RiGi

Eurobricks Vassals
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Everything posted by RiGi

  1. Care to elaborate on that last bit when there were at least fifteen other entries that also had side by side photos of both the original and remake, including @GerritvdG's 8835? And those side by side photos can work both for and against entries as they can highlight the differences between the models more clearly, as well as the similarities. You also talk about newcomers being discouraged from entering again - TC20 was my first contest and first MOC. I had such an enjoyable time building my model and had no expectations of doing well in the contest, and I was incredibly proud that so many people liked it. Having my entry singled out and insulted for no real reason actively discourages me from entering contests in future. As I understand it, having fun is meant to be the main objective of these contests, something which seems to have gotten lost in some of these posts.
  2. By coincidence I also did an order on 21/1 and my non-bestseller parts arrived yesterday, so I would imagine yours should arrive shortly. Unlike the bestseller parts, I didn't have any communication from Lego that they had shipped, they just turned up unexpectedly!
  3. Nice choice! I loved a bit of Thunderbirds back in the day and this looks good so far, so I'm excited to see how this progresses!
  4. Weird! I couldn't even see it as showing up as out of stock when I checked earlier, but it's there now (but still out of stock)
  5. Finally! Still no sign of the 3x19 frame on the UK PaB though... *eyeroll*
  6. I remember I had 3 of the 2780 black pins spare after bag one and thinking it was a bit odd, but after checking the instructions I couldn't see any missing from anywhere so I think it's deliberate to have 3 spare (possibly because there's none spare in the next couple of bags). I had a couple spare after a later bag as well (bag four sounds about right).
  7. Does anyone know if the new 20t gears run smoother than the old tan 20t bevel gears when meshed with a 16t gear in the configuration below? I always find this combination never runs as smoothly as other gear combinations, and from reading other threads on here it seems to be caused by the newer mould of the bevel gear (which is all I seem to have). I'm hoping the new 20t gear fixes this issue!
  8. Thanks! Making semi-trailing arm suspension would definitely pose a challenge given my very basic mechanical knowledge and limited MOC-ing experience (Although it would be pretty awesome if I could manage to pull it off!) I can only find one example online of it being used in an MOC, and that's @nicjasno's Ford Sierra RS 500. Fortunately, his YouTube channel has the livestream recordings from when he made that MOC, so I might try and find some time to watch them to try and get a better understanding of how it works mechanically and how it translates into Lego...
  9. As a kid growing up in the 90's in Essex, this is one of those cars that you couldn't help but love That massive "whale tail" spoiler is one of those iconic features of the time. I started working on this MOC about 18 months ago, but it's been largely sat collecting dust for the last year or so for various reasons. Now it's time to try and get back into it and actually finish it off! (This may still be a slow-burner of a project though...) This is the current state of affairs: It has a 5 speed + reverse manual gearbox and 4WD with a 4 cylinder engine at the front. My initial focus was on the gearbox. I spent a lot of time looking at various different gearbox designs people have created on here, but I always found them to be quite tall and I wanted to keep the gearbox as flat as possible and spread it out over the width of the car instead. I took a lot of inspiration from how @Gray Gear designs his gearboxs to work around the rear axle and the use of slightly unconventional parts in the gear selector mechanism and came up with this: Drivetrain (yellow axle connects to the fake engine) : Gear selector mechanism - The "mechanical claw" pieces turned out to be ideal: I've gone with the fairly typical use of thin liftarms to stop multiple gears being selected at once: The mechanism works nicely, and the gearbox & drivetrain generally works pretty smoothly - the only issue is reverse gear has quite a lot of resistance, which I imagine is down to the 3 8T gears. I'm also now wondering whether I could have worked a way of fitting a central diff in, but I don't think that will be entirely straightforward... The front axle is frankly a bit of a hot mess... It's functional but not very elegant! Trying to fit drive, steering and the engine all together proved to be very challenging. I'm sure there must be a neater way of fitting it all in, but I'm yet to find it! The suspension attachment to the top wishbone is largely based on the 42115 suspension. Coming back to this after so long I've noticed some other things that are bothering me slightly: The ride height seems a little bit too low - I think it should come up ~1 stud. On one hand this should be an easy fix - simply adjust the top suspension mount positions. On the other hand, getting to these may be tricky... I inadvertently slightly mis-scaled the drawing I was working from, and now my wheelbase is 1 stud too long... The steering wheel is probably a bit too low I'm also slightly torn on whether to make this the rally version or the road-going version. My initial plan was to go with the road-going version from my childhood, but now I'm thinking the rally version would be more interesting with a rollcage, massive front spotlights, etc.... (I'm not sure why this one doesn't have the whale-tail spoiler, all other rally ones did!) Bodywork is a massive weakness for me - has anyone got any tips/advice on how to approach making the bodywork? Thanks for reading!
