Sokratesz

I'll add a few finishing touches this weekend but afterwards I'll tear it down because it occupies the better part of my floorspace and I have a load of Technic to sort out (for which I haven't the space now), and I want to start building a thing or two for the 7777 redux contest :) - Sok.

That is a beautiful lot

I bought a ticket for the first day (wed I believe) mostly because I want to check out what's for sale. - Sok.

Having been to reykjavik several times I can safely say that it does resemble the original fairly well :)

8421 has a huge part count, loads of gears and other useful parts and can be had cheaply if you're not in a hurry

If you gave a single coloured line (blue?) running front to back it would be finished

'???' does not make me 3x more likely to respond with a useful answer than just '?'

I like the two-storey layout, makes me want to rebuild my 12v station in that fashion, but I'd need awhole lot of support pillars :D - Sok.

What if.. Hitler didn't piss of Stalin, and instead united as Germany+USSR+Japan against the rest This means GB would've been dead by 1942, US probably wouldn't have intervened because of their appeasement policy and lack of a direct attack Then, they could stage an attack on mainland US (conquering Hawaii and Iceland first as staging points) from two sides, Japan from one and Germany from the other assisted by the USSR However, this would prove to be extremely difficult being a drain on even the resources of a united Eurasia, thus at the homefront things slowly start falling apart with rebellion being incited in France and GB by the lack of occupational forces (all being sent to NA). This forces desperate measures to try and end the war in the US and the US, Germany and the USSR are all three racing towards nuclear weaponry. However, Mexico and the nations in South America who have been bullied into passiveness by the attackers so far start to rally, Brazil holds a massive draft and gathers an enormous army and they take control of the isthmus of Panama from the USSR. While they march north to attack the Eurasian forces laying siege on Las Vegas and the other major desert cities in the flank, they receive experimental nuclear weaponry from China As the first nukes fall from the south on the forces attacking Salt Lake City, the USSR forces retreat from two major cities on the east coast and threaten to nuke them if attacks continue South American forces ignore pleads by the US government to halt their attack, and they seize control of California, Arizona, Nevada and Utah, forcing the Japanese and USSR forces to retreat north along the coast The USSR meanwhile finds their supply lines in Europe sabotaged by rebels and thus is unable to carry out its threat of nuking New York and Philadelphia. The US government, who counted these two cities as lost as soon as SA forces moved north, now feels confident enough to use its newly developed nuclear weaponry First target is Kéflavik airport on Iceland, an important staging point for Germany and the USSR Second target is Hawaii itself which by now has been completely taken over by the Japanese and is used as both a Naval and Air staging ground. The nukes fall leaving supply lines on both sides for the attackers severely crippled Meanwhile US ground forces are losing the ground battle in the northern US as Japanese forces move towards Glasgow AFB where much of the remaining US forces are stationed At this point Hitler and Stalin fall in disagreement over whether the war can still be won. The US army is decimated but with supply lines broken and unrest in Europe mounting Hitler wants to retreat and strike peace, leaving the USA to be taken over by South American forces. With huge concentrations of both hostile and friendly ground forces assembling around Glasgow AFB neither side dares to employ nukes, and secretly emperor Hirohito strikes a deal with the United States: The Japanese forces will retreat, destroy what's left of the USSR forces on the mainland and accept Alaska as compensation With nuclear aid of the United States, Japan destroys the main Soviet harbours north of them, and their ground forces capture hundreds of thousand unsuspecting Soviet POW's on the US mainland Stalin, on visit in Berlin throws a mighty fit, accuses Hitler of conspiring against him and attempts to kill him Hitler is wounded but his SS bodyguards kill Stalin Albert Speer, the great architect, convinces the Reichstag that the war should end and brokers peace with the South American forces, and Germany vacates the eastern US and Iceland With Stalin dead, local nationalists all over the USSR celebrate and a civil war breaks out that the scattered USSR forces are unable to contain Speer, concerned about the rebellions, allows their conquered European countries limited self-governance, restoring order in most of Europe Scandinavia seizes this opportunity to rise against the German oppression and Speer, completely out of resources with great financial trouble mounting at home, sees no other option than to allow their independence Hardliners within the NSDAP disagree, and Speer is ousted in a Coup cannot be arsed to continue but this is a nice start I think

get 8421 and 8455 :)

I'm going to start selling a few rare items that I need to get rid of in my shiny new bricklink store. EB members with a good track record can expect a small discount, and in general I intend to sell below comparable bricklink listings. - Sok.

I had a problem with one of the cylinders in my 8049 tractor and they also sent me the entire package - two cylinders, a mini cylinder, a pump and several feet of tubing, instead of just the one cylinder. This must be costing them the better part of their profit margin on the sets which is not good. Also one of their telephonists told me that the reason that they had so few pneumatic sets in recent years is because the parts are expensive to make, hard to QA and thus require frequent replacing. - Sok.

..which is a shame really, because that must be costing them a small fortune while the problem is usually relatively easy to fix.

Why do you call them inferior to other tanks? As far as I know the number of MBT confrontations that was anticipated during the cold war turned out to be a deceptively low number ;) - Sok.

Sounds like one of the rubber seals inside got loose or the grease isn't spread evenly. Open the top part of the cylinder with a sharp knife (you have to list one plastic part over the notch in the other), and check if the rings are in their sockets and if the grease is spread evenly. If not, use some plastic-friendly bicycle grease. If that doesn't work, call LEGO customer service :) - Sok.

I'm about to buy a lot of loose 12v era pieces so I will have a load of new things for sale that I don't need soon. - Sok.

That's right, you cannot open them without breaking the seal, but with a very sharp knife you can cut between the plastic parts and remove them without much damage. I've taken two apart, glued one, taped the other and both run fine albeit the taped one is a little noisy. - Sok.

Personally, I like the 'LEGO' look of the 12v era trains, combined with decent detail and the ability to easily rebuild them into different models. The 7777 train book and the back covers of the leaflets and building instructions offered endless inspiration for rebuilding. Add to that the electrical detail (lights, remote switchpoints, signal posts) and you get a lot more fun per unit of layout than with 9v for example. Much of it is a matter of taste though, so don't take any of this as fact :) - Sok.

All plastic parts can be machine washed at low temperature. For cleaning the conductor rails I would use the type of plastic-friendly cleaning oil available in model stores (I forgot the name but its a white plastic container with a steam engine on the side), if it's rusty you can use sandpaper to clean it off and smooth the steel parts a little. What kind of motors are they? The classic 12v ones from the grey era are really easy to take apart and clean. - Sok.

I won this yesterday evening :)

Gravity Gun & Portal Gun

Oh there's definitely room for improvement, I will be working on that ;)

I fail to see how an MBT could be of any use in a 'Secret Mission'

I'm a bit hesitant to add too much detail because real-life railway stations are, taken at face value, often quite empty and the other official LEGO sets from the era did not have awhole lot of detail. But there are a few things like more minifigs, luggage and a phonebooth that I could add. More on that later :) - Sok.

I finally got around to putting light bricks in all the buildings and sorting out all the wires. Unfortunately my camera isn't very good but it should at least give you an impression: Next thing to do now is wait until I have 4 signal posts and add them :) - Sok.