[MOD] UCS X-Wing 75355 Landing Gear Stand

[mcphatty]

I've been working on some modifications to the 2023 UCS X-Wing in Studio. My main aims were to increase the slope angle of the top surface of the nose and to build a stand to display the X-Wing on landing gear, I also swapped the nose tip parts for light blueish grey and got rid of those horrible white flippers on the laser tips. The landing gear feet and doors are built into a a thin flat base which the X-Wing rests on top of, aligned by the rear gear and supported by a column of bricks that poke up into the ship's display stand hole. The X-Wing set doesn't need to be modified to sit on the stand so hopefully it'll be useful to anyone like me who wants to display the under a coffee table. It can also be moved, the UCS plaque positioned on either side (or not at all) and the X-Wing can be lifted away very easily. Free instructions are on Rebrickable

I also built a detailed little R2 to display with the X-Wing. Like many others I wanted to reuse the old 30611 polybag head part behind the X-Wing's cockpit, it's slightly too big to be the right scale but personally I prefer it to the too-small minifigure. Big thanks to Jan Woźnica, who goes by john_carter and is the behind the Tale of The Space Age Lego Ideas set, he kindly let me alter and use his very clever R2-D2 design. He brilliantly positioned 1x1 Round Plate with Bar pieces at 45 degrees between two 4x4 Round Plates, taking advantage in the gaps between studs and anti-stud notches underneath round plates, allowing an open stud piece to securely connect to the end bar poking out of the 4x4 circle. You can find his excellent original here and I created a seperate set of instructions for R2 (also on the X-Wing mod Rebrickable page).

I'm really pleased with how the mods turned out, it's great (for my marriage) to be able to display such a big set under a coffee table rather than taking up huge amount of space with the s-foils opened. I really like seeing the ship with the wings closed with the added bonus of the weight of the top pair making them appear fully close. I hope the stand proves useful to some of you, thanks for looking!

 

Edited August 3, 2023 by mcphatty

[TeddytheSpoon]

For such a subtle change, the nose angle mod improves the look of the set greatly. Hopefully it holds up IRL!

[ChemicalWorld]

As with the other thread fantastic stand, very classy way of displaying the set. I'm planning on buying the parts later on in the month after I see Blur at Dublin, have to see how many euro's the trip is going to sting me!

Very interested to see if the nose sloping modification works and if so I'm def going to give it a shot as well (the gaps at the top near the front are an eyesore for sure!). Fingers crossed the stability is still there!

[rde]

Would you share stud.io for x-wing? I have a few MODs of my own i wish to implement, thanks 🤘

[mcphatty]

I got around to taking some photos of the stand last week and have edited them into my original post. Here's my modified UCS X-Wing on it's landing gear stand, pride of place in our living room (for now!). Free instructions for the stand, X-Wing modifications and R2-D2 are on Rebrickable.

[bdestena]

Thanks for the mod, this is great. For those that are interested I've been able to lower the rear top so that it matches what the x-wing actually looks like. This is a work in progress.

Opening mechanism for wings is fully functional.

I will build a digital file at some point...

 

Edited November 1, 2023 by bdestena
broken link

[mcphatty]

@bdestena You've done a great job lowering the top of the X-Wing rear, those boat plate pieces are perfect for keeping the panels in place. Thanks for the pictures, I've been planning to do the same so I'll give this a try

[bdestena]

I have finished the mods on the X-wing. I'm thinking on ordering all grey parts for the rear part of the engines.