  10. Thanks! 5+r and a centre diff is the ideal scenario as that's what the real car has, so I'd like to keep that if possible, but it'll involve a bit of reworking of the gearbox at some point. Supercars definitely have their place (the 42056 911 GT3 RS was the thing lured me back from the wilderness of my dark ages...), but there's plenty of other interesting cars out there to MOC, so I'm glad to offer a bit of variety! In terms of an update, I've made a decent amount of progress (after far too many hours of tinkering ) and I think I've finally got a front axle that I'm pretty happy with! In order to fit the engine in I had to place the steering rack back as far as possible whilst trying to keep the bracing restricted to a pretty limited path: I then had a choice to make for the engine position, either place it partially over the steering rack which would have meant it sitting very close to the height of the bonnet, or place it in front of the steering rack but be able to mount it 2 studs lower. In the end I went for the second option as that way it'll give me more space to add some details on top of and around the engine later on: In an ideal world I would have preferred it to be one stud further back, but I'm scuppered by the half stud length of axle that sticks out from crank at that end. Finally, added some bracing and the suspension top mounts: (Orange axle connects to the engine, yellow axle connects to the diff, steering from the u-joint above) So it now has decent suspension geometry (positive caster, negative camber, kingpin inclination & ackermann), drive, steering and an engine! I suspect I'm going to have to route the steering to the steering wheel with two 90° bends via bevel gears rather than using u-joints, but that should actually make it easy to add a HoG steering knob on top of the dashboard so I think I can live with that. Next job - try and rework the gearbox to add a central diff and make reverse gear run smoother. I also briefly considered reworking the rear suspension to be more realistic, but after looking into semi-trailing arm suspension I realised that that's way beyond my knowledge level right now ) As always, any suggestions/critique are greatly appreciated! Thanks
  11. Thanks for the reply. Given that I'm going for the rally version rather than the road going version now, I don't need to worry about fitting in rear seats. That means more room available in the rear of the car, so I'm tempted to rework the gearbox to include a central diff now in keeping with the real car. That's a good point. If I did rework the gearbox, I might change it from a 5+R to a straight 6-speed (or even just keep it as a 5-speed and lose reverse) which would help it run a bit smoother as the 3 8T gears used for the reverse gear do put up a bit of resistance currently.
  12. Thanks! Thanks for the input! This is going to be a purely manual model, so hopefully there won't be as much stress on the components than there would be in an RC model. I was conscious of the bracing around the diff and the potential for it to sag a bit, so I deliberately used longer axles and doubled up on supporting liftarms at the ends of them to try and minimise this: I'm hoping that this will be sufficiently strong enough for a manual model, but I'll definitely keep in mind your idea of swapping the 16:16 gearing with a 12:20 gearing. I presume if I went down that road I would also need to apply the same gearing on the rear axle with it being 4WD? In a worst case scenario, there's probably enough room for the engine if I move the diff back up so that it's directly connected to the driven axles and use the newer 4L CV joints - but I don't have any, and I'm trying to avoid doing too many parts orders!
  13. Progress Update: after much tinkering I think I've finally got the front axle geometry setup just right! Head on, everything looks to be as parallel as possible: I managed to get a smidgen of negative camber, which is hopefully enough to have an affect: I ended up reducing the caster angle to 1 stud as it was getting tricky to line the steering rack up in such a way that didn't create toe in/out. Now the steering angle is much closer to being parallel with the axle and the wheel alignment is much better (the steering rack is fixed in place right now so I could check the wheel alignment more easily): I decided to drop the diff down 2 studs to create more room to fit the fake engine in (the axle with the orange connectors will connect the engine to the gear box) One downside I've found to my wheel hub design is that if I use 4L axles to connect the wheels, they have a tendency to slip off the u-joints after a while. The best solution I've come up with so far is to use a 5.5L axle with stop and use a 3x3 disc as a sort of wheel cover to hide the excess axle length: Hopefully over the bank holiday weekend I can spend some time finalising the bracing, steering and fake engine! As always, if anyone more knowledgeable than me (i.e. almost everyone ) spots any areas for improvement then I'll gladly take on board any advice! Thanks
  14. This may be a bit too similar to the TC20 studless contest, but how about a "scale-up a classic System set" type theme? You have the overall bounding box to stop models getting too big, you get a variety of models to keep (most) people happy and you get a fair comparison of models by including a comparison of the looks with the original System set as part of the scoring criteria. But unlike TC20, people can go nuts and add as many functions as they like within the confines of the bounding box!
  15. Thanks! I'm only really used to the standard Lego double-wishbone suspension, so it's been pretty interesting learning about and building something more realistic! Thanks for the comments! The caster angle works out at ~12.5 degrees with a two stud offset or ~6 degrees with a one stud offset. I read in another thread on here that recommended ~10 degrees so I went with the two stud offset. Although I did also read that most real cars tend to use around 3-5 degrees, so a one stud offset may be more realistic. Yeah, the two yellow shocks are super stiff, but that was mostly for proof of concept of the dual-spring setup. I don't have any of the soft shocks right now, but I'm planning on getting the 42139 All Terrain Vehicle at some point, so that will provide me with plenty of soft shocks to play around with! The main reason for changing the U-joints to CV joints is because I noticed that the axles tends to start slipping out of the 12t gears in the diff after a while, so I want to use them so the axles have that extra wiggle-room. I'll still keep the U-joints at the hub end for the extra steering angle. Out of interest, as this is going to be a manual model and not motorised, would adding camber have much noticeable effect? Or is that something that would only be noticeable at the higher cornering speeds you would get with an RC model?
