mostlytechnic

I gave it the value score largely based on the figs, as I noted in that section. The other modulars have fairly basic figs, where this one has the Vampyre couple (otherwise only available in the large MF castle set), the great zombie chef (unique to this set), the butler (another great and unique fig), and a couple (fairly common now) ghosts. Based on the better figs I allowed for the $30 higher price than Fire Brigade or Pet Shop. And compared to the smaller MF sets it's a great value in price/part. And you get tons of sand green, so it's a good value for MOCers too. Keep in mind there's about $30 worth of just 1x6 bricks in sand green (50 some of them). And $10 worth of 1x4 bricks. etc.

Lego 10228 Haunted House I knew I wanted the Haunted House as soon as I saw the first images appear... so I was at the Lego store on Sept 1 to buy it on the release day with my kids. Then of course, I had to build the thing in one night... took another day to get it all edited and commented and uploaded, but here it is. Name: Haunted House Set Number: 10228 Pieces: 2064 Price: $180 US Ages: 14+ Minifigs: 6 Theme: Monster Fighters Year of Release: 2012 Links: Bricklink Peeron Brickset The Box Front The front of the box matches the rest of the Monster Fighters line. It's got the usual Lego info and a nice large photo of the house. Interestingly, there ARE two missing normal details. There's no set name, and there's no names for the minifigs. The Box Back The back of the box shows the inside of the house. Unlike the modular line of buildings, this one does not separate into floors. Instead, it hinges open like a dollhouse. There's tons of nice detail to explore, shown here in small inset pictures, but we'll get to that as we build... The 1:1 Like most sets, there's a 1:! scale figure on the top of the box so strange people who have never played with Lego can understand the size of the contents. The Stickers Yes, there is a small sticker sheet. Looks like some windows will get decorated, and some tiles will become newspapers, portraits, and records. The Manuals Thankfully, the manuals and sticker sheets came in a bag with cardboard, so they're in great shape. All three books have the same front image as the front of the box. The Back of the Manuals Book one ends with a normal building page. Book two has a Lego Club ad (and is much thinner than the other two books), and sadly, book three has the Win! kid. Seriously Lego, that kid's gotta be what, like 25 by now? Get a new photo! The Manual Beginning The first page of the manual has the usual info about sorting the bags and making the minifigs. Note that there's both glow in the dark ghosts AND glow in the dark zombie heads here. The Manual Pages The pages of the manuals are nice and clear. There's a subtle background of clouds with a moon in the corner, but it's very subtle. The colors are well-defined and the black has white outlines, critical since there's lots of grey and black in this build. The Bags There are 5 loose grey plates and lots of numbered bags. Interestingly, there's only two small bags numbered 1 (minifigs and interior details), lots of 2, 3, and 4, and a single bag 5. The Minifigs The Haunted House has six residents. According to Lego, these are : Vampyre's Bride, Vampyre, Zombie chef, butler, and 2 glow-in-the-dark ghosts. The butler looks more like Frankenstein to me, although in grey rather than green. His head extension piece looks to be the same mold as the monster in Series 4 Collectible Minifigures, but in light bluish grey and a different print. Both Vampyres have glow-in-the-dark heads. I did notice a flaw in the manuals though - it only shows the gold dot on the leg print of the Vampyre, not the white bottom edge of his jacket. In fact, I assembled and photographed the figures wrong the first time since I didn't notice the dot in the manual and assumed both had plain black legs. The Minifig Backs The four main figs all have printing on the back of their torsos, even though it's covered on the Vamprye and nearly covered by the Bride's hair. The Minifig Alternate Looks Here are the back prints on the Vampryes, as well as their alternate faces. Neither servant gets an alternate head print, since the back of their heads aren't covered, but I the Butler does get a full face print (with eyebrows) even though the top is covered by his extra head piece. Also, the ghosts don't get legs, just a white brick and plate. (yes, I got the black legs swapped in this photo. Too bad) The Accessories The rest of bags 1 make an assortment of awesome accessories for the house. Some of them shown here - a heart (from the Pirates of the Caribbean Mill set) in a bottle, a bedframe, a helmet in a tub (I have no idea what that's about), a stove, wardrobe, some jars and light fixtures, and my personal favorite, the incredibly clever phonograph. Building the House, 1 The house begins with a foundation - 3 of the large plates with an assortment of bricks and tiles added. Doesn't look like much yet, but just wait.... Building the House, 2 The other large plates form the other side of the base. There's a hinge connecting the halves and flooring for the front porch has been added. Building the House, 3 Ah, the first of the sand green has appeared. There's TONS of it to come. I love the fireplace too - it's got the printed "ship in a bottle" from the small Pirates of the Caribbean set and it's on a hinge which will come in handy later. Building the House, 4 This is pretty much how the build is going to go - add brick after brick around the house. Building the House, the Windows The house uses lots of these window modules. They're all similar to this - a couple small windows (with or without glass, and with our without stickers), some nice black detailing at the top and bottom, and a board or shutter across it. Building the House, 5 The first floor is basically done. Again, there's tons of sand green bricks in assorted 1x something sizes (1x1, 1x2, 1x4, 1x6 are in abundance). It's a little