2GodBDGlory

I believe The Unofficial Lego Technic Builder's Guide suggested that red was the weakest color, while yellow was the strongest. Most of the evidence for these different things is probably fairly anecdotal, though!

Might work! Unless you wanted to have a longer lever (with a higher pivot) to get more travel for the shifter

Cool! That ought to be possible one way or another

Yeah, it sure isn't. If it's anything like PF, getting a 9V transformer and just pinching the wires against the correct two contacts (Using old batteries as spacers, perhaps with some tape on their ends to avoid any electrical properties of theirs from having effect) could work, but you'd definitely want to do it right, and EV3 may be more picky about its voltage!

I'm pretty sure he's got add-on rechargeable battery packs in there replacing the AAs, and that the AC adapter is really just a charge port built in to the rechargeable pack.

Yeah, 24122 is only two studs wide, so it would be great there, but alas, it doesn't work that way. Unfortunate that 27940 is too wide for that. I wonder what other options there are. EDIT: Have you thought about using this part, 53585, with the through axle hole? It can have a lot of uses for this type of thing.

I made some more progress the other day, starting on the body of the "truck" that will be hauling this container. We've got an unload function based on a track section at the rear, which links with the container through two 2L pins, and unloads it using two coupled pullback motors. (I've decided to keep this model manual, and it's always fun to find a good use for trusty pullback motors) There's a few little wheels along the sides to help support the container as it slides off. (No, this doesn't make it a space car!), plus some rather Y-wing inspired booster engines alongside the container. I also built a gun that will be hidden under the hood. It's based on the 6-shooter piece, and will hopefully be aimable with a joystick and able-to-be-fired with a knob. I didn't grab a picture of it, so that'll have to wait until the next update!

I'm excited to be starting another contest here at Eurobricks! To start off this topic, I'll try to do a little backstory for my MOC: In the year 22--, the Galactic government, and specifically its police force, was in a sorry state. Decades of corruption had led to an impotent government, which, though not particularly oppressive, no longer had energy to actually govern. The politicians in charge of the galaxy had no interest in ruling; but rather in simply enjoying the most luxurious lifestyles possible. Finding themselves in need of more money to fund these lifestyles, they gradually became more and more influenced by the various intergalactic criminal organizations, who were glad to provide money, so long as a blind eye was turned to their operations. Agreeing to this proposal, the so-called leaders appointed a succession of police commissioners that were just as lazy and hedonistic as they, and repeatedly slashed the peacekeeping force's budget. As the years went on, criminal gangs grew in power, as this galactic police force shrank. Along with these budget cuts came greatly reduced salaries for officers, a complete lack of new equipment, and worthless leadership. Under such conditions, all but the most dedicated peacekeepers left to find other employment, leaving behind only a grim core of officers determined to maintain order in the galaxy in spite of aggressive attacks from the powerful criminals that effectively ruled most territories, and despite the complete lack of encouragement from their superiors. Armed with nothing but whatever equipment they could salvage, piece together, or confiscate; admirable courage, and unyielding determination, these brave men and women would stop at nothing to protect the galaxy's innocents from rampaging criminal warlords... My model takes inspiration from two main sources: Space Police III's 5972 Space Truck Getaway and this ship, the Droch-class boarding ship, from Star Wars: The Clone Wars, where it appears in a few episodes, mainly in Season 1: This ship's goal is to impale an opposing capital ship, cut a hole in its hull, and then deploy battle droids inside. My plan for this MOC is to design a boarding ship for the galactic police of my world, reflecting their poor financial situation and resourcefulness. It will be a sort of space transport truck like that Space Police set, with essentially a shipping container on the back (And the anachronistic earth-truck cab design of the Space Police set!). However, the shipping container is not just a shipping container; but is detachable via hidden engines on its rear. After it is launched, four spikes like those on the Droch-class boarding ship extend from the rear of the container, but all slid towards the center to make one big spike (I'm pretty sure the CW one did this too). After impaling a criminal warlord's ship, the spikes will slide out towards the corners, ripping a hole in the hull, and allowing the Peacekeepers inside the container to invade the ship and capture its leaders. After jettisoning the container, the space truck unveils a hidden cannon from inside its "hood" area and gives air support. Anyways, I haven't made a whole lot of progress yet, but I wanted to show what I have and type out my worldbuilding, so this is what I've got: The container Rear doors blown off as spike extends The other end of the container, with the engines and a door to allow the crew to pass from it to the cab. I'm looking forward to making more progress, and seeing what others come up with!

