Lobot

Small update: I took advantage of Lego's free shipping offer yesterday and put in a PAB order for 537 parts for £65.51. The good news is that's everything now ordered, so the total cost is £596.53 (including Chewie!). It's above my initial estimate of £550 but not by too much. The extra cost was the shipping as I had to make a total of 18 orders. I've used alternative colours for 322 parts (6.22%), which are mainly the smaller technic connectors & parts; I might try & source the correct ones at some point but the alternatives will do for the time being. Summary below: Actual colour used shown in brackets: 111 x Black Technic, Pin Long with Friction Ridges Lengthwise (Blue) 36 x Dark Bluish Gray Hinge Brick 1 x 2 Locking with 1 Finger Vertical End (Light Bluish Grey) 32 x Dark Bluish Gray Hinge Plate 1 x 2 Locking with 1 Finger On End (Light Bluish Grey) 14 x Dark Bluish Gray Technic, Axle Connector (Ridged with x Hole x Orientation) (Light Grey, doh!) 2 x Light Bluish Gray Boat Mast Rigging Long 28 x 4 (Black) 1 x Light Bluish Gray Dish 10 x 10 Inverted (Radar) with Radiating Spokes Pattern on Concave Side (No pattern) 58 x Light Bluish Gray Hinge Brick 1 x 2 Locking with 2 Fingers Vertical End (Dark Bluish Grey) 60 x Light Bluish Gray Lever Small Base with Light Bluish Gray Lever (Black & Light Bluish Grey) 8 x Tan Brick, Modified 2 x 2 with Pin and Axle Hole (Light Bluish Grey) Unfortunately, my other Lego order is still delayed as 4 of the part types are currently available & it could be 3 weeks before they're shipped. Ah well, one of those things I guess. However, my last two small Bricklink orders arrive this week (radar dish, rigging etc) and I was able to make some limited (well painful) progress.... A bit more of the legs completed: I love the design of these, two are completed, the others are in various stages. Unfortunately I made a mistake when I ordered the 14 x 'Dark Bluish Gray Technic, Axle Connector (Ridged with x Hole x Orientation)' - I'd intended to get them in Light Bluish Grey, but ordered the old LIght Grey......I'm going to replace them as it looks horrible Top tip: don't make Bricklink orders when you've had zero sleep!! I'll be able to build some of the larger sections as soon as my PAB order arrives. Cheers, Robin

That's a shame, it's become a nice little ritual for me to buy them My nephew is addicted to Lego & he'll be really dissapointed... I just hope that another paper joins forces with Lego. I really don't understand the problem; a polybag for 30p or 60p and you get a free paper. If you don't want to read it then recycle it or, even better, use it to line your composting bin (which is what I've done for the last two years).

Amazon (UK) currently have: Star Wars 9498: Saesee Tiin's Jedi Starfighter for £20.23, that's 33% off (link here) Star Wars 75004: Z-95 Headhunter for £29.23, that's 27% off (link here) Star Wars 9496: Desert Skiff for £16.85, that's 33% off (link here) Cheers, Robin

Yay, I came second in the small category! You've made my day!! Thanks to everyone who voted for me, I really appreciate it I'm waiting to see what the actual Episode VII storyline is....all I ask is that it won't include (living) ewoks Congratulations to the other winners. Cheers, Robin

I spent a couple of hours last night looking through the manual for sections that I might be able to partly build, results below: Some of the feet (I've just ordered the 14 x 6538bs which I need to finish them): The cockpit (almost complete, missing 3 parts), but at least Chewie has somewhere to sit!: The docking rings (incomplete), these are really awkward to build but well worth the effort: The central rear section (almost complete): That's all I can do for a bit, it's going to be a long couple of weeks! Cheers, Robin

Small update: I’ve just received two more orders totalling approx 330 parts, so I'm up to 4,229 (81.74%) of the set. I’ve ordered another 365 from Lego for £120 but unfortunately several parts are currently out of stock including the ‘1 x 16 ‘Dark Bluish Gray Technic Brick 1 x 16 with Holes’ that I need to build the frame with. They won’t be in stock for another 10 days, so it will be 2-3 weeks before I can do any serious building, doh! However, I’ve put in two small orders today for a few ‘straggler’ parts including the rigging & radar dish (I’m not getting originals for them!). I just need to put in an order for 537 parts from PAB for £65 and I’ll be finished (I’ve decided to cheat by ‘borrowing’ 4 hoses & the turntable from my Falcon, which I’ll replace at some point ), but the total cost is just under £600 including postage....I managed to add a new Chewbacca to one of my orders for £2.43, but I don’t think that I’ll bother with the others. I’m going to trawl through the instructions & see if there’s any section that I can build, not that I’m getting impatient or anything....!

