Appie

Absolutely true. One small note: My reference about size of the model was mostly aimed at flagship sets (so biggest box) among themselves. The 8043 for example, is a "small" flagship in terms of size and partcount compared to his brothers from the years that come after him, but like his bro's, it comes in the flagship box.

There's also one rule that applied to 90% (perhaps even 100%, but I am sure somebody will chime in with the exception) of the so-called flagships the past couple of years: biggest box. The "flagship box" has the same width and length for the past years, only the height changed since the 42030. Biggest box doesn't care about size of the final model or the part count. 42070 comes in the biggest box, therefore it is the flagship.

But Uwe Wubra is the senior designer... This set and his previous set, the Porsche, calls for a job review imho or perhaps you're right and it's all about Lego's bottom line (like any other company), but that means Lego is really lowering its standards (less quality), which is not a good thing. And I haven't even started about the absurd MSRP on this set, which should have never been higher than the Volvo.

Thanks Jim, great review! Seeing more and more of these non-numbered bag big sets pop up is starting to look like it won't just be review versions but also for consumers. While I hate the dumbed down instructions and colour vomit in general to make building easier, I quite liked numbered bags for the simple reason I could pace myself to "a number at a time" with a set and spread the build accross 2-4 evenings. Not to mention each "number" of bags in previous big sets would amount to 4-6 open bags on the table instead of the 16 I now count for this set. This lazy approach looks more something like Lepin would do imo.

There have been a few supercars with this feature already. Jeroen Ottens' DB11 comes to mind. Unless you mean something different? The car looks awesome, great job!

Looks like a modern 3L diff and not the old 4L diff? Or was that what Snipe wanted in the first place? I don't see it being bright red, but there's alot of shadow in that area, but parts that are 100% red around that area aren't as dark as that diff, even when I take into consideration that the red parts are better lighted. So looks like DBG to me.

There's a difference between the problems of inefficient Lego gearboxes due to only having 16T clutches and/or rigidity that can exist in any gearbox and then there's the flaw of the Porsche gearbox where axles aren't seperated for the 16T red clutch gears where they absolutely should. This is the major problem in the gearbox of the Porsche and was discovered by Didumos. So your entire reply does not apply to this case. Like I said, the gearbox now has that sweet happy Lego rattle. That means they sit in place well and have a minimal amount of friction. So no, the comment still stands imo, the gearbox is flawed, even for Lego standards.

It's funny you should start this topic "a year later", because I have been reading the MOD topic and Didumos' topic since day one back in june 2016, but I didn't start building my Porsche that I bought back in november until 2 months ago. At which point I tried to build the model as per instructions and leave the mods "for now". "It couldn't be that bad" I thought. Boy, was I wrong! Porsche is not my favorite car brand by a mile, so it being "a thing of beauty" was never going to be its selling point for me. Back in june 2016 I didn't mind it lacked functions that pushed the enveloppe. Like @allanp I can appreciate the paddle gearbox for its design, but that is only with Didumos' mod of the 90 degree limiter to make it completely reliable. And there's the reason why even a year later I still don't like the model as it was released. There is not one function in the model that is not flawed out of the box. - The pinjoiner in step 5 is beyond retarded, period. This takes 5 seconds to see in a testing enviroment (as in: make a mockup of the 5 parts involved) - 4x reverse, takes 2 parts to fix this. TWO! How did Lego not do this?! - The 24T clucth gear in the gearbox and the reversed second and third gear are such a lazy solution to a far deeper problem: too much friction in the drivetrain. Those 2 very serious flaws were such a clear sign to me that this model was rushed to release. Neither of those solutions have any place in a proper functional gearbox. Like the founder of Lego, I expect quality from Lego, this means that when you (Lego) actually implement functions, they work or you do not implement them! Another way to go would have been to tune them and delay the release until they do work! The retarded friction in the gearbox is a major issue, that again was tackled by Didumos. And what I hope Lego or rather the designer finds truly insulting is that not only did Didumos fix these 2 major issues in his free time, he did this in 1-2 weeks after he got the set! This is a set that the designer worked on for 2 years. 24 months! 104 weeks! And I can only assume a handful of people even testbuilded it during this timeperiod vs 1 guy with 2 weeks of free time after work. However, once I finished building the set, I did notice I got a little appreciation for the model, but only because I applied the crucial mods to make it actually work like it should. The paddle gearbox is very reliable now and the gearbox drivetrain has that sweet happy Lego rattle. I can forgive it not having keyfeatures that define the real life model like the rearwheel countersteering and crabsteering*, but what I can't forgive is functions that were in the final model and don't work. *I will never believe Porsche blocked the rearwheel steering function unless I see the actual prototype that had it or an actual Lego employee that was close enough to the model and not biased to say that it did. The reason I will never believe there's a prototype with this function is because then it would boggle my mind how you can think of implementing a new function when none of the existing ones work!