plain still though since the porch hasn't been finished yet. Building the House, 6 At the end of the bags 2, the porch is done and there's a floor for the second floor. A nice detail is the zombie heads at the top of the pillars. Building the House, 7 The second floor builds similar to the first - walls with window openings. There's some nice texture from the dark tan brick bricks, and studs on the walls for later decorating. You also use a bunch of the tall 1x1x5 bricks in sand green, which are new to this set. Building the House, 8 And in no time, the second floor is complete. Some of these windows get falling shutters instead of boards, but they're still basically the same module. One future play feature is showing though - there's a trapdoor frame and an axle through the wall next to the chimney. Building the House, 9 The attic level starts off rather tedious. Any time the part callout in the manual has numbers in the 20s and 30s, you know it's not going to be fun There's 1x2 tiles with handles around the edge, and then alternating 1x1 cylinders and 1x2 inverted slopes on top of that. You can also see the purpose of the trap door - there's a folding ladder made of railing pieces. Cool! Building the House, 10 The attic gets a lot of the detail accessories from the first bag. Building the House, 11 The attic is nearly done. Building the House, 12 Just one bag to go, and the roof is on. It has the same spiky edge of black arms as the porch roof. It's nice that this is supposed to be a run-down building, so you don't have to precisely get all those arms matching and evenly spaced :) Building the House, 13 Bag 5 makes this top peak of the building. Nice assortment of slopes for MOCing too. (and fittingly, I documented the build in 13 photos. Bwah hah hah!) The Finished Outside When the house is opened up, you can see most of the outside. Like the modulars, it's heavily detailed on the front and much less on the back, but it's still nice all around. It's a bit disappointing that the shutters aren't the right size for these windows, but it's still a great effect. The Finished Inside The interior shows the attention to detail that's equal to any of the modular buildings. Let's take a closer look... The Attic The attic, naturally, is full of random old stuff. The tub with helmet is here, and the chest has a top hat inside. A Flaw! Here's one issue I have with the design. I like the folding latter on the trap door, but you have to only fold it up almost all the way. If you collapse it completely, the hinges hit the brown plate and it won't go up all the way. The Music The other half of the attic has the Vampyre's music. The photograph and box of records are here, along with a skull and bone for ambiance. The Second Floor This area of the second floor is mostly for transitions, with the stairs from below and the attic ladder being here. Behind the ladder is a writing desk. The Bedroom The right hand side of the second floor is a bedroom. There's a cool antler rack made of white arms, and I like the stickered artwork as well. The green plant in the corner though seems out of place. The tan bamboo leaves would have been better here. The Kitchen The zombie chef has a kitchen to cook for the Vampyres. Not sure I'd like the snake stew that he's working on though. The Entryway The left side of the lower level is a bit boring. The only thing here is the stairway and front door. You can see the fireplace though - when closed, it's over in the kitchen, but when you open the house, it hinges into the center area. The Side Entrance On this side of the house is the kitchen door and a lot of windows. The Chimney The other side of the house is the chimney, which has the hinges built into it. Why oh why though did they use dark grey for half of the hinges though They stick out rather than blending in. The Gate To add to the scene, you also get this front gate in bag 5. It's simple but a nice touch. With Some Modulars As you can see, it can't fit flush with them. The right side has the side door. The left side has the hinge bricks in the chimney - if you removed those it'd fit side by side. Also, I think it feels a little too big for the others. Sure, the floors are the same size, but it's a single house as big as a fire station. Just doesn't feel right. I think it'd work better in a large layout to have it close and the other modulars farther away to give some perspective. The Conclusion Ok, this house is great. It's got all the size and detail of the modular buildings, but in a stand-alone home. It'd be trivial to clean it up and have a nice sand green house, or you can have a run-down dump. It's a lengthy build that can easily occupy several evenings, but nothing's particularly difficult. There's only a few tedious bits during the build. The hinged design makes it much more playable than the modulars as well. The Ratings Value: 9/10 - The figs are great, there's lots of sand green, and there's lot of roof slopes. It's a bit more pricey than most of the modulars, but the figs make up for it I'd say. Design: 9/10 - All the details and furniture make a great house design. I had to deduct though for the dark hinges and the attic ladder though. Playability: 10/10 - The only way to improve would be to add a garage and car :) Parts: 8/10 - Points for the color scheme and details, but there's not anything too special. Overall: 9.6/10 - Go buy one. Or two - have a haunted one and a nice one.

Looks nice - I might have to try building this. If I do I'll be sure to report how it handles. Gotta dig up some parts though...

Yep, just watched that video and you're right, these do look great behind the BNSF - of course, they should, since that's what they were designed to go with. Still think I'm going to make bigger Maersk-style ones for my layout, since I've got Maersk locos and no BNSFs :) Yep, the stickers that came with these 3 sets that I bought are yours, and they look great (as I noted in the review). I just didn't put the stickers on the other 2 sets yet.

