howitzer

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

In this photo there is definitely a mismatch, but I'm not really seeing it (maybe, MAYBE a very slight mismatch if I really squint) in the video capture. If I were to speculate why the studio photo has such a clear colour mismatch, I'd guess that the bright studio lighting reflects/refracts somehow differently in the thin liftarms, though I'm not seeing it elsewhere. I wouldn't be surprised if the thin liftarms were also made from somewhat different plastic composition, like pins with pinhole are.

Here's my place as it is currently. I recently started building more System so that led me to get the organizers and the shelf to the right (some parts are still unsorted below the table), my Technic parts are in the drawers and boxes at the back of the table. Built models are displayed elsewhere in the house.

Price per gram is more accurate way to compare value of the sets, especially when it comes to Technic because, as said above, pins make for a significant part of the total part count while being small and essentially useless for someone who has a large collection of parted out sets.

Is that the weight of the model or total weight of the model along with instructions, packaging and all that? I believe Brickset lists the weight as an unopened box, rather than the weight of the model itself. That model does have large-ish wheels for its size too, so those push the total weight up - which might be problematic as either the weight limit is too low and no large wheels can be used, or the weight limit is too high and model with no large wheels can push the size out of proportion otherwise. The problem is similar to having part count limit for entries with tracks or chains where I proposed counting each run of chain as 1 piece rather than every link separately. I guess something like that could be done with large wheels, such as weighing the entry without tyres so that only rims are counted into the weight limit.

It seems that Technic designers have really become skilled at making shapes that are aligned outside the grid, with even the small cars getting constantly better sculpted bodywork. This is commendable but at the same time I can't help to feel the sadness of lacking functionality - sets tend to look great but don't do much.

That's why I don't think weight limit would be a good way to limit scale of builds when we're making two models in A/B-model style of old Lego sets. But even considering this limitation, you could still build two distinct models with different sets of parts and have them together meet the total weight limit - they would just be much smaller and probably less functional than two models built using mostly the same parts. Weight limit might work better if we were considering a single model contest. If there's no interest within the community to check each other's work in adhering the rules, I don't think there's no point in having those rules in the first place. But when it's small sets with limited number of parts, the checking isn't a large amount of work, especially if it's required to provide either digital model or photos to help dissecting the models along with the entry. Yes, this is somewhat more work for everyone involved, but I don't think it's more than building a large functional model.

I guess this could be remedied with a requirement to post a complete parts list along with the entry, this would also enable other people to check that the weight limit really is met if there is a doubt of manipulating the scale as it's easy to just pile the listed parts on a scale. Whether the limit is part count or weight, I would include requirement to post parts list either way.

I'd keep it lower, at least not much more than 150 parts because anything more would make judging hard, and also push the build time longer as contestants have to keep track of their inventory and so on. Yes, some of the entries will be basic but others might be surprisingly complex and functional. Pullback motors on the other hand are kind of problematic, as there has been a pullback contest before, and allowing them quickly becomes a requirement, if not formally, then practically considering you can do quite a bit of cool things with pullback motor that you can't otherwise. Require one of the following: a) a digital file b) building instructions c) good photos paired with a complete list of parts --- One problem about parts limit is that it makes for a very hard incorporation of chains/tracks as those involve large amount of small parts. So perhaps an exception could be made regarding them: any chain unit regardless of length could be counted as 1 part, so 42148 snow groomer tracks would count as 2 parts while 42132 motorcycle's drive chain would count as 1 part.

That's a great point about laser cut plywood kits, the complex ones aren't that cheap either though probably still not as expensive as an equivalent Lego set would be. But the same is true for most other toys too as they don't have the part reusability of Lego, so I don't think would be a problem at all. I hope TLG explores this direction more with more complex mechanisms.

About time we get a Technic-compatible nut to match the screw part. It's really annoying to build otherwise studless Technic but have to use bricks to connect to the System-style nut...

When keeping the maximum number of parts small, I wouldn't say that's a problem, people at this forum reverse engineer much larger sets all the time. There could also be a requirement to make a complete list of parts for the entry to be eligible so other people could build the entries to see if they comply.

I don't think there's much point in having a bounding box restriction at polybag scale, considering the builds would be pretty small anyway. I mean, sure you can put a dozen 1x15 liftarms in a row and call it an entry but who would vote for such a thing in this kind of contest? Anyway, I like the idea of a requirement to build two models from the same set of parts (150 or so max total) because it's much more of a challenge than just a single polybag model.

I love the colours! Hopefully this is an opening to introduce more Technic sets in the pink-purple-magenta region of colours.

Not sure yet if this is worth a buy, but it's much more so than any other sets announced for the next year so far. Definitely a step in the right direction.

This sounds fun, though I'd reframe it as "Small set contest" with rules requiring a limited number of parts (such as 150 total) and requirement to present 2 different models made of those parts (not required to use every part in each model). Also electronics, pneumatics and linear actuators forbidden and no Model Team style of building.

As uninteresting as the sets themselves are, it appears that they are constantly providing new cool parts such as this one.

The lengths of the sides in the originally hypothesized triangle are 2, 3,5 and 4 and if you make a calculation based on the Pythagorean theorem, you get 2^2 + 3,5^2 = 16,25 for which square root is approximately 4,0311 so one of the holes is only about 0,03 studs offset from perfect alignment and as 1 stud = 8 mm that's about 0,25 mm, around the same as two sheets of paper. The parts easily bend much more from the weight in heavier models so I hardly see a problem here.

I wasn't talking about authenticity though - there's a real limit how authentic you can make a toy after all. It's also something I don't care much about - in my opinion Technic should be about interesting mechanisms, be they accurate representations of real things or not. GBC's are some of the most interesting Lego things out there and they don't represent anything real usually, while fake engines in car sets might do a decent job representing an internal combustion engine, but it's not something that makes or breaks my decision to buy some set. I also realize that linear actuators are not mechanically authentic - pneumatics are much better at that, but LA's have advantages which make them suit better for some applications than pneumatics as has been discussed many times before in this forum. Anyway, my point was that licenses force sets into a specific form that is mainly aesthetic and only minimally based on functionality - all car sets have four wheels and some have suspension or fake engine or something, but since 42056 with its paddle shifter I don't think any of them has really broken any ground functionally - at most they have only refined old ones but mostly they are just repeats of the same functions over and over with only real difference being on looks.

Rough terrain crane in 2018 was the last unlicensed flagship set, and after that came only a few larger unlicensed sets such as the car transporter (2019), mobile crane and cement mixer (2020), heavy duty tow truck (2021), firefighter aircraft (2023) and the space-themed original sets in 2024 and 2025. I feel that while there has been some nice licensed sets, overall this reliance in licenses makes the set design worse as the designers must prioritize looks and functionality is secondary - opposite to the spirit of Technic where interesting functionality should always be a priority.

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.

This is very much it. Cars are not interesting (especially when they don't have any interesting mechanisms but just the repeating the same functions over and over again) but I don't mind them being out there - it's the low number and poor quality of non-car sets that I find disappointing. Small sets are not very interesting either way, there have been some nice medium sized sets but even them are too few and far between to really be that satisfying and the largest sets feel much too expensive for what they do.

This would be really sad direction that profoundly changes the building experience for Lego sets, and not for the better. I really hope they won't go there, at least for anything beside maybe the very smallest of sets.