dhc6twinotter

To be honest, I don't really see a point to the new part. The only thing I can think of is it makes the building process more mistake proof. You know how at the beginning of each instruction book there is a diagram that tells you not to squash a beam between a bushing and 24 tooth crown gear? This new part prevents a beam from being squashed between a bushing and a gear, or two gears, etc. That's the only thing I can think of. Question for the engineers amongst us: Does the round part of the axle produce less friction in a beam hole than the cross axle section would?

Correct. The part quoted in blue text is also correct, and it's what Hopey is referring to. Hopey refers to it as "changes the pitch of the blades", and this is the same as controling the angle of attack for the rotor blades. Same thing, different wording. The entire rotor head does not tilt, but rather each blade (called pitch or, sometimes, angle of attack). Nico is an excellent Technic builder, but his heliopter rotor head does not work like the real thing either (and that is fine....there's nothing that says a LEGO model has to work like a real one). Here's a pretty good animation of how a rotor head works: The blue piece is the swash plate. When the swash plate moves up/down, this is called collective. This changes the pitch of each blade equally. When the swash plate tilts, this is called cyclic control. The pitch of each blade changes as it rotates around the rotor hub. Camera angle 1 is probably the easiest to understand. Camera angles 2, 3, and 4 are taken as if the camera were mounted on the blade. You can see how much change in pitch each blade has to have to achieve something as simple as flying straight. It's amazing! Most helicopters operate in this manner. Tandom helicopters are slightly different, but I'll leave that for a different discussion. That being said, there are different rotor head designs, and some helicopters have a hinged rotor assembly that can tilt. However, that tilt does not come directly from the controls, but rather from the aerodynamic forces acting on the blades. Weavil, you are of course free to built your rotor system however you wish. As I mentioned above, there are no rules that say you have to build something that work like the real thing. This is LEGO and you can design it however you want. It may not be like the real one, but if you like the design, that's all that matters. Your design looks good, and that's a clever use of the new hub piece. My only suggestion would be to replace the 1x7 yellow liftarts with something thinner. The vertically mounted 1x5 thin liftarms will contact the 1x7 yellow liftarms when the rotor head is tilted. My suggestion would be to use the new 1x5 thin liftarms with axle holes in the end, plus two addition 1x3 thin liftarm for the side that your control linkage will connect to (the red axle). This should give you enough space for some movement of the rotor head. It's always nice to see a helicopter moc, and I'm looking forward to your project.

This looks fantastic! I especially like the way the front grill was done.

lol...that was the best customer service complaint ever! That was a PR nightmare for United Airlines.

I've never seen the x-wing, but the other three were exactly what I was thinking about when I read this topic. Awesome mocs.

It's not the end of the world. If we need motors so bad, there's always bricklink. I agree, if LEGO says they are going to release a product on a certain day, they should honor that. Not doing so is poor customer service. However, I have had nothing but exceptional service from LEGO, and I'm willing to cut them some slack. Who knows...maybe there's an issue with the motors or production. I'd rather receive a good product late then a poor product on time. How many mocs are we building that require these motors? Is everybody that is complaining actually building a moc that needs the L and/or servo motors? Like I said, there's always bricklink if we need them bad enough... Sounds like a good, reasonable idea to me.

The crane will be 219.99 when it hits the LEGO stores August 1st. I expect the U.S. TRU stores to price it in the 239.99 to 249.99 range. TRU typically has a 10% hike on their stuff.

I've seen some pretty awesome Technic sci-fi mocs in the past, and I'm all for seeing this done in Technic. And, LEGO Technic had some Star Wars sets back about 10 years ago. I don't recognize the assault frigate, but if you can replicate some of the functions (landing gear, doors, etc) and make it look good, I think it would be a nice moc. IMHO, I don't think the yellow wheels from the mini-backhoe loader will look good. Black or grey would be better and can be purchased off bricklink cheap.

This guy has some really cool stuff.

42004 Mini-Backhoe Loader 42006 Excavator 9396 Helicopter 10211 Grand Emporium 10197 Fire Brigade 10218 Pet Shop I've been doing quite a bit of travel during the last year, and I've have had very little space to build anything. Some of these items are in storage 2,500 miles from where my current location is.

My favorites: 8258 Crane Truck 8110 Unimog 8043 Excavator I'm sure that list is about to change once I get my hands on the crane and service truck. The hovercraft gets my vote. It comes with a fake engine and some gears. The race car set only has the pull-back motor.