While I have seen contests with great redesigns in studless, I like the idea of it being forced to another scale. Old studded can of course be remade studless then, but it still has to be a different scale. It's a great idea for a contest from Erik Leppen imo and really fits a 40 year anniversary of Technic to basically make tributes to old/recent sets.

Thanks for the info! I will try that. I opened the servo back when I broke it and yeah, very unpleasant to open.

Speaking from experience you can ruin the return to centre function of a servo by forcing a smaller turning angle. I wouldn't recommend it. I now have a servo that will work for angles up to 45 degrees, but once I try to use it for 90 degrees it simply stays in the 90 degree position. I should add that this was after extensive use that the return to centre started to fail. So if you absolutely have to use this solution, use it with moderation.

Cool. Glad to be of service

While I like the idea of this micro build and what you managed to put in it, it looks pretty off to me (just my opinion, and like some part of the human body, everybody has one sorry). Your micro Porsche and sea plane were awesome, but I don't know for this one. The whole mechanism for the rear makes it look very clunky and out of scale compared to the rest of the model. I understand that perhaps you had the desire to add gears to a Technic MOC, but I'd think the model as a whole would be better off with a "system" approach. With that I mean: ditch all the gears and just have a knob on a friction pin for the car lift. This would also open up space on top for a crane, which could be cooler as a whole? And that combined with the space between the front and rear wheels which screams to me: put something fun here, outriggers perhaps? I hope this doesn't sound harsh, it's meant as constructive feedback. Do with it what you want

Great idea BusterHaus, but I happen to have a few of those old rubber belts and they do tend to touch liftarms next to it as well. One minor note for the diff with this solution: with these tyres, the diff will be very close (1-2mm) to the ground at the 28T side. It should work, but something to keep in mind if ground clearance is a concern. edit: since the OP said it as well about the diff height, what you could do, is place the diff above the wheels and link them with gears to the wheels, but that would sacrifice some interior.

I like it that Lego is making new colours and don't mind if it takes a couple of years to make a full pallette. It is honestly one of the few reasons why I would even consider buying some of the 1H sets of 2017. What I do not like however is that we now have 3 versions of 'light blue": medium blue, medium azure and with the 42070, dark azure. Pick one light blue and stick with it! We don't need 300 variations imo of something that basically boils down to the same colour, I can see this being cool in system sets, but not for Technic. It certainly doesn't help for people who have a little bit of colour blindness for certain colours. For example, I can't see the difference between some shades of green and brown, I can handle bright green and normal green in Lego, that's pretty obvious to see, but I would dread the day I'd have to spend 5 minutes to see the difference between a "light ocean green" and "light sea green". inb4 ocean and sea are the same thing (in terms of colours), that's what I thought when I read blue and azure

Well initial testing of this version of my indicator mod looks promising, can't manage (yet?) to get a gear grind on the steering mechanism. The idea of this mod was to have in indicator below the speed-o-meter. I know from a playability perspective this mod is freakin useless since you have to be in the driving seat looking through your steeringwheel to actually see it (edit: and even then you can't see it lol, mod didn't make it to the final build, other attempts to get it closer to the steering wheel failed) , but I liked the idea of having it close to where one would be on the real car. I didn't want to use stickers, though at one point I did mess with the numbers that label the stickers on the stickersheet to put them on a part. Anyway, white=1st gear, grey 2nd, orange 3rd and blue 4th (just some colours I had round 1x1 tiles of). (and yes I don't like it either that I used a 3L pin with stop bush on the right and a ballpin on the left for the rubber bands, will probably adjust that tomorrow for the sake of symmetry)