Lego 10170 TTX Intermodal Double-Stack Car Lego train sets today come as full sets - train, track, cars, etc, except for the excellent Maersk and Emerald Night. Back in the day, Lego sold individual train cars so you could build a train how you wanted. One of those sets in 2005 was the TTX Intermodal Double-Stack car. It's actually two cars, sort of. Long discontinued, this car is one I've been wanting to add to my layout for quite a while. I was able to buy three sets at once - one with stickers applied, two without. Name: TTX Intermodal Double-Stack Car Set Number: 10170 Pieces: 366 Price: $40 (originally, now it sells for over $100) Ages: 8+ Minifigs: 0 Theme: Train, 9V Year of Release: 2005 Links: Bricklink Peeron Brickset The Box Front The front of the box has a nice, large, clear photo of the cars. They're rolling across bare ground though - I suspect Lego didn't want to include tracks in the photo to prevent confusion since no tracks are included. The Box Back The back of the box has several smaller photos of the set, showing how the containers are removeable and how the cars join together. The large photo also shows an optional rebuild with the car set up as a single unit. Not really a B-model, but better than nothing I suppose. The Box Top The top of the box shows the set joined with the 10133 BNSF locomotive, but does not have the standard 1:1 part for scale. It does show a couple minifigs though, and since anyone willing to buy this set would have other train sets, that's good enough I suppose. The Manual The manual pages are clear and easy to follow. The background continues the map theme from the outside of the box. Since the set doesn't have close colors, there's no issues with part identification. The Manual: Building the Containers Near the end of the manual you build the three small containers. Lego shows how to build them by making the blue one. Why? It's pretty clear in this photo since the lighting is excellent, but in normal room light it's the hardest color to tell details on. Why didn't they build the red or white one, since they'd be so much clearer to see? The Manual End At the end of the manual, it shows to build more containers in red and white. I'm not sure they'd do that today - I suspect they'd include full instructions for them since it is a different color after all... The Stickers The sets I got came with these reproduction stickers. They look fantastic - I don't have originals to compare to, but they match the original photos I've seen and the color and quality is as good as anything I've seen Lego print. The Car Parts The two train cars are made almost entirely of yellow and black parts. There's not really anything special or rare about them other than the train-specific pieces, which we'll get to. The only other part issue - this set has a LOT of stickers across pieces. Since I bought it used, gotta be careful not to damage them when building it (and a few times parts will be slightly out of order due to having to put both parts at once with a sticker on them). Building the Cars, Part 1 The beginning of the car is simple - a large bottom plate, some brackets at each end, and some yellow plates with grill tiles to support the containers later. Building the Cars, Part 2 There's a surprising amount of tiny parts in these cars. There are 1x1 plates, 1x1 bricks, inverted 1x2 slopes... and you can see here the first sticker across two 1x4 bricks. Building the Cars, Part 3 A bunch of panels make up the sides of the car, and ladders are on all four corners. There's another sticker across these panels, and an 8 to identify the car (the other car in the pair gets a 7). Traditionally though, these car sets are given letters to distinguish the cars in the set. Building the Cars, Part 4 A ring of black plates and yellow tiles wrap around the well to make a stripe that will match the ends. Building the Cars, Part 5 Platforms at each end will attach to the bogeys eventually. One end is solid and will be the center connection. The left end here you can see the hole left so that the bogey has sufficient flexibility. Building the Cars, Part 6 And some decorations finish the well car. Personally I'd rearrange this a bit - turning those yellow tile with handles around so that they help guide containers in. And at this point, you get to go back and do it all again to make the second car. Building the Cars, The Train Bits Here are the interestingest parts of the set. There's the train wheels, the bogey plate, and the magnetic couplers. This set has the older style magnetic couplers. Lego stopped making these because that magnet is removeable and could be a hazard if a kid ate it. Newer train sets have a non-removeable magnet (but also not as strong). Building the Cars, The Bogeys This is a very common bogey design in Lego trains. There's just a 2x6 plate across the wheelsets, the coupler, and the bogey plate on top. One of these at each end of the car set handles the connections to whatever else your train consists of. Building the Cars, The Middle Bogey In the center of the cars goes this wheelset. The red axles provide the pivot points, and the design allows the two cars to share the wheels. Since containers weight far less than train cars normally carry, sharing wheels like this is possible and reduces slack in the trains. Building the Cars, Done The cars together make quite an annoyingly long to photograph set. However, this is not terribly realistic. Actual well cars are normally either single or in 3 or 5 car sets. The Real Thing Here's a real double-stack well car set. You can see Lego had to make compromises - there's not much detail in the Lego cars, and the real thing doesn't need as much of a platform at each end to handle the wheels. Building the Containers, Part 1 The color in the set comes here in the containers. Like the cars, there's nothing exciting in the part selection, but a number of annoying stickers across bricks. Building the Containers, Part 2 First up is the long light grey container. Lots of 1x2 grill bricks give some texture to the sides. Building the Containers, Part 3 The finished first container: It seems rather long and thin in person, but the proportions probably are pretty accurate. 