Bublehead

Good progress, this is a great set, epic but not quite as iconic as 8880. I wasn’t that hopeful that I would ever find one for at least an average price used, but I was lucky to find an AFOL who was getting rid of this set. including box and instructions for the going average price on BL. He even had all the extra pieces and had bagged all the parts by color. So naturally this set sits on my shelf, never to be disassembled (well at least until I get the need to build it again, but I might use surrogate parts from the bins and change the color... maybe orange, dark azure, or dark blue?)

@BrickbyBrickTechnic, my post was meant as humor, but as for size and the RTC, are you looking for functionality and low cost? I think the size creep and cost creep are here to stay. Especially when it comes to the yearly flagship or as we have been experiencing, the twice a year offerings 1H/2H.

There was a time when the B Model was presented on the reverse of the box with as much flare and limited wording which allowed retailers to display either side almost as if the B Model was the A model. When stock got low,they could increase their “offerings” by simply turning a box backward. There were times when I got excited because I thought they had released a new model and it was just a B model of a set that I had not bought yet. Then, and I would guess this was due to market research, they started the 2 in 1 campaign to inform parents that this toy made more things than the main model, and the back of the box started showcasing the main model features, with a small picture of the B model. Yes, there were epic B models out there, but mostly they were somewhat limited in functionality compared to the main model. The main point here is there was a time when you wanted to buy the set to discover the features, they were not showcased on the box, and every build was a discovery of what the model could do, each feature as you completed it, and then the final play mode once finished. This included the B model. And the kicker was, if you liked the A model too much, you sprung for a second copy to build the B without tearing the A apart (if you could afford it) or just say goodbye to the A model and build the B, play with it, then rebuild the A model to put back on your shelf. I think relegating the B model instructions to online download has really made the B model an afterthought, and the need for instant gratification on a model’s functions (by showcasing every one) has made the discovery element of the build a lost part of the experience.

@Maaboo35, dang it! I knew you were going to bring that dump truck into this... ?

@Maaboo35, in the vein of humor let me counter... 42055 has only two functions... move itself and move bricks. And I got mine for $150, so it was big and cheap and low function count. I think it proves the rule.

Maybe do it like a wake board being towed behind a boat? That way you could have a “rope” the rider is holding on to that doubles as the controlling force to keep them stationary or move back and forth? Great idea for a ride

<off topic> I think you have found a new contest theme @Jim... how many parts can you eliminate from an official TLG set and retain the functions? Bonus points for increasing function count AND reducing part count. Call it a Bare Bones contest...

I think the recent discussions on size, part count (which = cost) and functionality tends to muddy the waters of what is a good set verses what people think is a bad set. Because most arguments can be swung in both directions like a dead cat and still hit their target. Some will say big is great if function count requires the increase in size, while others will say small is great if function count is high, while others will say a set is great if part count is low but function count is high. Its like that old saying about quality, price, and delivery time. You can only pick two out of three. So for Lego Technic, that would be function count, size, and price. If you want high function count and large size it’s not going to be cheap, If you want large size, and cheap, it’s not going have a lot of functions, and if you want high function count and cheap, it’s not going to be very large.

@Maaboo35, now that was funny... I think any outrigger that has a hope in heck of lifting a huge model off its wheels has to have one of two thing going for it. It either has to be geared down to a snails pace in order to generate the required torque, -or- it has to use a lever arm big enough to create the required mechanical advantage. or both. Throw pneumatics in the mix and now it becomes a factor of air flow and pump capacity. but it all goes back to how much work is actually being done and how much work your motor can deliver per unit time (power) and how that power is applied to the job. You want to lift 4kgm in 5 seconds? It’s not happening with a M motor, a L motor or a XL motor without some form of storage, and the reason so many outriggers on MOCs tend to be pneumatic with an air tank for speed. The outriggers on my Twirl & Hurl use a single L motor, but I’m not trying to lift the whole ride off the ground, only stabilize it. They are slow, but they do their job well.

@Didumos69, have you ever considered the possibility that you are a Technic savant? And I mean this as a huge compliment by the way. Sometimes the solutions that seam trivial to one, are like rocket science to others? How many times have you seen someone struggle with a engineering challenge that you see the answer to almost immediately? Remember, the designers at TLG have design backgrounds mostly, and engineering is a secondary skill. That’s why some sets look good but function poorly, and why some sets work great, but don’t look that good. The balance between form and function is the war between design and engineering. When both happen at the same time, we get epic sets like the 8880.

Isn’t there a topic on here with a tiny mobile crane recently? Would love to see Appies take on the Rough Terrain Crane.