I think a grader would be a fantastic set. I don't think we will see a remote control one, however. There is just too many functions. I'd like to see a motorized compressor, fake engine, and hog steering for both the articulation and front wheels. Everything else can be controlled by pneumatic levers in the cab. Think of it as a successor to 8455. IIRC, LEGO has built at least one road grader in the past, but it was a b-model for one of the sets. There are a few really nice road graders mocs, but not many. I'm currently working on two different version, one being remote control and the other manual (as described above).

I like the idea of a garbage truck. If LEGO were to build a garbage truck, I'd like to see them design one of the side load garbage trucks. It's been on my list of mocs I want to build, and it would be nice to see how LEGO would design one. The Barcode Reader Truck was probably the closest LEGO has gotten to building a Technic garbage set.

hmm....I may have to pick one up. 199 for this is a much better value than 9398. New color, more PF elements, and awesome rims.

I see. I'm not sure how you could do that with the driving rings right next to each other. However, if you space the driving rings 1 stud further apart than normal, you may have room to slide the selector out from one ring, then up/down and over into the other ring. The motion wouldn't be that fluid, but that's the only easy way I can think of to do it. The other option would be to use a selector for each driving ring and build separate shift linkage and shift lever. If you plan on motorizing your vehicle, you may have a problem with the driving rings popping out under high torque applications. Hard to say for sure. It sounds like an interesting project! I've never seen a vehicle that can switch between front or rear wheel drive. I do know a guy that has 4 shift levers for his transfer case....he has 3 transfer cases connected together (just the hi/low part), so he has a lever for each case. He has an additional lever that allows him to select between rear and 4wd. He can run his Toyota truck in triple low and in rwd if he wanted to. Plus, he has the manual transmission shifter too!

I'm not sure I follow, but if you're using a single drive selector (aka catch), each driving ring has to line up with each other for the selector to change from one drive ring to the other.

Very nice car! I like the minimalistic approach you took on the body....looks good. I'm usually not a fan of stickers, but you did an amazing job on your stickers. That is an interesting MacPherson strut style front suspension too.

The 4Runners hold their value pretty well, but they are also good vehicles. I don't mind paying more up front if it saves me from doing costly repairs later. My first car was a 1990 4Runner that I bought from a friend. I got a good deal on it, but it was in rough shape. It was a good vehicle though, and lasted me all through school. I learned how to repair vehicles on that 4Runner and did all my own work. I sold it to a friend with over 224,000 miles on it, and now he's been driving it for a while. It still had the original automatic tranny in it too. The 2000 4runner I bought 3 years ago with a bit over 81,000 miles on it. It was a bit more than I wanted to pay for a vehicle, but when I saw that it had a manual transmission, 81k on it, and had the sport package, I jumped on it. I recently did a nearly 25,000 mile road trip around the US, and it now has 124,000 miles on it. I did the 90k recommended maintenance on it (timing belt, water pump, idler pulleys, etc) and a new clutch, and it has been flawless. The 3rd gen ('96-'02) 4Runners have some known issues, but they are mostly cheap repairs. Otherwise, they are very solid vehicles. The older models are a bit smaller, but the newer models ('03+) are larger and have a bit more space.

This whole process has been pretty amazing! I hope LEGO will continue to do fan created projects in the future.

If I had enough money to buy any car, it would probably be the Aston Martin Vanquish: And either a 4 door or troop carrier 70 series Toyota Land Cruiser: Or some sort of classic. I love cars from the 30s, 40s, and 50s. But honestly, I like my 2000 Toyota 4Runner that I have now. I spent 2 years looking for one with a manual transmission, and this has been a fantastic vehicle. It doesn't have as much power as I'd like, but I've been able to go everywhere that I've wanted to. My 4runner at nearly 12,000 feet in Colorado:

Welcome to Eurobricks! I grew up in Cebu City and love the Philippines. My sister and her family just moved back to the Philippines last October. Great people there!

1) Spending forever looking for a piece that I just saw moments before realizing I needed it. 2) Spending forever looking for a piece that is already in my hand (yes, I've done this). 3) Having 1/4 of my LEGO 2300 miles away from the rest. 4) Not having enough space for my LEGO. 5) Constantly dropping pieces on the floor. 6) People who say, "You have too much free time" when looking at my mocs.

That is a really impressive truck. It looks to be very well built. I love design of the cab. Nice use of panels without an over-abundant use of liftarms or studded pieces. 10/10.

I think I know what you are building.

It's a shame I don't have the skills for this position. Too bad the listing isn't for a product designer. I check the LEGO website on a daily bases for jobs, and being a product designer for them would be a dream job.