Thanks, I'll try & keep it interesting!! I've tried to keep most of the colours original, but have changed some due to cost/availability. To date it's mainly the smaller technic parts (connectors, pins and the levers); I was going to build the frame in a different colour but Lego are selling the correct 3703s for 74p each if I remember correctly & they're only a bit more expensive than black etc. When I've finished ordering everything I'll add a summary if you're interested. The cost is an interesting question and depends I guess on what you want. For me I'll be able to have a shiny new Falcon, with only a few different parts for somewhere around £580..obviously without the box or instructions. The current price on Ebay for boxed, used example is £800 - £1000 so there is a decent saving to be had if you order wisely. To be honest it's just the challenge of it all.... it's kept me busy for hours! I might end up selling it but I'll decide when I've finished it.

Prologue: Following the countless hours I productively wasted last year building a 10143 UCS Death Star II (link here), via Bricklink, I’ve been looking for another project. Next on my list was the 10030 UCS Star Destroyer, but after sourcing about 50% of the parts I admitted defeat as I couldn’t obtain several of the rarer ones inside Europe. I briefly debated building an Endor Landing platform, using instructions which I’d purchased from Ebay, but it wasn’t going to big enough for my UCS shuttle so that was the end of that. Back to the drawing board, ho hum. To be honest, since I’d ‘Bricklinked’ the Death Star, normal sets (the ones that come in a box with all of the parts in numbered plastic bags) seem a bit too easy somehow... and I like a challenge!! I considered numerous options, but kept circling back to the idea of a UCS Falcon. I would like to say that I did try to stop myself from starting this for several weeks, but finally gave in. My wife gave me her, classic, disappointed look when I mentioned my plan to her and, to be fair, she did have a point as I already own one! My logic: My current Falcon is the third one I’ve owned (long story) and I paid £750 for it MISB a couple of years ago just before the prices got really silly. I built it once and displayed for a week in a darkened room before my irrational fear of dust & light damage made me disassemble it and return it to the safety of its packing box. Hence, there was some logic to this project after all....if I could build one (relatively) cheaply I could then display it long-term without any fear of i) daylight ii) dust or iii) one day finding our cat asleep on it!! Now I know that this project has been well-documented before by BobBongo and jFox but I thought you might like to see how my project develops, building it my way. Firstly, I’ll admit that I’m rather OCD about Lego; it has to be new! Secondly, I wanted to see how cheaply this could be done, keeping to the original colours wherever it was sensible to do so. Some of the costs I’ve seen for building one seemed ridiculously high and I was determined to do better, at least that was the plan.... My Strategy: Firstly I checked the Lego PAB website to see what parts were readily available to set a ‘benchmark’ cost. Next, using a spreadsheet, I recorded the cost of the parts which were available in four of my favourite stores, not overly scientific but it was a useful starting point. Using a few formulas I estimated that I could do this for about £550, give or take some postage. Before I forget I’d like to pass on my thanks to both gizmocom and KRAM who supplied a total of 1,541 parts, in 50 and 67 lots respectively. Their excellent service deserves a shameless plug; both sellers are 100% Lobot recommended! Bricklink: I’m not an expert in Bricklink, but if you haven’t sourced a lot of parts before, I can offer the following advice: i) Buy within your own country wherever possible; the cost of long-distance postage really adds up after a while. If you’re in the UK also be very wary of any potential Import taxes so try and order from the EU if you need to go further afield; I got stung a couple of years ago and it resulted in a cheap purchase from the US being a very