howitzer

So it would seem, I didn't know that! I wonder how it was marketed, as there's apparently still a "main" model (truck and helicopter) and the alternatives are much smaller.

I don't think it had that in DBG, only in orange. They probably wouldn't have used the already-produced Osprey parts in a future set anyway as I believe those parts had been distributed to packing factories and mixed into bags for boxing. It's probably cheaper just to produce new parts than to separate and sort parts from all those thousands of bags for reuse in sets. The production process must be highly streamlined in order to mass-produce things like Lego sets and anything that disrupts the process is a huge liability. On the other hand, marketing gag like this is a perfect place to sink thousands and thousands of otherwise useless parts.

How is that universal? Does it include instructions for at least 4 models (not buildable at the same time from the set's parts)?

A less simple answer: Last set which could be considered universal set was the Barcode multi set in 1997 so they are long gone. (Assuming you don't count Mindstorms sets, as they are of different theme and with significantly different focus than Technic sets, even if they consist mostly of Technic bricks, and also discontinued recently.) Power functions parts were released as supplemental sets while it lasted, but it was also discontinued few years ago. I don't think PU stuff is available in similar supplemental set style, only separately (single motor, single hub, etc.) and as proper sets (like the upcoming 42160 Audi.) Of course it's possible to buy PU motors and hubs separately, though they can indeed be pretty expensive. For a simple solution, the PU dumb hub (88015) combined with 2 motors (there are several, like 88013 or 88018) of your choice could be an option.

They don't have a part number like actual parts have, but nether do instruction booklets and I have personally gotten a replacement for instructions once when I had a faulty one so there's hope.

I just finished the build, and I've got to say I'm impressed about the functions. I saw the review videos of course but that doesn't do it justice to try for yourself how they work, the steering mechanism is really clever. It's also instantly recognizable if you know the source material, and while it's not the most difficult set out there, it still offers a bit of technical challenge to finish. Many people have commented about the places where you have to insert two pins with pinhole at the same time, but I didn't have any problems whatsoever inserting them. The only thing that bothers me is the instructions, there's absolutely no information on what you're building and why that goes there. Many other sets related to real life objects have additional background information so why wouldn't this one need it? It would be noce to know the names of the parts of the machine and their purpose and it would pace the build nicely to insert some little information on the pages. I also found a small error in the instructions, the black 36T gear isn't placed properly and intersects the DBG beam:

I just bought the Perseverance rover for 86€ while its price at lego.com/fi is 117€ so I guess that's 25% "discount", although the retailer I buy from always has almost all sets for significantly less than Lego's own webstore. The Deere would be 153€ there and 190€ at lego.com/fi, so about 20% less. At amazon.de the Deere would be couple of euros cheaper but delivery cost would more than negate that. I guess the brick and mortar stores rely mostly on buyers who don't know or care that the exact same product is available for less elsewhere online. Still, it's going to be tough for them to survive when more and more people compare prices online and order the cheapest one they can find.

That's true, it forces new limits on set design. On the other hand, people seem to be interested in licensed sets and even most MOCs are about recreating real life vehicles so I don't see why TLG shouldn't follow suit. And there's at least few non-licensed sets now and then too, many of which are pretty good. The licenses also force recolours of parts to fill gaps in parts palettes so I don't think there's that much reason to complain.

Indeed. Racing/cars/motorcycles have always been an integral part of Technic. The truly groundbreaking and innovative sets like 8862, 8868 and 8480 are few and far between, with majority of sets being mediocre or perhaps nice but nothing to write home about. There have also always been better and worse years, 1980's in particular had many bad years. In 1990's almost every year something interesting was released and innovation was really high, but many of those things fell into obscurity soon (like the fiber optic system) and at that time TLG had unsustainable spending habits which would come back to bite them in the turn of the millennium. Today the development of new sets is much more careful and controlled process, which might seem as less innovative but is actually much better in the long run. I also would like to see more machinery with interesting functions and so on, but apparently those barebone car sets sell really well so I can't really blame TLG for doing them repetitively. But what I can do is choose to not buy them and spend my money only on the interesting sets, like I just did with the Perseverance rover.