40' containers are after all, pretty long and thin. I'm not sure about those handles on the corners though - not realistic. I have no idea why Lego put those on. The tiles on the roof let the container mate with the others. Building the Containers, Part 4 On to the blue half-size container. Two complaints: the stacked 1x6 plates on top (seriously, don't stack matching parts like that!) and the black stripe. The other containers are solid colored, but this one gets some black. For some reason, both the 1x1 brick with handle and the 1x2 grill brick are very rare in blue. Both weren't made within several years of 2005, so Lego used black here rather than producing a special run of parts. Building the Containers, Part 5 On the bottom of all the containers are 2x2 corners. These lock around the tiles on the tops so that the containers can be stacked. Building the Containers, Part 6 The blue container is done. The style matches the larger container. Build matching red and white ones and we're done. The Loaded Cars The containers can be loaded in the cars in a variety of ways. The one thing you can't do is load a realistic double stack with a small container on bottom and a large one on top, since there's nothing to hold a single small container in the center of the car. (yes, stacks usually have the small container on bottom - small containers are usually small because they're so heavy) Comparing the Containers Lego has made a variety of trains with intermodal containers. The left pair are from the 7939 Cargo Train. The right obviously is the Maersk set. New containers are much larger than these old ones, since they're 6 studs wide rather than 4. Container Compatibility Nope, can't mix and match any of these containers. The sizes just don't match. Personally, I like the Maersk containers the best for looks, and the 10170 are second best. The 7939 build very fast since they're mostly large 6x5 panels. The Container Cars Here are all 3 styles of container cars that I have. The 7939 one isn't a well style - that lets it have a 6 wide container on a 6 wide car. The TTX set is restricted to 4 wide containers since the 6 wide cars use bricks to make the sides of the well. On the Maersk, Lego managed to squeeze 6 wide containers into "6 wide" cars, since the sides of the wells are tiles attached to brackets. The car ends up being closer to 7 wide though. The Video (view on YouTube for full HD version) Here are the Maersk container cars, TTX cars, and 7939 cars all in a train so you can see how they compare in action. Again, I like the Maersk the best. The TTX are too small and the 7939 look like toys. (For the curious train people, I have 1x2 plates on the couplings all the way till the TTX cars so it doesn't separate. One of the 7939 locos at the front has double motors, the other a single motor. The first Maersk loco is unpowered and the second has a single motor. So all told, I've got 4 train motors powering this around my track.) The Conclusion This set is an oddity - Lego doesn't make many expansion sets like this. It's tough to evaluate it as a set, when it's not meant to be a stand-alone plaything. Over 10 years earlier Lego had made a similar double-stack train car set, but it included a truck and handler (set 4549). This set though, is just the train cars with containers. And frankly, the containers are lame. They're small and fairly plain, due to limitations on building the car. I much prefer the modern Maersk cars and containers, but they're a bit pricey to built a fleet of. The train base alone runs $3 on Bricklink - and they need full bogeys at both ends, rather than sharing like this one does. So I think the best compromise in my eyes is this design DaveBey came up with here on EB: MOC of 10170 / Maersk cross-styled. I like the yellow color since I see real cars that color all the time. And it's a nice functional design. It even has the realistic barely-there bottom. I'm highly tempted to make a bunch of his design for my layout, but I'm already running out of room! The Ratings Value: 6/10 - Even at release, this set was over 10 cents a piece, and there's nothing that rare or valuable in it. No figs, no rare parts or colors. Just some nice design and a nice sticker sheet. Design: 7/10 - The design is nice - it's completely clear what this set is and it's a solid representation of the real world car. However, it's been beaten by the modern Maersk design, although that one uses a large train base that makes it more expensive. Playability: 7/10 - The cars work as they should, and the four containers can be swapped around. However, there's no figs, no container loader, no truck to haul them... so that's a ding in playability as sold - but I actually like it because it keeps the cost down on a set like this which is basically an expansion for other train sets. It doesn't need all those things since you'd have them. Parts: 6/10 - Other than the train parts, it's a basic grab bag of normal common colors and parts. Not a set anyone would be buying for any reason other than to build it as is. Overall: 8/10 - Yep, I gave it an overall score higher than any of the sections. Its drawbacks are mostly due to the objective of the set - it's an expansion, not a stand-alone set. Within that objective it does its job well and is a solid design. Couldn't go higher though since the value isn't there and there's better containers and container cars out these days. At release I probably would have scored it higher.

