otpi

My humble opinion would be to add subforums only for very special subjects that can be strictly moderated, i.e. a forum for lego 3d drawing and creating instructions a forum for nxt programming maybe a review subforum (because it makes reviews easy to find) Other than that I believe a forum needs to have posts running off the first page to feel alive. General topics such as the "Lego Technic General one", and "Which set should i buy?" could get a sticky to keep them up top.

I solved this problem by buying more than one of each set. I keep one as display and the others as spare parts. My kids love to play with the display models, and if they break one I have good reason to rebuild it :)

Hm... I might have to blow the 2013 lego budget. I'd really like to have one of each, possibly two or three unimogs... I always watch for deals, but I may have to go for retail price this time.

Yes TRU. If it is an online offer only it will say so.

A fire engine with a working water hose! I can see that as a winner! yay!

4x 8070 Supercar, 2x 9398 4x4 Crawler, 2x 42009 Mobile Crane mkII, and 2x of those pullback models. If only I had more time... :)

Christmas came early this year. Just bought two 42009 mkII at a 30% discount. :)

Interesting... For some regions, e.g. Norway. You get "pick a brick" where you guys see "to buy a piece". If I select Uk or denmark, I get the same as in the post above.

That's a nice mod. Well done. I think the unimog wheels look good, but a tad off next to the 8070 front wheels? Maybe add some color to the all black canopy to accentuate the shape? Now I'm sounding overly critical.

Going thorough these steps I cannot find "To buy a piece"? I only get "pick a brick" where I cannot find the right panels and frames, or "my piece is missing", where I do find the desired pieces but I can only select as many as is present in the set I'm "missing pieces" for. Did they do away with the buy option?

I don't think the problem is the price, but whether there is actually a market for MOC plans? I'd happily pay 20€ for an awesome moc of respectable size, If I had a lot of spare parts lying around. What I mean is; since TLG don't have Technic part-packs readily available, most people only have bricks that are already tied up in models. So the thought goes: "Should I use my €, tear down a model, and build this MOC?", rather than: "I have all these bricks, what to do? Oh... what an awesome MOC! I'll buy!". That's, imo, why people are not willing to shell out the cash. As an example: Since I have kids, and like lego, I naturally told grandparents, uncles, and friends that where going to buy gifts to go for Duplo, specifically bricks (because you only need so many lions and police cars). We now have a "ton" of bricks (and eight lions and five police cars), sufficient to build a house of duplo big enough for one toddler to crawl into. That's pretty awesome. And every time we take out our Duplo we ask: "What should we build today?". If I could browse for awesome duplo builds, I'd probably pay... Only problem is that I would also be able to replicate whatever is shown from one picture, at least something that's close enough.

Your local RC stores spare parts section? It's not lego, but should offer tires that will fit your rims. Just bring one in and try them on.

Build your own diff using knob gears, a frame with the 40 t gear fixed. Takes up space, but should handle the torque.

Thanks. A good read. I have a pretty decent RC model car store nearby. I bet they have some of those wheels in stock, or something like it. Off topic; Anyone tried changing the lego battery for a RC 11.1 V LiPo battery. I know It's to much V, but I don't really mind burning a motor, and from what I have read so far it seems like the lego motors should handle it. Ideally I'd like to change the IR remote for my RF one, just to get the increased range and be able to use it on sunny days. Mybe this should be it's own topic. :p

Anyone tried chipping away the center ridge of the tires to increase grip? As it is the center forms a continuous slick surface. If I chip away 1-2 mm of the rubber between the tracks I believe the tires would grip edges a lot better. Thoughts?