TLG seems to do recolouring mostly when they have a specific need for it, they don't do much of that otherwise and for licensed sets they tend to be more demanding on colour consistency, which is to be expected as those have a colour schemes which TLG has no control over. Personally I don't mind funny colours in pins and such, but others clearly do, so they're at odds with TLG. Hopefully TLG finds more reasons to produce pins in neutral colours and also to fill other gaps in part palettes of specific colours.

Probably for a set where tan would stand out too much. Why they chose that colour and not simply black is strange though, perhaps black would look too similar with 2L friction pins and black 2L axles but pearl dark gray is easy enough to distinguish while loose, and still dark enough to blend into black when built.

No, CV means constant velocity, which indicates that the turning rate of the output is identical to to the input. This is in contrast to U-joints where the output rotates slower in certain phases of rotation and faster in certain others, which necessitates correct alignment of several successive joints. More info: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_joint

I think this is a plausible hypothesis, though only based on rumours. If the leaked photo of the box is anything to go by, I wouldn't be surprised to see it going back to the drawing table, as it's really not what this kind of set should look like. No idea though, how they would solve the supposed stability issues and such.

Umm.. of course they are, they're after all a company which aims for profit, and to get profit they must cover their costs with the selling price of their products. I hope nobody has been misled to believe that TLG as whole is some sort of charity.

Yeah, it's obvious that simply having two hubs and 6-8 motors isn't going to be nowhere nearly enough to justify the price so I'm also expecting something new and interesting. Though the price of 600€+ is such that I don't think I'll buy it no matter what's in the box - it's just too expensive. But I'll reserve the judgement on if it's worth the money for when it's officially revealed.

That's what practically everyone has said on this thread numerous times already. We'll just have to wait and see what's in the box before making final judgement. Though I have to say that people on this forum are very marginal segment of buyers from TLG's point of view. Whatever our collective opinion, it's going to matter very little in grand scheme of things - maybe the Liebherr will be grossly overpriced but maybe many people will still buy it and that's enough justification for TLG to continue with such overpricing.

You're comparing apples and oranges. The RC car will never be anything else than an RC car while a Lego set can be transformed into many, many things. The trade-off is of course the fact that a proper RC car is much better at being an RC car than a Lego set, and this isn't much different with PF cars. (Physical controller is of course a great advantage for PF over PU as it is out of the box, though it's possible to control PU sets also with a physical controller.)

I feel a bit conflicted about these load-additions to sets. With 42055 there were far too little of those load-parts to make it work properly, it would need at least 10 times more to see the full effect. With 42082 the wall-element-things added a great playability thing, along with the tools and stuff that was included with it. 42139 ATV also had logs, and it felt a nice addition along with the chainsaw even if those are much less playable. As for the John Deere, I don't think a couple of simulated logs would've added much to the set, one could easily gather a handful of twigs outside for playing with it. I liked the wheel covers of 42082 and I'd love to see those used more in heavy machinery sets. I get that TLG don't want to design new hubs, but having wheel covers would add variety and realism with existing parts.

I don't think they are available from PaB, but instead they are listed among the sets. Go to lego.com and find the online store and then the theme Powered Up and you should find them among the sets which include PU components. Much more expensive that way than finding them in Bricklink though.

While dual-moulded wheels would've been great, the hard plastic wheels can be thought as kinda-sorta-realistic if you think metal is just replaced with plastic in the model, as the real vehicle has fully metallic wheels. Rubbery surface would've made for better play value though...

That makes sense, thank you!

Too bad there's not much analysis on the dimensions and angles of this new part. I wonder if the middle holes in the diagonal section are in any way in system or not. --- Apparently there's also 1x10 Technic Brick in DBG in the Ninjago City Markets, which should be new.

Yeah, I know it's mostly wishful thinking rather than a real possibility. But one can still hope.

I really, really, really hope that the new black 16T gear is actually as @kbalage speculated in the video, meaning its axle hole would be rotated half a teeth compared to the usual one. Such a change would be enormously useful.

Yeah, additional mounting points for the cylinders would also be great, maybe coupled with some sort of special part if it's difficult to make more holes into the current design without increasing dimensions. Hopefully there will be smaller pneumatic sets which will include the short cylinders. I could of course buy them second hand, but I would very much like to get them with a new set with pneumatics...