howitzer

I thought it was about parts that exist already but are hard to obtain for some reason, naturally any truly new part would attract a lot of attention, but at the same time it's definitely not going to happen.

What parts would those be?

Yep, same here. I bought the 42209 as I thought it would be good and it was, but I fear that will be my last Technic purchase at least for now, perhaps the trend reverses at some point in the future. Meanwhile I've moved to building System, but instead of buying sets I get my bricks from Bricklink etc. so perhaps there will be exceptions here and there but mostly my days of buying sets seem to be over, at least for now.

Oh, right, I thought that was your photo and you had the part in hand which would imply a part that's released and in circulation.

Are you sure it's Lego and not of some other brand? I couldn't find a wheel like that in Bricklink or Rebrickable as it's definitely not 39367pb02 or 49295pb02.

That was a System build though, Technic builds have inherently more parts due to pins. But its true that RC cars are entirely possible even with small amount of parts and 719 is more than enough, especially with the all-in-one hub.

Care to elaborate?

While remote with proper physical controls would of course be better, I think with this particular set the smartphone control isn't that bad. Sure it still requires an expensive third party device (which everyone who can afford the set itself has) and there's no haptic feedback, but it's not that big of a problem when controlling something big and slow moving like the crane. For controlling cars the smartphone-remote control truly sucks and it's very problematic that TLG still hasn't addressed this issue. You're exactly right about the trusses, and not only because they're easier and nicer to build but also because the large pieces make it much stronger and also better looking than any truss would be if built from standard beams and pins. I don't think it's particularly expensive for what you get, even if Control Center style remote would be a great addition. But of course it's really expensive for a toy, no matter how well the price is justified by contents.

This thing has been sitting on my shelf since I finished building it, only be taken out occasionally for some play demonstrations. I haven't modded it in any way, not even to fix the small building mistake I made originally (routing one of the cables wrong way, not a practical problem but aesthetic one). After all this time my fondness of the set has only grown and here's some thoughts on why. Most importantly, it feels properly Technic, same as the old great sets like 8868 or 8880. The functionality is interesting, complex and plainly visible - not being hidden inside closed exterior. The functionality is also (mostly) quite accurate and true to real machine with the only real problem in that sense being the silly rollers under the counterweight. The educational value is unparalleled in modern Technic. I remember it being a great building experience, feeling challenging and rewarding at the same time with no moments of asking myself "what am I doing, what's this thing supposed to be?" unlike with many other large sets I've built over the years. I had to take it slow and concentrate to get it right, but it still didn't feel annoying or tedious at any point, which I can imagine is the case for some adult-oriented sets such as the Botanicals. It also works great. Even after all this time collecting dust in the shelf I can take it out and unless batteries need replacing, it can be played with and there's no jams or clicking gears or any problems whatsoever. The same cannot be said for many other sets, with Land Rover Defender being the most notorious, but I also noticed while ago that the gearbox of my Ferrari Daytona SP3 doesn't work anymore, it jams at one point of the shifting sequence. Sure I guess I should store them behind glass or packed away somewhere safe from dust, but the same problem doesn't seem to affect the Liebherr crane, instead it works as well as when it was just assembled. Sure, the proportions are all wrong, but have you seen photos of the real thing? There's no way it could be ever replicated in a Lego set with it still being at least somewhat playable and strong enough to hold together. Some concessions have to be made and within the realities of scale modeling and ABS I think TLG has after all done quite nice job.

Lately I've been losing interest in Technic as everything seems to be repeating the same old cars and nothing else of interest, and these rumours just confirm it. I feel that the Liebherr crane was the last large properly Technic set.

That's a cool idea, but I wonder if the parts stay together or tend to separate over time when the switch snaps to on and off. Though I'm sure it stays together well enough when using 26287 but while using 18948 it might separate.

Cool Lego-setup but I immediately noticed the Babylon 5 box! Best TV-show ever!

Yeah, it's few dozen people at most who are active long time commenters in the Technic forum. For a global corporation with millions and millions of customers that's not very big sample of opinions to draw from, no matter how loudly we complain. There might be other reasons like licencing why TLG hasn't released a JCB model. But it's true that TLG has other priorities like making money on what has been shown to work in that regard, rather than catering to opinions of a very very small minority. I, too, wish for something better than endless cars (which I'm not buying out of principle at this point) but the trend is clear: Technic sets aren't for me anymore.

I don't think this kind of car is realistically possible with current parts, so it would require a number of new parts at least for transmission and suspension, and I don't think TLG is willing to invest so much into this kind of thing. Also apparently normal cars aren't interesting to public but only offroaders and really fast cars. Which is of course a shame as the lineup with only these is really dull and repetitive for AFOLs but I sort of see why they do it this way - sports cars and offroaders have an appeal to kids and their parents who while buying only a few sets ever still make up the largest segment of Technic-buying customers. So endless repetition of the same old functions and vehicle types don't really hurt sales while any sort of new/experimental stuff is a big risk.

I wouldn't mind (though my wallet would) but never going to happen, not unless something changes drastically. Cars are obviously very profitable so that's what they're going to make.