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BrickMonkeyMOCs

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Everything posted by BrickMonkeyMOCs

  1. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    Post-review mod of the McLaren W1. The tops of the rear fender are higher, the exposed studs on the side are tiled over, and the orange-black color transition at the nose is a plate lower. I used a couple of small non-Lego parts for the stud-reversal at the front, but I think lowering the front does a lot to improve the model. Stock on left, modified on right.
  2. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    Sure. They're on Rebrickable: https://rebrickable.com/mocs/MOC-154596/BrickMonkeyMOCs/mazda-mx5/#details
  3. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    Reviews coming soon at Hispabrick Magazine. Ferrari, McLaren, & Bugatti reviews are all now live.
  4. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    It does look good, but the chances of the actual 2026 livery looking anything like that are pretty low, so I doubt we'll see it.
  5. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    I just built the new UCS AT-ST and am satisfied with it. It's a worthy successor to my now outdated 2006 model, with a more polished finish and adding a decent interior. I did find the construction of the feet to be oddly flimsy (and in a way that was easily fixed), and the seat backs are definitely better (and not too fragile) after replacing the stickers with actual 1x2 ingots. I quite like the outwards splay of the legs, and it's nice to have a more affordable UCS set on offer for once. Still waiting for that UCS Speederbike though.
  6. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    The new Porsche 911 GT3 is excellent and easily the best of the latest wave. It's amazing looking back to the Porsche 911s of 2015's 75912 set to see how far the theme has come in ten years. My only gripe is that the driver sits too low and hunched forward, looking like a child in need of a booster seat (see below). I recommend removing the bar behind his head and then raising him by a plate, moving him a stud forwards, and then leaning him back. It requires some further modification to the steering wheel mount and the rear deck mount, but makes for a much better and more natural look.
  7. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    Just built this and can't praise it highly enough. Incredible build techniques, great new parts, and an amazing final product. The first Icons car since the Mustang and Porsche 911 to really raise the bar for car design. The few minor flaws, such as the weak door limiters, stickered number plate, and studded windshield, barely register when set against the beautiful lines and proportions of the model, and its many satisfying details like the seamless hood and boot hinges, and curved edges around the doors and boot lid. I should probably be annoyed by the price tag, but when the model's this good I'm actually okay with it.
  8. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    Here's a simple fix for making the front winglets turn with the front wheels the way they're meant to, and as they do on the Red Bull. It's not quite as simple as just copying over the Red Bull assembly, as the differing suspension set-up (push vs pull-rod) gets in the way. Still, it's easy to do and significantly improves the model. (If it's not obvious from the last picture, you'll need to change the lower suspension rod connection from a red pin-type ball joint to a grey axle-type ball joint.)
  9. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    Not a fan of the stickered headlights.
  10. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    Well, the 42205 Corvette now looks a lot nicer by comparison. It was never going to be easy to replicate the curves of the Supra at this scale with Technic parts, but the windscreen/roof area in particular looks far too square and rectangular.
  11. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    My first thoughts are that the model looks like it will be much more reliant than the Ferrari on stickers to look good, given the yellow nose on a black panel and the red bulls on either side of the engine cover. (The Speed Champions version looks to have the advantage of these being printed.) The angle of the Halo also looks oddly flat, but I'm very pleased to see the differing side wall printing on the tires, offering an alternate tire compound. I expect the functionality (suspension, steering, and 2-speed gearbox) to be the same as the Ferrari, but if I'm choosing one over the other (which at this price I will be), I'm going with the Ferrari.
  12. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    Wheel #42716 from the Mustang and Porsche sets arguably already is a better generic wheel at this smaller scale - it just doesn't have a matching thinner version like the #56904/56145 combo used here. I suppose the #42716 rim is also more of a generic muscle car rim than a modern sports car rim, but it shows that it can be done. I think we also need a more sporty alternative to the #49294 Defender/488 rim with the same hollow design. I'd love to see something like what CaDA have done for 1:10 rims at this smaller scale.
  13. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    Looks alright but I'm not seeing anything to warrant that price increase. Headlights could've been printed, and the stickered tail-lights and exhaust feel lazy. These cars also badly need a modernized wheel rim or insert.
  14. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    I agree it's not a big deal, but I still would have preferred gender-neutral racing balaclava head prints under the helmets. A mixture of male/female heads would've made more sense in the city line-up I think, where realism has already been sacrificed for play.
  15. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    Nice model, but I'm not a fan of the stickers. I don't get why TLG promise not to sticker Star Wars UCS plaques anymore, but continue to sticker the plaques in other product lines.