That's really close to real - a couple things still gave it away to me. 1. Tires. Just don't look like rubber yet. 2. Shadows in the second pic - a little too mathematically perfect. I do lots of photography, and those shadows just don't quite pass as real yet. 3. The glare off the front fender (very bottom center of the image) - just too perfect again. 4. A bit too shiny. Real lego isn't quite as shiny as these renders. But that's all being really picky. It looks fantastic and close enough to real that I could easily accept it as real if I was flipping through images faster.

The bulldozer had 2 XL motors, but using separate channels on the receiver. The new 4x4 has two L motors on the same channel, so that's too much power for the older receiver.

You've got a PM on the train cars and modulars

Looks great - simple and effective.

Edit: Closed and move to main B/S/T forum

Or hit the red stop button on the speed controller - that recenters the servo motor immediately.

Picked up the new box at Target yesterday for $30. Then installed the app on my Galaxy Nexus and it says screen resolution isn't supported. So guess I'll return the game and wait till they update the software. So far, there's no sign of the second game on the Android app store. There's also no indication on the box of the limitations on Android device support - it just says that 2.1+ is required. Box is smaller than the old one, and has a flap on top so it can hang on a peg, but looks to be the same contents. It's kinda annoying though, because it's got so much text on it and it's all in 3 languages, so it's just overwhelming compared to normal Lego packaging.

I love it! Might have to build my own for my mini-modular street... The headlight brick windows look great and the awnings are fantastic (at least the yellow ones - never been a fan of the 1x1 plate styled ones like the upper window, but that's just me.)

I drove it over my boys' feet. They're 7 and 2, both thought it was hilarious.

The new orange Lego tool is great for these - it's got a thin enough end to get under the tiles, but since it's plastic, it doesn't scratch it up.

Thanks for the review. I got this set with a coupon a while ago and was pretty happy with it. I too was surprised by how much track they included for the train. Actually though, I got mine to mod. I plan to make it a bit bigger (height and width), making both openings large enough for normal Lego trains to go through. then I'll stick it as the opening to a double-track tunnel on my layout :)

Also, loving all the little details they worked in. The way a couple pieces that seemed to have no reason to be there turn into latches for the doors. The use of the 3x3 T parts near the front of the hood to make it line up just right when it closes. etc. However, it would have been nice to have some better cable management in there. There's a ton of slack cords and they tend to get in the way when closing the body down.

Well, finished mine. Great vehicle - totally amazed at what it can drive over. This is Lego, not specialty RC off road vehicles! I did notice that the suspension is a little wobbly - my body tends to lean to one side or the other, even when sitting still. Oh well. And seriously Lego, the B-model? Changing just part (the smaller part!) of the set was bad enough on the 8421 Crane, but at least there you converted it from a crane to a (weirdly out of scale) lift truck. Here, you just change cosmetic stuff. And you show the B-model truck without stickers, but most people will have applied them all over the panels making the main body, so if you decide to try the B-model it'll look lame. A little disappointed there, but I'll get over it. Probably by just never building the alternate body style :)

Woo, bought one yesterday at my local Lego store (Columbus, Ohio). Built the chassis (ie all the #1 bags) today and hopefully can finish the body tonight. Did take it for a little drive though - it's slow but powerful. I like it :)

Aw, another cool icon to go with the gold RA badge. Thanks! Now time to to take photos for my next review...

My reviews: Extreme Power Bike Toy Story Trash Compactor Escape Technic Motorbike Lava Dragon Game Technic Mini Container Truck Technic Mini Mobile Crane Grand Carousel Technic Power Puller And of course, this one. The last ones are the big sets and my favorite reviews :)

Oh come on, it's only around $1900 for a MISB one of these! Better jump quick before everyone else reading this review gets them!

Anyone ever taken apart one of the old 9V battery boxes: I've got a red one in the Airport Shuttle monorail set that is very flaky. It only works sometimes - there's definite corrosion on the one terminal inside, but I've scraped it off well and it still doesn't always work. Since these are VERY rare with the monorail stickers on them, I'd rather not destroy it trying to fix it. My guess is there's something wonky in the actual switch mechanism but I'm not sure.