Yeah, he's right. I've got one in my hands now, and it won't go into the pinhole. Perhaps you could use one of these instead, with one of the new friction stud-pins inside it:

Which can be added via an external hosting website, like Bricksafe.

4770 is long out of production, though, but I think it can be useful!

I'm pretty sure it could be done in theory, but there'd be some practical problems. For one, both of my mechanisms are already a little finicky because of the tight space I allowed for them, and a more complex mechanism really wouldn't help that. For another, I didn't want to take up too much of the interior space, (behind the spike) because the crew needs some room too! That's also why I didn't use motors.

I've made some solid progress lately, and have essentially finished the container part of the model! This is the container in its disguised form, but by turning a knob on the side, this spike will protrude, blowing out the rear doors! By turning another knob on the top, the four parts of the spike slide out in four different directions, tearing a hole in the hull of the enemy ship and allowing the container's crew to disembark into the ship. I've got a video of this action down at the bottom. These mechanisms were fairly hard to realize. I used two mirrored linkage setups to link the spikes into two pairs, and then controlled them with these two long 15L liftarms, which are driven by the square inner profile of a 28T turntable to allow them to function like a long extendable axle (Something similar and simpler could probably have been done with 16L axles, but I only have one real one that I can use in this contest, and I'd need two). Because of the square profile on the stationary part of the turntable, though, the turntables could not be rotated when the beams were slid back in for a stowed spike, but this wasn't a problem, since the spike doesn't have to expand until its extended all the way anyways. Also, I think this model will go quite nicely with my one Technic figure, who happens to be a police officer! Matched with a black helmet, I think he'll look pretty good! My next step will be to start building the "truck" that'll be carrying this container!

Welcome to Eurobricks! I'm pretty sure that should be fine. It might be hard to rotate that long red axle right now by grabbing the axle, but if you pull on the center lever (or the other one that isn't installed at this point in the build) you should have significantly more leverage to get it moving. That's a great set you're working on!

Sweet, thanks for the heads-up! The blue 12T/20T gears were both back in stock as well, along with some other cool stuff, so I'll finally get to try some of the new gears and pins out thanks to $20 in VIP points!

Ah, I see. That's annoying! Sometimes people just make torsion bar suspension by twisting axles, which is something you could try, but that can also be challenging to make hard, and would lose the quirky appeal of your solution!

If the pullback suspension is too soft, could you try preloading it by winding it up a bit before inserting the suspension arm?

Impressive performance for snow!

Nice work! I really like the unconventional suspension ideas. The links work nicely to simulate leaf springs; the Watt's linkage is cool to see, and the pullback torsion suspension is pretty awesome! Does it work well?

I was just looking through a new Lego catalog, and noticed this new wheelchair wheel part, part 80441, which looks to be a half stud thick with a pinhole. I wonder what uses it might have for Technic, being so small and skinny!

Amazing work! The model looks amazing and very clean, but I think what really sets it apart from other 1:8 cars is the functionality. The 8+N+R transmission is about as complex as you could ask for, but the dynamic steering/axle lift is very cool looking, achieved with interesting mechanics, and innovative. Thanks for sharing! I'm pleased it'll be released by CADA as well to make it easier for more people to enjoy it (and, I suppose, result in free instructions through the CADA website eventually?)

Just saw this newish part in Brickset's Random Part of the Day, and it looks like the part I always wanted to make compact 4-way steppers, without the 45 degree offset that knob wheels give you! It's even essentially only one stud in width (two plates plus studs)

I don't have much to add to the technical side of this conversation, but for hosting images, the typical place people use on here is called Bricksafe, which is something of a successor to Brickshelf, and fairly easy to use.

You could use it with part 32172, I believe! It's a pretty useless part, but it's the only one I know of that can clip onto axles from the side...

Well, I'm not 100% sure, but I'm pretty confident it would work, but not at the same speed as the Buwizz. Speed is roughly proportional to voltage, and Buwizz can give up to 11.1 nominal volts, as opposed to the 7.4V of the CADA box. It'll work; it just won't be as fast. Roughly 66.6% of the speed, I believe. I guess I was just trying to say that the 7.4V of the CADA box is quite normal--the same as old PF rechargeable battery boxes and lots of other things. Actually, come to think of it, I think we can infer that the Buwizz motors will function just fine at 7.4V, because I'm sure it's compatible with the older Buwizz 2.0s, which had lower-voltage modes, in a similar range. I don't see them making a motor that wouldn't operate at voltages their batteries put out. Also, if it's of any value, I've used generic Chinese buggy motors on 7.4V batteries lots of times, and it works no problem; just slower.