Bublehead

Ok, so I have started the list of vehicles, so I am looking at a three semi rig set. One similar to the T&H with ticket booth and porta potty, but no sign, instead a built in knuckle crane. Then two rigs that are simple cab over engine trucks pulling trailers full of parts. The first trailer houses the ride station and the first hill and the final run and super structure that holds up the overhead track. The other trailers add built in parts of the track and the three trailers line up to complete the station and support structures. The crane is needed to hoist the overhead sections up and install them. This is copy of the original ride, so it has a lot of source material to draw from. I am going to go old school on the cab designs, like a late 1950’s or early 60’s COE. And it will look old, rusted (brown elements mixed in at random) and have a real “carny” feeling.

I was expecting this topic to show up sooner. My response would be, yeah, like who DOSEN’T see GBC potential in it?

I am working on my next MOC ideas and after looking at the new roller coaster set, I am toying with the idea of creating a mobile trailer hauled version that is even bigger than my T&H ride, although this time maybe not a one armed version, but more in line with a “built from parts hauled on a trailer” version. If you have ever seen the old “Wild Mouse” coaster ride you understand where I am coming from. This ride used slightly undersized cars and had 2 riders, one per car, with 2 cars per train. It was not very fast, it was more a “twist your head off” ride that used tight 180 turns without banking as the thrill and it makes it feel like the track is ending just as you take the turn. The track sections and size of the cars make the new roller coaster elements perfect for a Wild Mouse ride scaled to Technic figures. Anyone think I am crazy?

Couldn't be DBG, NOoooo... had to be black... Can you tell my base/chassis/frame color choice combo is LBG/DBG? Red and black are my Main Model color combos... at least it won't clash. What a fashion hound I am becoming

It is REAL easy to cram that many parts into a model if it has any size at all to it, and this one does. Once you reach a certain scale, even adding small touches adds a lot of parts. I added a platform extension to my model that added three 11x7 panels to each side. So 6 parts plus a few pins and an axle and a this and a that... 150 parts later and we are done. Now grant you I made 2 hinges, 4 locking levers and 4 stowage brackets to support the manual function of folding the platform extensions for hauling, but why add something static when you can make it another working feature? BH

Game changing. (I hope people laugh at this) but seriously- amazing job. I know a little about amusement rides and you seriously have "swung for the fences" to turn a American phrase. Great work, can't wait to see it finished.

@allanp, thanks, for the video!

Oh great... just when I thought my MOC was finished... NOW we get 3x7 panels in red... Nope, not doing it, not going to rebuild it one more time to put in red 3x7's... nope... nope... nope... ok, well maybe... maybe...

Ok, how many of you would have tried walking out of the toy fair with this tucked under their coat?

What can you say but, yeah, going to buy it. After 40 years of playing with Technic, I still buy almost every flagship set, just not misb on the first day at full retail.

Coaxial movement is possible at this scale, but not coaxial control. That would require the arms not be keyed at all to the main shaft and then you would have multiple parallel shafts that would have lever arms to apply motive force. IIRC, there are "pipes" and liquid gas lines that run up the side of the tower... I would be tempted to use them as camouflage for my control shafts the I needed to control each gantry arm. Just some food for thought. BH

Could you live with one knob that turns both? I think you could engineer a solution where one knob rotates the crew gantry arm 180 and then use a shorter connecting link to turn the other shaft a fraction of that 180, or possible do a 2 to 1 gear ratio to get 180 on one shaft and 90 degrees on the other. Aventador2004 looks like he wants the challenge BH