Exactly why I think the product was rushed. Didumos and others fixed this thing so fast it wasn't even funny. Only adds more to the insult that they think we'd be OK with this kind of model. While most customers probably won't care, because it looks nice and they will never remove the body, because that "in a normal gearbox I wouldn't be here" white clutch gear solves all problems there might be, but personally, I can not take another of these sets. I might buy one to build awesome stuff like Jeroen Ottens' DB11, but never again for the actual model if it is as flawed as this one. I am all ears if you have other solutions besides the Claas which auto-align. The problem I ran into with the Porsche was that at one point I had to involve gears, so I could route axles to the rear steering, so more slack. Perhaps with a custom chassis I could have removed that problem, but I didn't think it was worth the effort (and tbh, I want to spend my time on other Lego stuff). I don't have any pictures of this solution, but it was basically a combination of the rear hog route, my 4>2 gear selector from my first attempt at this 2 mode RWS and the Claas method. I used the same as my original attempt, so in front of the midconsole and behind the front wheels was my playground to squeeze it in. The reason I completely dropped it was because I felt I came up one stud short at the top (collided with the normal steering to front axle) and it looked like I couldn't get enough angle on my small Claas mechanism to compensate for slack. Also in the back of my mind was that I had to brace this stuff to hell and back like Lipko's telehandler with Claas mechanism to compensate for the tires acting like glue on a surface. It felt like a little too much for the limited space I had available, it could very well be doable, but I had a hard time visualizing it. I also heard TLG had a prototype with rws, but that Porsche said no. I have a hard time believing that to be true though, considering the crazy amount of flaws in the current version (if you have time to add another feature, you have time to make sure the stuff you made first actually works). And even if they did have rws, I wonder if it had an actual switching mechanism to switch between 2 modes of rws or if it was just like the 8880. Porsche could have said no, because they didn't find the angles realistic (which they won't be with Lego) or was like: nope, don't want 8880 steering. I don't think such a version was presented to Porsche though, the 8880 version maybe, but with a real switch? Nope.

Thanks and my apologies, should have re-read the topic, I remember that reply from months ago now that I see it again. As a result I added your frictionless style axles to the gearbox. Except I only used it on the side of 4th and 2nd gear. This had 2 reasons: I could mount an 2x4 liftarm here easily providing space for a 4L axle with stop and 3L axle with stop. I personally don't like a 2L axle "floating" halfway in a liftarm. I know the chances of it moving are 0.0001%, but I just don't like it. The other reason was that on the other side of the gearbox I already mounted my new version of a 1 speed reverse (this time same speed as first gear ) and didn't feel like tearing it down again. Luckily for me the real culprit in this story was the red clutch gear in front of the gearbox that goes to the selector axle of 4th and 2nd gear. Once I changed this, second gear became as silky smooth as the other 3 gears. So thanks Didumos for figuring this out. Another thing that felt off to me was how the rear part of the gearbox was basically mounted on a pair of these mounted only in the middle to the 5x7 frame below it. I could visibly see that stuff bend when it was in second gear (like Didumos said, it's pushing it down). So I added his brother to the dead space of 5L axle which I then mounted to the 5x7 frame below it with a couple of black pins. I did this before changing the axles and could notice a slight decrease in friction, small, but noticeable. @Kumbbl I agree, alot of these errors have no place in product like this, luckily there are people out here that will fix Lego's utter crap (the pin joiner in step 5 is a serious triple red card Lego, it does not fit!) I do hope however that people who aren't on forums like this, will email Lego to death with the clear flaws in this product so they know better for next time. And I know they get emails for the dumbest crap, but in this case they are warranted. The product was rushed (not finding a proper solution like Didumos for 1>3>2>4 clearly shows this imo) and very flawed in general (see errata). I have been wanting to quit this build many times and I just barely finished box 1. I never take breaks from building a set, yet this has been on my table for 3 weeks now. There's only so much face palming a guy can take in a week. In other news, I decided to drop the rear wheel steering mod. I got pretty close to installing the Claas method (only method I knew which will auto-align the wheels on gearshifts), but could already see slack getting the best of me when the steering angle at the rear is so small and my space at the front to compensate for that slack being limited. And then I figured: if I am going to bother to make a mini version of the Claas method, why not actually give it a whirl in a mini Claas (yes, I am aware somebody already made one, I am not original ) I am still trying to get my indicator mod to work. I want it below the speed-o-meter in the dash, which I managed, but I need to brace the steering better. After that, I am done with this model though.