Lego 6399 Airport Shuttle I missed lots of awesome Lego during my dark ages - for me, that was late 80s to early 2000s. Once I got back into Lego as an AFOL with kids, there have been certain missed sets that I just had to get. Some to keep, some just to build, play with, and then sell on to others. One of the latter category was the Airport Shuttle monorail set. Due to the extremely high price, I had no intentions of keeping the set, but I wanted to try it and show it to my kids. I set up a Bricklink and ebay alert and waited. Finally, one came along at a price I was willing to pay. Name: Airport Shuttle Set Number: 6399 Pieces: 730 Price: $140 (in 1990, so that was like a bazillion dollars!) Ages: 8-12 Minifigs: 9 Theme: Classic Town / Airport Year of Release: 1990 Links: Bricklink Peeron Brickset The Box The box is large - easily as big as the largest modern sets like the Technic flagships. The front has a decent photo of the set, although it's so large of a layout that even Lego couldn't get it all to fit the box without an inset. Inside the Box Like other old sets, this box has a flip-up panel on the front so you can see inside. I'm sure originally the pieces were nicely displayed under the plastic, but the molded inner part has been lost. Now the pieces just are a jumbled mess. Under the Lid The inside of the lid has a nice array of photos showing what the set can do. There's some action shots of the figs using the train and stations, plus a trio of images showing how the monorail can be controlled with the switch tracks. I think the best one though is the top photo with the boy. Having a real child playing with the set shows just how large and awesome this layout is. The Back of the Box Now this is what's missing from modern Lego. Suggestions to make your own mods! New station designs, even new train variations! My favorite by far is the safari monorail in the top right. A great open car for seeing the animals, a decent brick-built elephant, and a nice tour guide in the front. The Manual The front cover of the manual (just one manual!) has the same image as the box, plus it shows you the minifigs in a group so you can assemble them correctly. They're easier than modern figs though, since they all have the same head! You can't really see from this photo, but this is a THIN manual. There's only 20 some pages to it. Considering you build two large train stations, a monorail train, and the track layout, things must move fast once you open this book... The Manual Wow, this is so different from modern Lego manuals. Here, in just two pages, nearly a whole train car is built! 5 steps add several dozen parts, rather than the 10 or so you'd add in 5 steps today. They even assume kids have brains - check out the cover for the motor on the right-hand page. They didn't tell you explicitly to put the 1x4 tile and 1x2 grills on the back of the cover! They thought a kid could figure out to do both sides the same! The Manual The last page of the manual is a fold-out so that they can show you the entire track layout. The Manual On the back of the manual are suggestions for a couple alternate track layouts. I rather like the top one myself, although it'd take a little work to make the stations fit. The Minifigs This set comes with NINE figs! You get an engineer to run the monorail, a white-gloved steward to take care of the passengers on their long train journey (what? Seems so unnecessary!), a dad for the travelling family, a pilot headed to the airport, mom with her red-necklaced torso, a red-headed daughter, two sons with plane and truck shirts, and finally a cook for the hot-dog stand. How many hot-dog stands have chefs with chef hat and formal attire though? He should be in greasy casual clothes. And being from 1990, they all have the same head. The Monorail Parts Here's how the monorail itself works. There are special train bases. One end has a thicker spot with a pin hole for the wheels, and the other end has a tab that will connect to the motor. There's no easy way to make a longer train than car-motor-car. You'd have to custom-build a coupling system to extend it. The wheels themselves are fairly complex. The pin lets the bogey rotate, and the pin is mounted on a pivoting section to let it tilt forwards and back to handle the ramps. There's a slot through the underside of the bogey that straddles the ridge in the tracks, keeping the train on the track. Nice Windows In this set you get a nice array of trans-light blue windows for the train. None were particularly rare at the time, but they're unusual today. The Battery Box The red 9V battery box. It's only ever been in two sets (in red; this 9V box has come in black, red, white, and yellow over the years) , but I sorta wish it would come back in the PowerFunctions system. It's so nice and compact. There's a 2x6 section of powered studs on top for attaching multiple things if you wanted, and the raised grey studs at the left end are the power switch. They latch down to turn the power on. The Battery Box Here's just how small the battery box is. A single 9V battery just fits inside. Granted, a modern battery box with 6 AA or AAA batteries will last longer, but they're so much bigger. I wish Lego would come out with a rechargeable box this size or smaller. You could get a lot of power in that space using modern lithium batteries. Building the Train, Part 1 This is how much you build on just the first 2 page spread of the manual. The front of the train has the battery box, two passenger seats, and a cockpit for the driver. A little bit of SNOT at the front gives headlights. Building the Train, Part 2 Another two-page spread in the manual, and the front half of the train is done. The train opens nicely, although unrealistically, to access the seating. Building the Motor In the middle of any Lego monorail is the motor unit. It comes as one piece, plus a cover. The motor has connections for a 9V cable on one side. Under the Hood On the bottom, the motor has a metal gear. That meshes with the teeth of the track, letting the monorail handle hills with ease. The points sticking out to each side are a switch. In the middle (as shown here), the motor is off. Pushing the switch in on one side makes the motor go, and pushing in the other side makes it go the other direction. This lets you set switches on the track itself to control the train, as we'll see later in this review. The Finished Train The second car of the monorail builds very much like the first, but with extra seating space since there's no battery box taking up half the car. You get another driver's section (since the monorail can run either direction) and three seats. I guess the space in the back (towards the motor) is luggage storage, since it's hard to access. The Baseplates The Airport Shuttle comes with two large, 32x32 baseplates. The green one appeared for the first time in this set, but showed up 4 times over the years later. The grey version ONLY