@Bartybum, thanks for the support

Here are some questions- What is the process between an inspiration and then it's first submital to the whole Technic design team? How much does a designer have to "pitch" his ideas, and is this done via round table discussions or is it more a present your idea and wait for a green light from a design review committee? What is a typical day like for a Technic designer? How much of a designer's day goes into actually working with bricks? Does a designer work on one official set at a time or do they have to juggle multiple models in different stages of development? How much do the designers interact on a design? Are most models developed solo or do you ever work in tandem or as a team on a large set? Do designers compete with each other, either formally or informally, to promote their projects? Are designers graded or rewarded in any way based on the number of sets sold? How much does sales drive the design process? If a set becomes very popular and sells well, does this translate into any benefit for the designer? Bonus, raises, awards or recognition by upper management? What is the ratio between number of models submitted for review to green lighted projects? If a set is rejected, is there an iterational process that lets the designer refine and resubmit their ideas? Do you have to meet deadlines? How much freedom does a designer have to work on a new project or inspiration? Do you ever take your work home with you? Are there any "crunch" times where you are working up against a major deadline? Do designers ever work overtime? Do the designers ever go out for a pint? What is the yearly Christmas party like for a Technic designer? Do you ever celebrate completing a design, or making any milestone? How serious is the work atmosphere? Is it all business all the time, or is it layed back and casual? What gives the designers the most satisfaction, getting their project into production, or the sales numbers of a popular model? Do the designers fear the reaction of children to their projects, or do they look forward to the focus group results? Can the results of play testing totally kill a design? What is the average number of cycles of play testing a model will go through? When a designer is given a task to create the next flagship set, are they given a budget and a deadline, or does the bill of materials get hammered out after a successfully play tested model is developed? Are decisions on whether a model will be power function or pneumatic made prior to development or are designs selected based on what categories they fill? Are projects doled out to the designers by size, functionality, or category? When the yearly catalog of sets is being decided, do they segregate by size or by category, i.e. "We need 5 sets with 100 pieces, 3 sets with 500 pieces etc..." or is it "We need a supercar, 3 trucks, one airplane, and 3 motorcycles"? I figure that my chances of becoming a Lego Technic Designer are actually less than zero so maybe if they answer a few of these questions, I might at least have an idea what it would be like to be one. ? BH

@Skiing Biology God, Some of the questions you have asked can be answered by watching all the TLG Technic designer videos on the web, and there are a couple of interviews and other videos that pull back the curtain, even if ever so slightly. One thing is for sure, the design cycle for Technic is longer and more rigorous due to the nature of mechanical design. Other themes have to "play well" and follow the TLG builders mantra, where the Technic designers have to do that AND make the machine work, and work at the first go once the model is complete. If you followed the directions, and didn't squeeze your gears, then the model should work without having to "tune" any feature to get it to work. That can be a tall order. One interesting thing I learned from one interview was the designers don't make the instructions or determine how to put the model together. Once they have a working model it goes to a whole different group to determine building steps, order of construction, and graphics for the instructions. Check the videos out on the web. Some of your questions however, I would love to hear answers to. Will they answer them? Probably not. ☹️

I too hate bodywork, but it's not that I am not any good at it, it is just freaking time consuming as heck. You have to finish so much of the body to determine if your ideas are going to work or not, and after putting in marathon build sessions you look at the product of your labor and get real mad that you spent the last 8 hours getting one panel to fit just right. That being said, here is a method I use to help reduce the massive rebuilds... use analogs. This can be a little troublesome if you have a limited selection of parts, but I am known to completely mock up a section of the model (the "analog" of that portion of the model) and then work specifically to get just that portion of the model tuned in and looking good. Then I build an analog of the adjoining sections and expand the analog to cover more areas of the model and keep going. I usually end up with 5 or six sections that then get combined in one massive rebuild. Make sure to make your analogs as close to the real deal as possible including colors and parts because too often the analog becomes the final model and requires only minor surgery to swap out the correct color pieces if needed later. But these are just suggestions and everyone approaches builds a little differently. Find a building style that fits your needs and stick with it. Your model is coming along but I think the "flow of conscience" design style is pulling you in many directions all at once and solutions from one section start to encroach on other finished sections. This is not necessarily a bad thing, but it can make the build take way longer than you might like. So often, my first thoughts on a design ultimately end up being my final solution, so trust you instincts and your inner minds eye. So many of my best and successful ideas come to me when my eyes are closed, there are no bricks within 20 feet of me, and I see the solution in my mind. Designs for bodywork can come to you in the same way. Be Zen about it, meditate on what you want the final model to look like. Let your mind sculpt the shape, then let you hands bring it to life. And if something doesn't feel right or you have reservations about something, posting your dilemma here like you have been doing can get a lot of eyes looking at it as well. On the rear end, the tail lights speak to me, but they say something like "straight and skinny and flat are not the right shape here" and I see them needing to be more triangular with sharp points near the centerline and expanding as they go out. This shape is a little hard to achieve but if you can get it right, it might solve some of the panel fit issues at the same time. Just my opinion. It's your MOC, so it may speak a different language to you BH