A question: do people notice more friction in second gear than the other 3 after fixing the sequence to being correct? The funny thing is that when I put gear 2 and 3 like the instructions (so 1>3>2>4) the friction is gone (just like Lego said why they did it). In gear 1-3-4 I can push the chassis with no rigidity reinforced mods perfectly smooth over the table, but second gear comes to a grinding halt within 5cm. Considering the same amount of gears are turning, I don't understand how this happens. Additional bracing of parts doesn't seem to help nor moving the gears of gear 2 and 3 in front of the the rear axle. Removing the red 16T of 4th gear made no difference (figured that different speed might be messing it up like Didumos pointed out) , but perhaps I need to fully adjust the axles like @Didumos69 did with his mod.

Wow this looks awesome! I love the colour scheme. I understand you don't like that 3x3 LBG part in the wings and therefore are considering full LBG wings, but the black works so well with the medium blue imo. Can't wait for the video (I hope there will be one at least).

What people choose to keep "real" and not is up to them and being contradicting or not in that aspect as well. People mod what they want with this model or keep what they want. As for the 16+ tag and Lego seriously ignoring this tag while using the instructions or functions of the model was already clear, so we can add stickers to that as well

No need for IMHO, it's just wrong I was afraid I might have messed this up. I figured the instructions would show the model being build in 1st gear, so I build this mod on that assumption, I should have bothered to check this properly, sorry. To fix this to the same ratio as first while preserving ground clearance might be a little tricky, but I'll give it a whirl. Same ratio as second is doable at least. As for being a "hell-driver", I'd consider it quite a feat to move a car from standstill in 4th gear, not to mention "4th gear" in reverse. I managed 3rd once (and never tried again), but that was due to lack of me not paying attention and I guess some nice clutch handling (it didn't make a sound), but from 4th? Would just shut down the engine. As for combining the 2 mods, I don't see that happening. If I read correctly, DayWalker has inverted the D and R on the console, mine is still true to the sticker. I am aware the sticker is wrong compared to real life, but overhauling the gearbox to make the rear red 16T gear in the console reverse felt like more of a hassle and I didn't want to mess with the sticker.

The 3L pin with pinhole in the centre would be mounted by that centre pinhole on the 5x7 frame, the right side would be on the 6L thin liftarms and the left side of that 3L pin with centre hole would be inserted into the black liftarm of the chassis (besides that 5x11 panel in black). Those 6L thin liftarms aren't going anywhere on that side. As for the structure being stronger because of the axle holes, the cross blocks are much more likely to break under stress than any other part in Technic. The axles holes of the thin liftarms are nice to keep the 2L liftarms in place for the top of the console though, hence why I kept them on the right side for this solution. I am not going to bother taking a picture for this, this is just one kind of fix of many for this very small problem. Also, no problem you like the one from DayWalker more, to each their own. I have a different idea for a gear indicator which some probably won't like either, I don't mind, it's just an idea I like more than the 2 current options available

Ok, take it easy, that's easily fixed though. Not that I care to fix it, but if only that axle is a problem, I see an easy fix with a couple of 6L thin liftarms in place of the (left side) 5L thin liftarms, a 3L pin with pinhole in the centre and a couple of pin changes and done. I agree that it's a good building style, but I like the idea of the unibody being functional on a model. Just as I did for Sheepo's Mustang, however Sheepo's Mustang gearbox doesn't suffer from the loss of rigidity in the chassis like the Porsche chassis, because the whole gearbox is modular on the Mustang.

In the real car they are mounted at the rear of the front wheels. (edit: woops just noticed another page to this topic with DayWalker's reply) @Kumbbl Also, from your images of the gear indicator mod I see nothing of my reverse mod that wouldn't be compatible. Your choice to use it or not obviously, but I see nothing that would stop the 2 from co-existing. Perhaps the 4x2 liftarms behind the console would be in the way, but I question their necessity in general for this mod. Though it's probably just to keep the chassis rigid without the body. I personally don't care for that feature, because current cars also have the feature that they get their strength from the body as well.