expensive one!! ii) Don’t get too obsessed about saving the odd penny here and there; it’s far more important to minimise the total number of orders. During my searches I set myself a minimum 100 (ish) parts per order; otherwise the postage gets prohibitive. iii) Having said that, I’ve adopted a policy of ‘grabbing’ parts wherever I could. For example the Falcon requires 243 x 3021 ‘Light Bluish Gray Plate 2 x 3’; these are £0.10 from PAB, so that’s £24.30 unsurprisingly. However, if you can buy 20 @ £0.07 from a seller, as part of a larger order, you’ve just saved yourself £0.60. Now that doesn’t sound much but if you manage to source all 243 for that you’ll save £7.29, as long as you don’t incur any additional postage charges. I’ve found that most sellers use weight bands (0-250g, 250-500g etc) so provided you keep a careful eye on the total weight of each order, via the shopping basket, you can make significant savings. For my orders I estimated that the weight of the packaging would be a maximum of 30g, so kept all 250g orders below 220g. iv) PAB can look expensive for some parts, but for some they’re unbeatable (for example the 3069b ‘Light Bluish Gray Tile 1 x 2 with Groove’ & 3068b ‘Light Bluish Gray Tile 2 x 2 with Groove’); also they have a fixed shipping charge which can be very helpful if it’s a large order. You need to bear in mind that lots of plates will be heavy, and even if you can get them slightly cheaper on Bricklink the cost of postage may eliminate any potential saving. v) Don’t automatically disregard sellers with only a small (ish) parts inventory or feedback. By using the Bricklink filters I used several with 50-150 feedbacks; their service was at the same level as those with 1000+ and frequently their price per part was significantly less. Progress to date: I managed to find 414 new parts from my own collection before I started ordering. These were mainly small Technic connecters etc and realistically they were probably worth £15. During the last 6 weeks I’ve made a total of 13 orders for 3,747 parts at a cost of £374.74, excluding my own stock. 6 orders were from the UK, 3 from the Netherlands, 2 from Germany, 1 from Denmark & 1 from Belgium. Including my own stock this adds up to 4,161 parts, or 80.42% of the set which I’m quite pleased with, breakdown as follows: Orders Parts Total Cost (£) Cost per part (£) Source Own 414 £0.00 0 N/A 1 873 £46.99 £0.05 UK 2 668 £36.52 £0.05 UK 3 443 £42.68 £0.10 UK 4 343 £37.40 £0.11 Denmark 5 311 £34.46 £0.11 UK 6 147 £28.35 £0.19 Netherlands 7 103 £20.56 £0.20 Netherlands 8 100 £30.22 £0.30 Germany 9 111 £15.70 £0.14 UK 10 96 £12.30 £0.13 Belgium 11 206 £24.76 £0.12 Netherlands 12 98 £13.82 £0.14 UK 13 248 £30.98 £0.12 Germany To date 12 orders have arrived, totalling 3,913 parts (75.63%). So, what does this look like? Scroll down to find out: A large box: Han in part heaven (insert the music to American Beauty here): And what can I build so far: “She may not look like much, but she’s got it where it counts”...Han paused and then, with a deep sigh, continued...”Ok kid, I’ll admit it’s total rubbish” I’ve just made two orders for another 457 parts, including the technic beams, so I should be able to make some tangible progress soon. I add another update soon. Cheers, Robin

I've also got both and the Falcon is far better value if you can get it for the same price. The design is also very good & it's far less delicate than the old 4504. I appreciate that the new minifigures are expensive to make, but the RRP for the Palace is ridiculous; 1233 parts for the Falcon, 675 for the Palace....

Nice work, it's good to see someone else attempting this. I love the dis-assembled C-3PO in the crate! I tried to build one using parts sourced from PAB, Ebay & Bricklink, but couldn't get the last 20 for a half-decent price... the grey curved base plates are impossible, so I finally admitted defeat. There are some very nice features in the original version, I particulary like the duelling platform (I got my curved pipes from Luke's landspeeder 8092!) and the chamber itself. I'm sure that a new version of Cloud City would be a best seller for Lego, I don't understand why they haven't released one yet?