I would posit that 2 super cars in 2 years is pushing the super car distribution cycle- here are the years TLG has put out a large auto chassis: 1977,1980,1988,1994,1999, 2000, 2011, 2016, 2018 which gives an average number of years between them of 4+ years so releasing one every 2 years could be considered an abundance when you look at it from a historical viewpoint but not unprecedented as the 1999/2000 cycle saw two back to back with the Super Street Sensation and Silver Champion. I am sure there are a lot of people here who wished it was every year like that and gladly look forward to the one after the Chiron, but like you, I prefer a different and a broader range of flagship models other than auto chassis. So maybe over abundance was an incorrectly applied term and what I am really getting at is the noticeable uptick in supercar offerings from TLG seems out of the norm for them. BH @Jim, maybe my question should be "Are these sets going to become their own specialized sub-theme, and should we look forward to a new one every 2 years? Kind of a "UCS" for Technic?" BH

@Jim, My biggest question would be, are the models in this series targeted at the non-AFOLs who are gearheads, the general Automotive Enthusiast, or children ages 9 to 90? Because they sure don't appeal that much to this Technic fan as much as sets like 42030, 42043, or the BWE. Sure, I bought a Porsche like most good Lego Technic fans, but I was disappointed in the final model and was glad I picked it up used for way less than retail, which I think is a testament to how much some fans disliked the set that they would part with it so cheap. If they are trying to bring more people into the Technic theme using popular real automotive models, then I am all in for anything that helps the Technic theme survive. But the over abundance of super car models is making Technic more a "Supercar Construction Set" building toy and I feel that is getting away from the original idea behind Technic, which was a construction toy to make working models of real world machines and vehicles, not just supercars, which have their place in Technic lore, but are not what I look forward to every year from TLG. BH

Hello, I am Bublehead, also know as BubleheadDan or just Dan Roth I am a 56 year old AFOL returning to building after coming out of my second black period which was brought on by a fear of carpal tunnel and my excessive building. Turns out it wasn't carpal tunnel that was causing me to have numbness in my left hand but from a pinched nerve in my elbow. So after reassembling a bunch of my old Star Wars sets, I caught the building bug again and went and bought a bunch of Lego, mostly used, but a lot of nisb from TRU (RIP), and a bunch of sets off Craigslist from Lego "investors". But I found a guy who was getting out of Lego and more into RC stuff and he sold me a bunch of misb older sets I had missed in my second "black" period. My first foray into posting a MOC here brought me a bunch of unwanted attention, and I am having to say a lot of mea culpas to get my standing back. If I have learned one thing, never use the words "game changing" in the title of your MOC thread. That being said, some may wonder about the spelling of "Bublehead" and why bublehead and not bubblehead. If anyone remembers IRC chat back in the dark ages of the internet, your handle could only be 9 characters long, and so I dropped the extra "b" and went with just Bublehead. So now the question, why call myself Bublehead? I am glad you asked... I spent 6 years of my life in the United States Navy as an electronic technician trained in the Nuclear Power field as a nuclear reactor operator, or as some like to point out, the same job as Homer Simpson. I was stationed on the USS Andrew Jackson, SSBN 619 (Gold crew), a Lafayette class ballistic missile submarine, and made 7 strategic deterrent patrols off the coast of Russia during the Cold War. I have spent 83 days underwater on my longest patrol, and most averaged around 75 to 80 days at sea. Since then my career has taken me through many different occupations including: Electronic Technician repairing manufacturing fallout from producing networking cards, IBM typewriters, and radar avoidance detectors. Electronic Technician working in a small electronics store selling IBM computer clones and Alps printers Electronic Technician working for Grimes Aerospace Advanced Electronics Department, servicing Fokker 50 and Fokker 100 flight warning computers. Qualification Testing Technician, doing final qualification tests on Grimes Aerospace products. My specialty was photometrics, which is a fancy way of saying I was a lightbulb tester which is a way over simplification of what we actually tested for. Aircraft Lighting Engineer- so after telling his engineers how bad their lighting designs where, the head of Aircraft Lighting asked me if I thought I could build them better and I said, yes, I think I could, so he gave me the job. After working there 12 years, they were bought out by Allied Signal, who eventually went on and became Honeywell after buying them out and keeping the name. I left soon after because I had hit the glass ceiling of career growth without a degree, and completed my associates in computer programming. IT Consultant/Developer working for Accenture. Software engineer working for Wells Fargo Bank. ok, so much for my work experience, my hobbies are Technic Lego, Pinball (I own 3 real ones and a virtual cabinet), technology and making things including rapid prototyping, 3D modeling (using Solid Works) and 3D printing using my Printbot Simple Metal printer. My focus in Technic Lego is Flagship modeling, that is either modifying original TLG sets to make them more flagship-like or creating a playset that is a TLG flagship worthy design. My first real mostly original MOC has been brewing and steeping in my mind for 25 years, because that was how long ago I initially tried to build it. Using studded Technic beams, and a lot of model team construction techniques, I was able to build the gantry and the ride "heads" with cars, but the scale of it was out of control. So now, fast forward 25 years, and I have finally built it using studless beams and posted it in the Technic Mindstorm model team forum under Twirl & Hurl... please check it out. So that is where I am coming from, and one final thought. When I build, I build for kids. I try and build playsets that kids would want to play with. I am not going for hyper reality or for scale accuracy but for playability and fun and cool working functions. Thanks for reading, BH