  16. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    The NZ price has gone from NZ$330 for the McLaren or Mercedes to $400 for this one.
  17. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    Nice. There's a lot to like here, with the printed tires, 2-speed gearbox, new cylinder molds, and vastly improved shaping over the 2024 Mercedes set. Price is rather high though (fewer parts than previous 1:8 F1 models yet costs 20% more?), and it's a pity the front/rear tire width remains unchanged, especially given that Speed Champions and the Icons FW14 have both corrected for this. With the Speed Champion sets also going up in price (again!) I don't think I can justify getting the Red Bull as well as this.
  18. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    New F1 cars look good. I like that there is more variation in design than there was between this year's McLaren and Aston Martin models. I love the nose slopes, front winglets, fatter rear tires, and concave rear wing slopes. I'm surprised they haven't made a custom Halo part (as some other brands have done), and I'm not sure yet about the new helmets.
  19. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    I've bought this set but found it to be a bit disappointing. It's very reliant on stickers, the engine can't be accessed or viewed without some disassembly, and a long hose element meant to go across the rear was 5mm too short to even be attached. It also seems to have been optimized more for motorization, as the static model's front axle sits far too high (minus the battery box to sink it down) and there's a very noticeable hole left in the cockpit floor (for the steering servo). It still makes for a nice display model but falls short of Lego's Peugeot 9x8 in terms of design and functions. I also bought CaDA's licensed 1:10 RUF GT though, and this one far exceeded my expectations. The printed elements are great, the spring-loaded doors are very satisfying to operate, and the whole thing just felt like a top-end premium product. The wheels and tires on both models are also light years ahead of anything Lego are offering for 1:10 cars, and I greatly appreciate the absence of colorful pins and axles spoiling the external finish.
  20. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    Thanks for the heads up! There's no perfect purist solution, but the best I can suggest is to build the rear wing all studs-up, connecting to an inverted 2x2 tile at the bottom (in place of 33909), then using different connections for the rear light and 1x1 diffuser panels (I'd replace the 1x1 bracket with a 1x2 jumper plate, and instead connect the rear light via another 1x2 jumper plate with a 1x2-1x2 up bracket from below the 1x4 plate, and then use 1x1 brackets in place of the 1x1 plates to connect the diffuser panels at 90deg).
  21. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    Made the above three changes and also replaced the minifig with a more suitable driver. Really happy with the result, though not yet sure if I should also remove the black printing from the side window frame. Update: Switched the headlight covers from trans-black to trans-clear, and added the cheese slopes in front of the spoiler as suggested by Void_S.
  22. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    Yes, early reviews confirm that the Ferrari needs some work - filling in the headlights, thinning the spoiler from 2x6 to 1x6, and removing the red printing on the lower side windows. Unfortunately one further flaw that looks less easy to fix is that the figs only fit in the car with one arm raised.
  23. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    Excellent work. While I would prefer a hollow rear wing and cars that fit a minifig, I can appreciate why you've sacrificed those here as you get a realistically low position for the driver's helmet, and very accurate overall shaping. I particularly like what you've achieved with the sidepods, and it's very interesting to see the difference made by properly sized front and rear tires. The custom sticker work is also impressive, especially on the Ferrari.
  24. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    Here's a great comparison video from RacingBrick. I'll repeat here what I posted on the video, which is that I think Firas' MOC is off in small ways that can easily be modified (rear wing, engine cover, windscreen, etc), while the new official set is off in fundamental ways that will be very hard to modify and which affect the defining lines of the vehicle (staggered hood-to-windshield line, height and bulk of the rear end, etc). I think the MOC being a bit smaller also scales better with the Porsche and other cars in the line. I haven't modified the tail-lights on mine from Firas' design, but perhaps I should. I agree that Rastacoco's solution looks very good.
  25. BrickMonkeyMOCs
    It would be good to provide solutions in addition to finding flaws, but that is not a requirement for critical discussion. Yes, I can speculate as to how the proportions ended up as they are. But no-one designs a model out of proportion on purpose. They are likely the result of design decisions taken early on that became too difficult to correct once the model progressed. The poor proportions are clearly compromises, but they are not necessary ones as better models prove. Saying "may" is speculation, because you don't know. As it happens, there are better Countach MOCs that are not fragile and which do get the proportions correct. What claim have I made that doesn't hold up? The evidence of the incorrect proportions is proven objectively by the slide-tool posted earlier. I'm here to discuss the set, but you're not doing that.
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