Didumos69

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It's only a problem when its application requires the involved axles to align correctly. When it's being used in a drive train or in front / rear axles a perfect alignment is not that important I suppose.

That must be it. If my corrective words were rude in any sense then sorry for that. It remains to be interesting what all of you have to say in this matter, also on this page.. And I agree we all kind of agree.

I get your point and I think it makes a lot of sense now. This discussion is not going to influence the world outside Eurobricks. I started this discussion with the Eurobricks community in mind, but the world is bigger than Eurobricks of course. Thanks for clarifying! Cheers!

In the 42056 Porsche the shifting mechanism (or shift train as I like to refer to it) relies on correctly aligned axles. Each of the axles needs to have a close-to-perfect 45 degree or 90 degree orientation. However, despite many imrpovements I never got the paddle shifter unit to operate correctly. I rebuilt it many times and there was always one paddle that had problems. It even motivated me to build my own paddle shifter unit. Today I found out what the problem was (I had the CV-joint axle at the right of the first image sitting in my Porsche between the shifter unit and the gearbox): This mis-aligned CV-joint axle caused the vertical axle at the center of the shifter unit to misalign significantly. Now I cannot recall whether I ever swapped the CV-joint axles that came with the set with ones I already had. I don't think I did, but I'm not sure. So my question is: Has anyone seen this kind of mis-aligned CV-joint axle before? Would it be a misprint or a fake?

How inventive again!!!

Nicely put and I totally agree

`He must be the same NLF as the one behind these brilliant paddle shifters:

Too bad these parts are not covered by the 42036 set, haha:

Great! Thanks for coming back on this and thanks for testdriving this unit alltogether Have a nice time in the pub with your friends and don't forget to bring this shifter along to show it to them, haha. And when you do, don't forget to give credits to the original designer (just kidding).

Good idea, I will fix that soon.

@t12ung thank you for your appreciation. In the image you posted the dbg (+0)-liftarm inside the h-frame and the orange (+0)-liftarm at the left side of the gearbox should point in the same direction, see step 100 of the errata. I can't see if this is the case in your image, but in your video it appears not to be the case. Maybe this is where the problem comes from (please let me know) but the way you solved it boils down to the same idea. You could leave it this way. As for your side note on the errata, I will check that, thanks for notifying.

That would be even better. That would give you 1.56 stud distance (heart-to-heart) which is indeed quite close to the required 1.5 stud. Apparently close enough .

What you're designing is not a correct fit. Try adding a second plate and use a 12t - 20t mesh (or a 8t - 24t mesh) instead.

On the first page of this discussion there were some interesting replies that tried to put things in perspective and bring some nuances to it. For some people those perspectives are interesting and help them putting things in perspective themselves. It did for me and it did for a few others I know for sure. Nor the OP, nor any of those replies pointed into the direction of having an 'intellectual property club'. On this page the tone seems to have changed and some appear to feel uncomfortable with having this discussion at all. My request to the ones that think this is boring would be: Let's try to stay on-topic and not make this into a discussion about whether this topic is interesting or not. Perhaps it's better to refrain from commenting when you're not interested.

Thanks for the compliment! I have some ideas for a MOC in which I want to incorporate many of the insights gained from modding the Porsche. About the tan bevel gears: I'm a bit confused whether you understood my notes on the tan bevel gears. They have been used with the same orientation knob gears would have had if I used those. So they do not change the orientation of any of the axles involved and should not affect the behavior. I used bevel gears in the bottom section of the unit and inside the 5x7-frame with the indexer for convenience only. I don't have enough of them and they wouldn't fit within the 5x7-frame together with the indexer. If you want to implement this in the Porsche I strongly recommend to use knob gears instead, because they will make sure all involved axles have the correct orientation. Here's a cutaway of the complete shift-train as I intend it to be used in the Porsche: LXF-file here. About your observations so far: The disengaging of the pusher that you're mentioning should only happen when you hold the whole unit with one of its sides facing downwards. In that case the pusher at the side facing downwards may fall outwards before it engages the central knob gear. However, when you hold the unit close to horizontally - the way it is supposed to be used - this should never happen. If it's still not reliable when you use it horizontally (as in: not each shift succeeds) my guess is that there is something wrong with your build. In that case I can only think of the following things to take into account: I think it's fair to say that every single part used in this unit is essential for its correct behavior. For example, when you would leave out the black pins connecting the upper and lower thin liftarms in each of the shift-levers, that would decline the shift-levers stability and introduce a lot more undesired bending. Also replacing the 1/2 pins with 3/4 pins anywhere in this unit would decline its overall stability. Also the 3L axles that help the pushers return correctly should be held loosely by pins with pin hole to give the pushers enough space to return smoothly. The 5x7 frames to the sides of the unit should have their smooth sides facing outwards. That gives the pushers exactly enough space to return smoothly. It's important to make sure that - apart from the resistance induced by the 90 degree limiter - the entire shift-train rotates with minimal friction. It's important to make sure that all moving levers inside the unit have some play to make them move smoothly. Especially the pushers need some play to make them return smoothly. And last but not least: The unit relies on its interaction with the 90 degree indexer. If it's not connected to such indexer it won't do anything. But I suppose you haven't missed that one . Still, when you find a way to improve the whole unit in any way, I would be highly interested !

I guess there are some wannabe stars out there that think they can get there using designs from others. But - at least within the Eurobricks community - I think/hope there's a kind of community conscience that will correct for that kind of behavior. I look up to people like you and Nathanael Kuipers, both of you are a great inspiration to me. Personally I'm happy to mingle between other Technic-fanatics and don't need to rise above them. I do have an urge to add something to the community though and I guess I do search for some kind of recognition too. In that light: Receiving a personal e-mail - a few months ago - from Nathanael showing his appreciation for my work on the Porsche made my day .

Haha, great, thanks for letting us/me know!

Great to read all thoughts on this. Also nice to see a few more distant viewpoints from @nerdsforprez and @Boxerlego. I especially like the holistic view on all this. When you share your builds you enter a community that creates, shares, uses, improves, shares, etc. You enter the march of online civilization.

@ImanolBB, now I know what you're talking about. Never seen this before. @Pat-Ard this is rediculously cool!!!

@allanp your point of view makes me decide that from now on I will be speaking in terms of 'I got this idea from...' or 'this was inspired by...' rather than in terms of 'the original idea comes from...', unless there can be no doubt about the original designer.

I like it when I see people using some of my ideas, like a modifications to set, a straight forward mechanism or anything else useful to others. I like it even better when people credit me - or simply mention me - when they use my ideas in something they want to share themselves. However, I wouldn't feel offended when they don't, as long as they don't take credit for the specific idea themselves. At the same time I feel obliged to credit those whose ideas I use. What is your opinion? Should builders add references to the ideas they use, mention their designers or even credit them? Or should we accept that - like most things on the internet - anything shared can no longer be regarded as something that can be taken credit for?

Here's a video showing the mechanism from close-by:

You could also use a black one and add a few more black details, for instance the engine cover and the rear bumper. That would also give some more resemblance with the 42056 Porsche. LXF-file here.

Thanks @Myers Lego Technic! When you build this be sure to place the 5x7 frames to the sides of the unit with their smooth sides facing outwards. That gives the pushers exactly enough space to return smoothly.