@Jim, thanks for your in-depth review. I too am a @ss-man with this set. Not sure why, but after finishing the steps that completed the rear end, all I wanted to do was run my hand all over the sexy curves. One question for you, do you think the front of the car is wibbly wobbly compared to the rear? I felt like the rear end was built to be man handled, but the front, not so much. Definitely agree with your pecking order, Bugatti > Porsche. Thanks again for all the work you do to support our hobby.

I guess it’s great to be Danish right now...

Ok, @allanp and @Jim, I agree with both of you, and Allan’s writeup pretty much sums up my take as well. I just finished Bag 12 and have unlucky Bag 13 yet to go, but the mainstay of the build is complete. My only comment on the front end is it seems a little flimsy compared with the rear end, and the doors could use some latches. I think the negatives about the gearbox and the triple driveshafts are not as warranted as some would argue ( @Didumos69, but I agree three shafts are not accurate) since you can’t see them.

Have you though about trying to recreate the actual mechanism the real ride uses? I have played with this idea myself as a possible MOC similar to my other ride and my initial findings were the mechanism works, but will require a lot more mini pulley wheels than I have right now. Good luck ?

@Jim, ok, wow! Not what I was expecting, but sure right up my alley. Thank you for embracing a sub-theme that has been un-mined by TLG in my mind. The roller coaster would not have rolled if it wasn’t for Technic. Now we can see what these brilliant EB members can do with an amusement ride. Are you positive it can’t be on a trailer?

Not arguing for bootleg parts or discussing them, and certainly not trying to promote third party anything. just pointing out a choice is only free will when made without outside influence.

I give a hardy AMEN to this statement. I am a one motor/many functions builder myself. I think a Technic model with a separate motor for every function is only a viable solution when incorporating IR RC or third party controllers (Buwizz Sbrick). If it is a non RC model, power distribution gearboxes and a single fwd/rev switch, whether on the BB or remote PF switch are more interesting and harder to pull off from a gear train perspective. One motor/one function designs rely on a single simple criteria, do you have enough room for the motor, and can you get a PF extention cable long enough to bring all the channels to the IR receiver/controller.

Which was heavily influenced by TLG due to unavailability of certain parts in certain colors. “Forced” is not far from the reality of having to make a choice which is based on an external party’s choices, here that being TLG’s public offerings of parts in known colors. I have felt “forced” many times by this same fact. You can’t make a pure Lego model in a specific color if they don’t make the parts in that color. I consider it being forced to use non Lego parts if they are available in the color you want to use by third party vendors. My color choice of red and black for my main model colors is not made lightly. More parts are available in red and black than most any other color beside lbg and dbg which are my chassis and frame colors. And if it wasn’t red and black it would be yellow and black.

My style has never changed, per se, but I came to Technic while I was older child. I was 15 when it came out, but didn’t get into it until after I left home when I was 18. My parents were not very rich, and we never had money for a big expensive European toy. I had to start making my own money after I joined the military in order to afford my first 8860 set. So since then, I have bought and built almost every flagship set and my own MOCs and MODs have always stayed true to one philosophy. It has to be cool. No matter what else, when a child sees my MOC or MOD, they must go “KEWL!” or “Awesome!” Now this isn’t really a building style as much as it is a life choice about what I am trying to accomplish with my hobby. The over - all mindset I take when I build is, would this pass an inspection by real Lego designers and the rules they are burdened with? Are any functions questionable in their operation? Do they work by the same principles of a real official TLG design, which is, if you follow the building instructions, the functions work, and work well without any “tuning” and definitely on the first attempt. Does it work like its real world counterpart? Does it look like it could really be a real life machine? Ok, and before I get the litany of responses that TLG functions don’t always work first time every time, for the most part, however they do, especially if you are OCD enough to check every axle and gear for smoothness and proper alignment and don’t squeeze your beams. I have had to tune a couple before. So my build style has only really changed due to the nature of Technic, as studs gave way to studless and features have shrunk down to 1L dimensions, and model density has reached the levels of pure gold, the Chiron being one of the densest in recent history. Looking back at my 8880 mods, and looking at how much room is in that model that is not used, I find it a bit strange that back then, I felt I was at the density limit of Technic. I don’t know how I would have reacted if you would have showed me a Chiron from the future... I guess I would have simply said “Cool!”