  16. So after much learning and tinkering I think I've come up with a MacPherson strut suspension setup that will work. The wheel hub started off life as the one in @nicjasno's video that @Mechbuilds posted above, which I've then modified to make longer so it fits in the deeper Defender rims and gives the axle more support. The top mount is the result of trying out a few different ideas until I found something reasonably compact that would prevent the suspension from bending under load. It has (if my understanding is correct ): positive caster angle (I've gone with a 2 stud offset in this instance) Ackermann steering a reasonable approximation of kingpin inclination - the hub is vertical but the steering link and U-joint aren't perfectly along the inclination axis I also made a dual-spring version, as I suspect the final model may be quite heavy, so this gives me some options later on: (Disclaimer: this is just a test frame at the moment, the finished axle will obviously look quite different! I'll also be replacing the U-joints that connect to the diff with the new 4L CV joints, but I don't have any right now) I still need to work on the steering rack placement, as it fouls on the diff in this test setup. Offsetting the diff is also a possible option. Of course, if anyone wiser than me spots any glaring flaws with what I have so far, then I'll gladly take on board any advice!
  17. @Mechbuilds Oh wow! That's some seriously helpful information, thank you so much!
  18. I'd definitely like to improve the front axle for sure. Unfortunately my knowledge of steering geometry is pretty much non-existent at this point, so I'm gonna have to spend some time educating myself! Yeah, I'd started to make the same realisation about the seats. They were largely just a placeholder at this point though, so I'll definitely be changing them at some point. Thanks! I'll have to check out the RS500 thread. Yeah, thinking back to when I built the gearbox, I think I sacrificed the central diff because it fouled on the gear selector mechanism. That said, if I go for the rally version, I don't need to worry about fitting in rear seats, so could rework the gearbox without worrying about the self-imposed height restrictions... Decisions, decisions... Ahh, that would explain it! Thanks! (I totally agree with you on the top wing - why buy the Cosworth without it?!)
  19. It's interesting to see TLG making those changes to the Zetros. Although I can't help but think that they probably wouldn't have bothered going to the effort if they weren't already being forced to update the instructions/packaging because of the new hubs... Maybe I'm just being cynical though
  20. RiGi

    LEGO 10294 Titanic Discussion

    This set is absolutely stunning! It's incredibly tempting to order it on day 1, but I have absolutely nowhere to display something of this size at the moment - I might have to take a trip to Ikea first Has anyone come up with any ideas on how to feasibly display this behemoth of a set? (Besides Racing Brick's Tinic of course!)
  21. So with everyone taking the chance to rebuild their favourite childhood sets, this seemed like the perfect opportunity to take on my own favourite - the 8872 Forklift Transporter! I'm torn between keeping it at a 1:1 with the original, or making it slightly larger and adding one or two more functions, most likely a small engine and tilting cab in the truck, that way the extra functions will be kind of hidden so it can still keep the looks of the original. I'm leaning towards making it slightly larger, and this is my (very basic) initial progress so far: I'm not 100% sure the wheelbase is quite right on the truck with that size wheel, I think it may need to be 1 or 2 studs longer. I'm hoping I can dig my original transporter out of storage over the weekend to do a side by side comparison!
  22. Instructions are finally completed and available for free on Rebrickable: https://rebrickable.com/mocs/MOC-89526/RiGi/8872-forklift-transporter-studless-remake/ There is also an updated Studio file available on Rebrickable as well - I noticed a couple of minor errors with the original while I was making the instructions This is my first time making instructions, so if anyone has any feedback on them feel free to let me know! :)
  23. Thanks! I figured Studio would be pretty commonly used, but wasn't sure! I'm probably not the best person to ask, to be honest! I've not used any other Lego-based design software so don't really have anything to compare it to (apart from other non-Lego 3D modelling software I use for work). In terms of constructing this model, Studio was pretty straightforward to use once I'd learned the basics. Rotating pieces was pretty easy and you can temporarily hide pieces from displaying to make placing pieces in covered areas easier. My model is fairly simple though, with only a few bits of "off-square" geometry, so I can't really comment on how well it works for constructing more complex geometries/models
  24. For anyone that may be interested, I've made a digital version of the model in Studio that can be downloaded here: https://bricksafe.com/files/RiGi/8872---forklift-transporter/8872_ForkliftTransporterStudless.io I may make proper instructions at some point, but this is my first digital model and I'm still learning how to use Studio, so it may not be for be a while (On a side note, is there a particular file format for digital models that is generally preferred? I noticed Studio can export to several other different file formats)