ever appeared in this set, making it run $15-$20 for used ones. Building the First Station, Part 1 The first station of the shuttle begins like this. Two smaller green baseplates are added onto the back of the large one to extend the space. They're only attached though by the 2x3 bricks on the outside edges - just 2 studs of each small plate ever attach. That makes it weak and hard to move the station later. Lego really should have put a few plates across the edges here to strengthen the ground. Building the First Station, Part 2 Just a few steps and the station is nearly done. There's a long platform for the boarding the monorail, steps up to it, a couple storage lockers on the left, a phone booth near the road, and even little ticket scanners at each staircase. Lego did a great job here keeping things simple but very playable. The white curved panels making the base of the awning are pretty cool, and very rare. They've been made in other sets in clear and trans-light blue, but only here in white. So yeah, they're $5 each to replace. And that's not even counting the stickers! Building the First Station, Part 3 And the station is done. The awning is complete with a nice airport sticker on top (although annoyingly, that sticker is across 3 1x4 bricks), flowers have been added, and the track is in place. You'd think the track would strengthen the extra baseplates that it's on, but you'd be wrong. The track keeps popping off, because it's only attached with a couple studs. (Actually, I'm wrong about that. The center of the switch track is a large attachment point, but I never got it properly attached when I first built the set. When I rebuilt it later, I got it on right and it's much stronger.) The Track Speaking of the track, let's take a quick look at the Lego monorail track. This is the short straight piece. There are also long straights, short and long curves, left and right switches (aka points), the control switch, and ramp top and bottom parts. All have this toothed rail running down the middle to guide the train. There's studs at the ends on the sides - the track pieces are connencted by adding 1x4 plates or tiles to those studs. On the underside, there are some stud connections. They stick down from the track so that the edges of the track don't hit other studs. However, the small section of connection makes it a weak connection. The First Station, Complete The train stops at the station and you can open the doors. The platform is just long enough to reach all the seats, but there's no easy access for the poor drivers. A Mini-Fig's-Eye View As a minifig arrives at the station, this is what they'd see. Nice little signs in the center directing them, a town map on the awning, a phone booth, and some random seats near the phone. Oh, and completely exposed tracks with no guard rails of any kind to protect the kiddies from running out onto the tracks and getting hit. Hey, it was the early 90s and lawyers hadn't sued everyone yet. The Town Map Sticker On the awning is this nice map. The train track is actually shown as the double loop layout with two stations that the set uses. It even shows the driveway at each station correctly, with the little island splitting the roadway. Even the green vs grey baseplates are correct! The rest of the town and road, though, are not included. The Schedule Sticker This is a great little surprise Easter Egg in the set. Those "flight numbers" are actually Lego train set numbers from the 1980s, spanning the 4.5V and 12V era. 7725 is the Electric Passenger Train, 7755 is the Diesel Heavy Shunting Locomotive, 7720 is the Diesel Freight set, and 7715 is the Push-Along Passenger Train. The last two numbers (7719 and 7721) are not trains though. They're Bionicle and Exo-Force sets from the mid-2000s. I wonder if those numbers were used internally at Lego for trains or something? Or train sets that were never released? The Phone Booth Ok, it's not a full Superman-style phone booth. But it's still a nice little telephone using a printed slope brick. I love the more realistic red phones (such as in the latest Batcave set), but this one fits this set's style perfectly. Building the Second Station, Part 1 Time to start the second station. Here again another baseplate is added to the back of the large one to expand the area. Based on the pillars, it's pretty obvious this station is going to be elevated. Building the Second Station, Part 2 After another page of building, the elevated track supports are more substantial, the stairs are built most of the way up, and a little food stand is nearly done. Building the Second Station, Part 3 The burger stand is now complete, the stairs have extended upwards, and the upper level is building out. Building the Second Station, Part 4 Almost done now. Scenery has been added - plants, lightposts, chairs, etc. The platform is built with railings, and the awning is in place with stickers showing a train schedule. Those yellow curved panels may be the rarest pieces in the whole set - in yellow, Bricklink only shows 4 having been sold in the last 6 months! They come in white and several trans colors (including currently trans clear in one of the Friends sets) as well, but yellow was exclusive to this set. Another thing driving Lego's profits down on these old sets... why not use the same white panels as the other station? And then just change the white floor here to a color if you want. Sure, the white ones are larger, but who ever complained about an awning being too large? The Second Station The station has a nice layout. A couple trees split the driveway. Passengers can grab a burger and drink from the booth before heading up the stairs to the platform. There's seating for 3 up there (as well as the random pair of yellow seats across the road - why not put them near the burger shop?) The Seating Why a minifig would want to sit way over here I have no idea. Maybe just to be out of the crowds while waiting for a friend to arrive on the train? At least they've got some flowers and lights to keep it from being so abandoned. The Burger Joint Below the station lives a small burger shop. The sign is again an annoying sticker across multiple bricks. There's ketchup and mustard on tap, and I love the tiny burgers made from 3 1x1 round plates! The Stickers This station has the same stickers as the first, but side-by-side for easier viewing. The Train's View As the train approaches the station, it has a nice clear view. Lights (fake, obviously) indicate whether to stop or go - but I think by the time the train can see these lights, it can see if the station is occupied! Still, a nice touch though. Maybe they'd be better pointed inwards so the train IN the station can see them and know when to proceed out of the station? Overhead View of the Station You can see here how Lego makes the monorail fit perfectly. The train is 4 studs wide with nothing sticking out the sides (other than the direction switch on the