grum64

Thank you all for your kind comments which are very much appreciated. I'm not going away completely, I'll still be active on these pages and hope to be back building as soon as possible. I said a long time ago and still maintain that Eurobricks is the friendliest place on the 'net so again, thank you my friends.

Hello my Freinds Unfortunately due to complications with my broken leg I'm confined to bed/hospital for the forseeable future so building the 42055 has to be put on hold Obviously I'm gutted I will be back building but I don't know when, all I can say is it's likely to be at least 6-8 weeks .. I'd just like to say big thank you to those of you who've sent messages etc., enquiring of my whereabouts/well being and for your very kind words.

Looks Great! All your hard work has really psid off.

Agreed. When you look at the UCS London Bus - Route 38 by great_mazingas on LEGO Ideas you see how good it could have been. I guess the introduction of 10258 has killed off this project.

Terrific build, more so considering it's your first MOC. Very well done.

Really nice MOC, very creative. Good to see something different.

Thank you Andy, that's very kind of you. I've not taken as many photos with this build as I've done with others as it's getting increasingly difficult to hold the phone, start the 2sec timer and hold it still. For each photo of an assembly I post I discard 6-10 and with it taking a minute or two to take each one it eats into valuable building time. I take the in-build photos mainly to post on these pages but also to give me a record of each build to look back on so yes, it's something I'll keep doing while I can and while my EB friends want to see them. As for my comments. I'm not as articulate or technically knowledgeable as others hence the lack of any really informative comment so I just write about any difficulties I come up against & whatever else comes into my head and hope for the best

Thank you. It certainly is a (big) fun build.

Very nice build. Great work

Really great work. I look forward to its completion

Thank you for your good wishes. Patience and stubborness saw me through my previous builds and the same will be true for this one. I just think it's going to take less of the former and great deal more of the latter

Build Day 6 - Days build time 5hrs 15mins / Total build time 26hrs 40mins With nothing on the calendar for today it was out to the shed for a few hours building. I was hoping to get the rest of this assembly completed and fitted onto the carrier today but it wasn't to be due mainly to much of the building being fiddly and time consuming rather than difficult, the pulley wheels and worm gear shown in pics 1 & 3 being particularly so. A lot of time was taken up getting these in place. As this build progresses I can't help but admire the work that must have gone into designing this monster. Most of today's building seems to have been taken up adding part after part locking the assembly together. This is proving to be one very solid build but I guess it has to be when you think what it has to carry. Today's pictures.

Thank you Edwin. Thankfully it's just a broken leg so is a temporary condition and doesn't stop me building. Thank you for your kind words. The upper assemblies do look high but I'm hoping my new wheelchair will help me as I can raise the seat level by 12in (30cm) . Thank you.

Amazingly realistic. I had to look several times to check I was really looking at a LEGO model.

Stunning! Absolutely stunning!

Thank you. It'll be several weeks but won't stop me building. As for the photos, thank you for your kind words. I'd like to able take great pictures like those we see from Jim and others on these pages but I don't have the equipment/setup and with no clue how to use it if I did have my mobile will have to do.

Thank you Jeroen. Spare room on my laptray is indeed noticeable only by it's absence. Once the risers for my table have been made I'll be back building on that. Hopefully they shouldn't be too much longer.

Build Day 5 - Days build time 6hrs 20mins / Total build time 21hrs 25mins After a few weeks away due to a broken leg I'm happy to be back building. Those of you who follow my ramblings may think this sounds familiar and you'd be right, my leg was broken during a hospital procedure last year but this time I can blame no one but myself. Wanting to keep a long story short I'll just say I must be the only person in a wheelchair daft enough to run their own leg over! I'm now the owner of a bright pink (our beautiful 4yr old Grandaughter Penny's choice) thigh to toe cast. Anyway, back to today. Building's been really good today with only the tracks causing any real grief. Assembling both sets took well over an hour followed another 30mins or so to fit them. Good job I had over 6hrs to build today. With the base now complete I'm getting an idea of just how big this thing's going to be. This size was making it a difficult beast to take pictures of but thankfully I've just bought a new wheelchair which has a powered reclining back meaning I can get far enough away from the build to get it all in the shot, for now anyway. Unfortunately, this doesn't mean my photography will improve. Today's pictures.

Nice build, I like it very much. Great work.

You're very kind. Thank you.

Thank you.

I've a feeling this is one build I'm never going to forget!

Inserting the 5L axles was aided by my trusty forceps. Impressive progress. Thank you, I'm pretty pleased but there's a very, very long way to go yet. Thank you for your kind comments. Really pleased you've now been able to build the 8880. It's a great set.

Build Day 4 - Days build time 4hrs 25 mins / Total build time 15hrs 5 mins Another day having fun (most of the time!) playing with my little ABS friends. Most of today's building was spent repeating much of the previous day's building which meant coming up against the same problems. The 15100's were again a pain to fit whereas the 55615 proved to be a far more worthy adversary with each encounter being a battle of attrition with the last being particulaly so. The fight was long and hard but with nothing to show for the time spent a strategic withdrawal was called. Wounds dressed, a new plan of action and a few short skimishes later and victory was declared. This time... With 31 x 15100's and 12 x 55615's left to go I fear my battles have only just begun. The only other difficulties today were with the four 7L liftarms in stage 60 (page 83). Being fairly deep inside the main assembly they were a job to get to and keep in place while trying to exert enough pressure to fit them. Almost 50 minutes passed with no results before I did what I should have done all along (my head will never save my struggles). I passed a 5L axle though an unused hole in the assembly at the same level of the needed pins. Then the liftarm, held in forceps, was gently guided onto it. The liftarm, now held in place by the axle, was then easily affixed. This was repeated for the remaining 3 liftarms. Hope that all makes sense. The rest todays building was problem free. Today's pictures. Apologies for the last picture. It was taken at the end of the building and I was whacked so it was difficult to hold the phone high enough to get the whole assembly in frame and keep it steady enough for it to focus. My bad, I'll try and do better.