I like updated versions of this model. Great job. Super execution. I spent like 6 months back 23 years ago making "my" version of the 8880. In 2 weeks when I go back to Ohio to visit, I am going to unearth it from my east coast Technic collection (my brother has all my Technic Lego from 1977 to about 2008) and see if it still works. Here is a list of my modifications... I only lost one original function which was HOG steering but I did lengthen the wheelbase 4 studs because I always felt the original was stubby: electric proportional power steering electric power convertible roof fake brake pedal and working break lights opening doors with internal and external latch pneumatic adjustable ride height fiber optic ignition timed to v8 (simple firing order) electric adjustable rear spoiler controlled by dashboard switch. i will post a topic and pics later this month.

Do I need say anything else on the subject?... @Meatman just proved my point.

You know what? I don't need this kind of aggravation in my life. I am trying to navigate this forum and not step on any toes and all I get is snarky and derogatory comments. You guys can keep your comments and criticisms, I don't need every word I say on here discounted because of one mistake. I can see there are those on here who feel they are holier than thou, and I just don't have the time to deal with it. I will go back into my hole and crawl out again when I have spent another 8 months creating something people on here won't appreciate. Enough said. BH

No, I am a man with many words and one MOC. One that took 8 months to design and build. Don't discount others words based on their deeds. Please play nice. You cant blame me for being overly cautious.

Sorry for opening old wounds, I'm looking for a specific answer to a specific question as I ask below. You can ignore this thread otherwise. Ok, but do people accept the Sbricks and Buwizzes because they are the solution to an unanswered need? Would they be as accepting of a 3D printed non-Lego element? And I know that people are using third party tires and 3D printed rims, but what about accessories, like miniature support items for a specific profession or trade? Or printed plastic sheets similar to the sails on the technic Racing Yacht? I am trying to determine how people will respond to my next MOC if I use non-Lego pieces in the playset that simulate a "new" element that Lego would mold just for this specific set. A lot hinges on the decision due to the functionality and ease of use of a single molded piece which could be made dimensionally specific, or having to build something up from existing bricks which will be harder (if not near impossible) to work with due to significant differences in their size/shape/construction. For arguments sake, do I use a 3D printed single element that would be the combination of 2 individual bricks, or use the two existing bricks stuck together? The single element would be a combination of a 2x2 round brick with a 2x2 plate but allow the center of the round brick to be hollow all the way through the plate. BH

Ok, what is everyone's take on non-Lego items used in a model? A) Never B) Only if it would be something TLG would possibly do for a specific set/model C) Ok, as long as it was cool D) I mix my Megablox and Lego together