to let the liftarm move, but I’m glad I got it to work.

@Jerac Cheers! It really was all about shelf space for me, this and my Ghost are as small as I think I can make them while squeezing in the minifigures. It’s definitely okay to be played with, my daughters handled it fairly roughly and nothing fell off… until one tried make the wings flap.

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Nice one. I found your Ghost online recently and intend to build my own based on yours. Always thought the gunship worked well at this scale but never been able to pull it off, too flimsy or too chunky, can't seem to find a middle ground.

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I love it.  With the single cockpit you can almost think of it as a different ship entirely and you've translated the shape perfectly to this scale.  

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Looks great and I like how you have piles as well, very clever. I also like how your wing guns don't look like they can hold soldiers; its a mistake the sets also make. I made that mistake when I made mine years ago, making the wing guns and side guns identical.

Edited by gotoAndLego

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Looks awesome despite its small size!  I also like the bid guns are still mounted in ball mounts. What are the grey bricks above the ball mount to make the ball shape of the gun mount?

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@Gray Gear Thank you! The guns are a bit of a cheat, the grey bricks are 2x2 Round Dome Bottoms in flat silver (part 15395) connected to a 2L Bar With Towball. At the front of the gunship the whole thing can be wiggled around without the ball joint being easily seen so that little feature worked out pretty well… unfortunately at the back it’s not so well hidden.

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I love this sort of idea for a set. Lego has done something similar recently with the down sized Tie Fighter and X Wing, and I think a downsized gunship similar to this one would actually be really cool and certainly more affordable. Some things I think could be improved in a hypothetical official Lego version would be if the main body was one brick higher so that the clones could stand in there, and also some new specialized piece for the cockpit windows that has two bubble-like windows in one piece, which will be more accurate while also not requiring two of the larger bubble window pieces to be accurate and needing a larger front area to fit.

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@SillySeeker I like the idea of making it a brick taller, might give that a try in Studio! And yeah more custom canopy and windscreen pieces will always be welcome, there's a new pointy type in one of the new Lightyear sets that will perfect for an X-Wing.

I've just updated the Rebrickable page with some bits and pieces. I've improved the connection of the doors and the shape of the wing bubbles but left the rest of the gunship as it is... apart from a few new colour schemes and some Attack of The Clones style pivoting bubble turrets! Here's a render, the 501st colours are based around Bruxxy's design for his blue and grey playscale gunship, the Muunilinst colours are fairly simple but the best I could do without the cost spiralling out of control and messing with the structure. I've got the parts for a 501st colour swap so as soon as I get a chance I'll take some photos.

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Edited by mcphatty

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A couple of months ago I became unhappy with the long, shoe-like appearance of this ship, the proportions just looked off. After a lot of messing about with different wedge plates and angles I tried reducing the length by 2 studs and having the cockpit about 4 plates higher up, which seemed to look better. I then redid the nose to be more accurately shaped, improved my poorly designed top rocket launchers and reduced the wings by 1 stud each side to correct the overall proportions. The Midi Republic Gunship is now 10% smaller, 10% cheaper and 10% chibbier whilst still having space 6 figures, plus two more with the Bubble Turrets connected.

I've updated the instructions to version 2.0, there's also a zip file with extra parts required to upgrade from v1.3 (about £5 worth). Lastly I've redone the 501st and Muunilisnt colour schemes and added a few new ones; the 212th, 33nd and Coruscant Guard. Here's a comparison of v1.3 and v2.0 along with a photo of the new version doing some perimeter creating, plus all those colour schemes. I'd love to hear what you guys think, suggestions are always welcome!

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Edited by mcphatty

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And another photo. Without intending to I've collected a few Clone Troopers, plus a Command Centre, so I'm putting my minifigures to work.

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@Chrome Vader Thanks! It seems ridiculous to get hung up on proportions with a build thats more or less chibi, but I definitely did.

Edited by mcphatty

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