@Didumos69, It’s funny how myopic two companies, who both share a common theme of “only the best is good enough”, end up with a product that is really just “good enough” (and to finish the phrase here in the States) “for government work”. The saying “good enough for government work” sometimes confuses people. It refers to doing personal work on company time, or the burgeoning overhead costs of people using company resources for personal gain. This is written off for tax purposes as the cost of doing business, which means any work you do for yourself on company time is work done for the tax man, or working for the government. And we all know that for government work, “good enough” is the best you can ever expect to get. Your solutions prove that it could have been better, but for $350 plus tax, what we got feels more like “just good enough” and not really the “best” of anything, But maybe it is the “best” compromise between cost, performance, and looks, which this set seems to fall victim to. This set is also not aimed at us as much as it is aimed at the automotive enthusiasts, who are used to the limitations of toy representations of real cars. This set has more functionality than a diecast model of a Chiron, it just doesn’t live up to our standards of functionality as Technic AFOLs. But as my momma always says (truly, she really says this) “The enemy of perfect is good enough”

I am on Box 5, Bag 10 IIRC I think, but either way I just finished putting the Dark Azure fenders on mine. Putting the stickers on it too, just doesn’t seem right without them, and I will keep this one original without any mods on the shelf. Just like the 911, Static display only. Hopefully I will find another one for way cheaper to place in the parts bins. Been mulling over making a MOC Flatbed truck to haul it on. Or possibly two, one for the 911 also. So far here is my take on the Chiron. With Bugatti involved from the beginning, I think there are reasons that the suspension doesn’t work as well as we think it should because I believe that the designers had to make the insides of the car match the real Chiron monocoque construction. Now in theory, for the real Chiron, the monocoque frame is light and very strong. But to get the rigidity, and mind you I think the Bugatti folks wanted this thing to be robust and sturdy, that required a lot more ABS to both match the shape of the chassis and provide the necessary rigidity. Which ultimately led to it being overly weighty and thus the problem with the suspension. Now you have to believe that the finished model went to Bugatti for final sign off, and that they saw the poor performance of the suspension. But seeing this only makes the thing look even lower to the ground, with a front to back rake, they probably saw it as acceptable trade off between strong and non flexy and flimsy and weak. The only reason they left it alone was they ran out of design cycles (as stated many times here and elsewhere as probable cause). Now have I been impressed with it? It has been an entertaining build so far, no new building techniques to speak of except using 1x1 syringe needles and half pins to interface System with Technic. The paddle shifter stepper mechanism is cool, and actually works pretty well out of the box/bags. Build has been pretty straight forward, no missed “gotcha” steps where you have to disassemble 40 steps to fix an error. The Technic-olor innards are not too bad and the construction is very robust and stiff. You are not afraid to look at it directly in fear of handfuls of parts sluffing off by a stern glance. So far it seems pretty swooshable as a toy car goes, and man handling it doesn’t seem to be a problem. Is it over priced? absolutely. But then again the real Chiron is too. Does it look like a Chiron? Yeah, hard to mistake it as anything else except a Veyron, but only to the un-gearheaded eye. Does the gearbox work? It shifts nice, but not much of a head turner on the difference in output between gears. Does it have a turning radius of the Titanic? Unfortunately, yes. Is the rear wing cool? Yes, pretty cool, yet even cooler if it worked with the gearbox or a fake brake pedal. Does it have flimsy doors? Yep, TLG spared no expense to give us un latched, wibbly wobbly, timey wimey doors (and I haven’t even built them yet!!!) Would I buy it again at $377 out the door? Nope. Looking for a sub $200 used one even as we speak. Dark Azure and Dark blue? It works for me. Navy blue is better than Navel Orange. But I’ve been mulling a orange and dark blue Chiron MOC... might work. Seems to work for the Denver Broncos. Looking forward to finishing it this Sunday night.

I use this piece a lot when locking in gear trains and preventing the slippage of an axle out of a heavy cyclic torque load. Axle creep occurs when the power traveling through a set of gears has a cyclic component, whether is it back and forth, or just loaded and unloaded. An un stopped 4L black axle will require it to be physically stopped from slipping out by blocking movement in the axial direction. Sometimes there is no way to do that and this piece comes in really handy because it self stops axle creep. It has to do with repeat business and acceptance of the toy by the child. If a child abandoned a build because it was too hard or too confusing, they don’t end up with a playable toy, and the toy is abandoned. A parent is not going to buy the child another Technic set ever again because it did not satisfy the child as a “good” toy. Anything TLG does to make the first build go as flawlessly as possible gives their toy its best chance at satisfying both the child, the parent, and ultimately TLG, because the likelihood the parent will purchase a TLG product in the future is higher. And anything you do to increase future business is money well spent.

Truly a Technic-olor marvel. The photographer was really good, he made them look almost like renders. Nice job. If these were real Lego sets, can you imagine how hard it would be to sort the parts out prior to the build?

Axles in all colors of the rainbow- like unicorn poop. But seriously, having options on axle colors is not a bad thing IF they would make all axles in all colors, however, I did prefer the lbg/ black scheme of the past over the red/yellow/black/lbg (and sometimes white) scheme we currently have.