motor). The track is also exactly 4 studs wide. Here you've got the grey (on the left) and white (on the right, front edge of the station) "Plate, Modified 3 x 2 with Hole" using their rounded edges to guide the train perfectly into the station. Keeps everything nicely lined up so the little figs don't get a toe caught between the train and platform :) Building the Supports Most of the track will use one-piece support legs, but there's a section near the elevated station where you need track running under other track, so you get to build this little set of supports on another small baseplate. Simple but effective, and continues the light grey stripe from the elevated station's legs. The Full Layout It's too big for my normal photo setup. The white surface I use is a 4x4 foot section of panel, and this set won't fit on that. As you can see though, it looks like it really could be a airport shuttle (other than the track's spiral shape, but that was just to give more length in a smaller space for kids to play). I can totally imagine though a parking lot near the green station and and airport terminal at the grey one. The road there would be for taxis and shuttle busses, but the monorail takes people out to the parking lots if they drove to the airport. There's a monorail control switch at each station, so you can have the train run constantly, stop at the station, or reverse when it gets to one. Getting a Snack The chef runs the burger shop, providing food and beverage service to these waiting kids. The Ticket Scanner Both stations have these cute tiny ticket scanning terminals. A pile of the 1x1 blue tiles are included to use as tickets. The Video (view on YouTube for full HD version) The function of the monorail train is fantastic. I know there's always discussion in the Train forum about how much slope a 9V or PowerFunction train can handle (hint: not much! So making a bridge requires LONG stretches of straight track to get high enough) but this monorail just flies up and down these ramps with no hesitation. It'd be pretty uncomfortable to be a fig in the train facing down (think roller-coaster type slope, but slow, so nothing pressing you back in your seat - if they didn't have studs on the chairs sticking into their butts, the figs would fall right out of the seats), but the monorail system works great. Since the gear-drive keeps the train moving at almost exactly the same speed all the time, there's no trouble with traction going up nor runaway speed coming down. Additionally, the switch functionality is great. You can see it in action near the end of the video. I'd love to have a simple switch like this on the current train system. It'd be pretty simple to modify further as well. I'm envisioning using a Technic liftarm instead of the manual switch there, with a timed motor that puts it in the "stop" position till a train arrives, and then a few moments later, moves the liftarm sending the train on its way. Come on Lego, that'd be awesome! As is, the switches let you have a lot of flexibility with the monorail. The train can run continuously, stop at stations, etc. You can also use a pair of switches set to "reverse" to make a linear track. With just one train, you don't need a loop, just have the train bounce back and forth between the stations. I've seen people use it like that in larger train layouts since the monorail track is rarer. The Conclusion Wow, what a great set. I bought this thinking I'd build it, we'd play for a few days with it, and then I'd put it up on Bricklink to pass on to another AFOL. However, it's just SO cool! I'm very tempted to keep it and integrate it into our large train layout that we're working on. It could be an elevated train over the main train tracks, dipping down to a ground-level station at one point. Hm, but then I'd wanna buy more monorail track to extend it over more area, so that'd be another hundred bucks. And I'd have to raise the elevated station so a regular train could fit under it. And I'd have to replace most of the supports with arches over existing track. Basically, it'd be quite a bit of work and expense. So will I? Who knows at this point. All I know is this is a great old set and I'm SO glad I bought it. The monorail system Lego came up with here works so perfectly. It handles hills, it runs smoothly, it has control switches so you can have it automatically stop at stations or reverse... I just love how they did this! The playability of this set is incredible. Lego kept it very simple and open on the stations, but look at all they still did! A burger stand, ticket scanners, driveways for cars, plants, lights, seating, it just goes on and on. There may not be the decorative minutia of some modern sets like the Modular Buildings, but it's just how I remember Lego from my childhood. The Ratings Value: 10/10 - I'm basing this on the original retail price. With current second-hand sales running $400+, the value isn't as good, but for the original $140 you got a great train set with everything you needed, but still easily expandable into a full town layout. Design: 8/10 - I love this old-style Lego. It's clear exactly what things are without being too detailed. I had to ding a point though for some of the overkill, like having two different color curved panels. Sure it looks great, but it was too expensive to make. I dinged another point (reluctantly) for the weak baseplate design under the stations. The track doesn't connect strongly, the baseplates are joined together weakly, and that makes it hard to move. Playability: 10/10 - Could you give it any less? I was tempted to give it more than 10 to counterbalance the two points I deducted on design :) Parts: 9/10 - There's quite an array here - plants, seats, plates and bricks for the stations, windows... however, it's all in basic yellow, white, red, and black. I know that was basic Lego color back in the day, but I wouldn't have minded seeing some more variety. Minifigs: 9/10 - I love these simple old figs. They're all obvious as to what they are, without needing over the top details like current licensed figs. They're just cute, classic Lego. And you get a ton of them! The only drawback in my opinion is the identical heads. Overall: 9.8/10 - This came so close to a perfect 10. I had to go a little lower though due to how hard it is to move. The track through the stations and the baseplates are just too fragile. As I kid, I would have been setting this up on the kitchen table to play for an afternoon, but then it'd have to be moved for dinner. It's HARD for an adult to move the stations without parts falling off - no way could I have done it as a kid. Just a few more pieces would have made a world of difference here in holding it all together. If you can set it up and not move it though, wow, is this a fantastic playset!

I was coming to post the same thing. Yes, for the contest you might need to add detail to win, but this looks spot on as an actual garage.