Thanks, it will be interesting to see if it gets the green light and, if not, what reason they give.... I'm still bemused that the Winchester Pub from Shaun on the Dead was rejected. If memory serves they said that it was 'innapropriate' (or similar)....I'll never understand that; comedy zombies from a cracking film, nope, but the 'Monster Hunters' range is fine..... :look: :look: Anyway, I digress. Fingers crossed that this will be accepted.

Does anyone know how long the Cuusoo 'In Review' stage will take for this? It reached 10,000 votes on 12th August last year & I really can't see what's taking so long? It's bound to be another big seller for Lego as follows: i) Big UCS set ii) Original Trilogy iii) Old version has a £300+ aftermarket value iv) Everyone loves Jawas & Power Functions & LEDs!! :wub: I hope it ends up being 3000 - 3500 parts & I'm looking forward to spending £400+ on one!!

Adult Fan Of Lego.....to me that explains things nicely! Although I suppose if there are specific categories I guess that I must be a SWAFOL, actually that doesn't sound too bad....perhaps I'm onto something here! In all seriousness it's all Lego and if there are guys who only collect figures, for whatever reason, it's bound to result in more sets being split and the parts ending up on Bricklink, so to me it's a win-win. Personally I like to build, especially larger sets, for the challenge but I'd never critise anyone for collecting minifigures; it takes a serious amount of dedication & money to do it.

My local Tesco store (Newton Abbot) has the new Star Wars AT-RT (75002) reduced to £13.50, it still looks expensive at that price though!!

I couldn't have put that better myself In all seriousness I expect that Lego will concentrate on new (and exclusive) minifigures to ensure that it sells well, and that the actual village will be a lot of reddish-brown with the odd green branch, like a scaled-up 7956. Perhaps I'll be wrong, and I do hope so, as there are some really beautiful MOC tree designs & it would be great if they took inspiration from the likes of Brickplummer

I 100% agree with that! My only hope is that Episode VII is based on the re-grouping of the Imperial forces.... with their first target being Endor and the Ewoks, but this time they'll be equipped with blasters that shoot straight and body-armour that stops blunt arrows!!

6. Empire911 - Expecting High Visit on the Training Grounds - 1 point 10. Bob de Quatre - The Negotiator – 1 point 13. ACPin - Yoda's Legacy – 3 points

That's really nice :wub: I want one!! I'm glad it's not just me who's noticed the scale issue with R2...

Interesting news, this looks really nice & is a 'must buy' for me unlike the B-wing that I just can't get that excited about. It's seems like a reasonable RRP as well, which is always good. However, I don't understand why they are including an R2 unit (again) but not a pilot (again).....perhaps someone can explain that one to me? Surely if it's R2 scaled it should be scaled for a (Luke) as well Now that the 'unique UCS' has been broken, I'm looking forward to an updated Falcon in the next 5 years, it's bound to be a massive seller for Lego. I just hope that they release a UCS Sandcrawler & Slave 1 before then.

Interesting images, I'm really impressed by the new Gunship & AT-TE, and am looking forward to seeing them available. However, what have they done to the Biker Scout in the calendar?.... I really hope this isn't going to be the new 'standard' version of it; the old one was far cuter!!

That's looking really good Bob Do you know how many parts you'll need for the top section, or when you're hoping to finish it? Are you going to use any other colours than light & dark grey? I've debated buying a couple of hundred 1x1 and 1x2 trans-blue plates for my standard SSD to mimic the film, but wasn't sure if it would look ok.....

Thanks for the link I'm quite impressed by the Gunship and AT-TE in a non CW format. I'm not usually a great fan of the PT, but I can see myself getting both of these if I can find them at a reasonable discount. I'm still not sure about the Barge though, I'll wait until final images appear before making a final judgement.

Noooo!!! Not more ewoks All I want is a new Cloud City, is that too much to ask?

Thanks cavegod, it's interesting that Lego will be releasing a new UCS-priced X-wing after all. I wonder if it will be radically different from the old one? I guess this opens the door to an updated UCS-type Falcon in a few years.....

I'll be in the minority here but my vote goes to 9678 Twin-Pod Cloud Car & Bespin, not really for the set but Lobot himself :wub: :wub: I just hope that they might release some other Cloud City sets this year...... Jabba's Palace was a nice set, just a shame it wasn't 50% bigger.