S.I

Saw the post with the coupon a couple of hours before I wanted to go and pick up the plane for 100 from karstadt, now I got it for 85. Nice find!

It looks like the tan 1.5 pin is mounted backwards, or the bracket isn't pushed into the pin properly. That is offseting the bracket.

Splitting up the releases like you suggest doesn't work, because then sets at each price point sit on the shelves for a year, which stores don't like.

At least this seller is honest and even notes the fact it is a clone in the description, as well as showing the fake box. I should probably double check mine though, havn't found the time to tear it down and rebuild it, the clones presumably don't have lego labels molded onto the parts.

just got back home from vacation, you got a set left?

Lego direct is almost always cheaper for new parts,I remember buying 50 of the red sliding gears for 10 cents each after the mobile crane came out, and they were going for over a euro each on bricklink.

After I bough 8070 when it came out I decided to collect the other red sportscars, namely 8448 8653 and 8145. I managed to get the first two fairly quickly for 40-50, ended up buying a second (incomplete) 8448 for really cheap for the red parts and to get the couple of pieces missing in the other one. At the time 8145 was going for 60 or so every couple of weeks, and I wanted to wait for the price to also drop down to 50. Instead the only time it showed up for less than 100 afterwards it was bought in seconds.

If you look at the full datasheet you will see it lists two output voltages, one is for when the TTL logic signal is high, one is for low. High ouput is input voltage - ~1V, low output is ground + ~1V, due to internal voltage drops over the transistors etc, and the overview is just listing the later voltage. This lets me use a 12V power supply to power my circuit, and after the voltage drop the PWM signal is roughly 9V, and this chip contains diodes to prevent inductive damage. What I have been doing is using an xbox controller connected to me PC with a small program I wrote which maps the stick positions to different motors, and feeds these values to a FPGA via USB. the FPGA then uses these values to determine polarity and PWM duty cycle, and the logic outputs will be fed into the H bridges and then into the motors. I'm still waiting on two last orders of parts to finish this.

I've been using these chips to control my motors. They only go up to 1A though.

Not that much of a bargain, but since I'm really happy with finding this at last I thought I'd share it. A used 8145 (Ferrari 599 GTB) for 75 euros.

I thought the only parts missing were the "licensed" parts like orange unimog panels.

Does the adaptor cable not power the bus wire pair? :(

You should be able to use the old switches, if you use PF extension cable/adaptor -> old style switch -> PF extension cable/adaptor -> IR receivers. It doesn't work with the new style cables because they have a 9V bus wire as well as the motor function wire.

Was used on ebay.de I also saw one a couple of days ago for a bit less bit missed out on it.

saw a half built 8421 + pile of parts for 50 euros the other day, the ebay listing claimed it had never been completed. Maybe one of you ended up buying it. Picked up a 8043 for 80 euros or so today.

A couple of years ago they decreased the size of almost all the boxes, to cheapen shipping and to let stores put more boxes on the shelves. I bought sevceral 8069s for the mini LAs and have two box sizes.

Now I know who has been buying up all the cheap 8455s on ebay here!

I've bought half a dozen 8285s over the past couple of years cheap from ebay just for parts, it has something like 50 15l beams alone.

Was at karstadt the other day, picked up the helicopter, saw the snowmobile and hotrod there as well.

Things I saw but ended up not buying: the blue container truck for 40 euros, the combine harvester NIP for 35, and the tractor + trailer NIB for 75. Trying to save for the new 2014 sets.

8145 or whatever the GTB is.

What do you mean by recycle? Right now it lifts them, then they go back into the input hopper.

extension -> old style 9V cable -> extension with polarity reversed might work.

I finished an initial version of my first GBC module, which raises the balls/marbles from the exit of a large basket. (And currently drops them right back into it.) The only issue it currently has is since I had a very limited number and selection of parts to build the entrance, they sometimes jam up and aren't released. The grabbers also function as a ball ejection mechanism, with a slope that ensures the balls leave in the direction I want them to leave at the top of the arc. Sidish view: Front view, the next marble to be picked up is visible between two of the grabbers:

Thanks, that's exactly what I wanted to know. I guess my information with 14mm diameter was off since the opening in that piece is 13mm.