howitzer

Yeah, these would be far more useful than even-length liftarms. 3x4 L-shaped liftarm would be pretty useful too, as would a zig-zagging liftarm.

Yeah, I was introduced to the LUG in the last Piipoo event in the summer before the pandemic started, but somehow I never got around to actually join... I guess I should finally do something about it

Very nicely done! I guess I should actually join the LUG in question, if they are big and active enough to hold contests...

If I'm not mistaken, only the transformation is motorized and drive/steer is manual. You are right though that it has more motors than the contest allows.

Very nice, appears to work quite smoothly and reliably. I contemplated on building a similar split-flap display to be used as a calendar, but I wanted it to be completely mechanical (being actuated by manual lever). The reason why I never got into designing it was that making the counter to take into account the variable length of months would be difficult and I didn't even think of accounting for leap years. Using a smart brick makes it obviously much simpler in mechanical terms so that would be doable, but I don't want to have my Mindstorms unit stuck into a calendar...

So, I did a disassembly and reassembly of the rear section and got about this far with the project: Then I realized that the XL motor in the rear has too short cable to reach the hub when at extreme position, so I'll have to design the whole chassis again. I think I'll attempt to fit the motors side-by-side in the middle, so that drive motor is in the center and transformation motors in the sides.

Very nice, looks true to the original! I hope you can find a way to connect the arms nicely.

Awesome B-model! It's also refreshing to see something else modeled than another supercar or truck. Kudos to you for making this.

In addition to Raptor there is the Batmobile, though at least Brickset lists it as 2022 set for some reason. But you must consider that 1H had the Ferrari, Senna and Wrangler which are all proper car sets in my books, so I'd say there has been more than enough cars this year and I see no reason for the next year to go much differently. In 2020, in addition to Sian there was at least the Dodge and Top Gear cars. For 2019 it would be Corvette, Porsche and Land Rover, which makes at least three cars per year and I'm not counting pullbacks here. For 2022, only two construction equipment sets have been announced and they both are really small. I don't expect the John Deere to be that special either and the same goes to the transformation vehicle. Hopefully the second half will bring some real goodness like the Tow truck this year but for now the only actually interesting set for me is the ATV, as it appears to have some nice functionality in relatively small package.

I'm not holding my breath on a new Technic Space Shuttle set, as the Discovery Shuttle set was released just recently and even if it's in another theme, I doubt TLG will be releasing another similar set anytime soon. Of course one can always hope, and if there ever was a designer capable of pulling it off, that would be Markus.

Backhoe is something that will probably be made at some point, as few of those have been done previously and they have all been marvelous sets. Grader on the other hand... no A-models ever, and only a couple of B-models too, so I'm not holding my breath. I don't think recognizability is the issue here though, they are common enough at real life roadwork, and there are tons of other sets with little to no familiarity to most people. I think the problem with graders is that they are complicated pieces of machinery, and it's really hard to make it in a way that doesn't just fall flat on expectations while conforming to TLG's design standards. Even MOCs are few and far between, though they don't have to meet the same design criteria, it's just that it's really hard to make a properly good grader from Lego.

Oh, I didn't know the Logging truck was motorized. Then the year of the last non-motorized flagship definitely moves much further back... Size (part count), cost and marketing all together. Sometimes though, set with the biggest part count might not be the most expensive, and neither might be the most marketed.

True, though it's hard to say which is more of a flagship, Porsche or BWE, and same goes to Bugatti/RTC. I guess Sian might be more flagship than Volvo hauler though. But UCS cars are a bit of an oddball here, while they are definitely Technic, they are also more of a subtheme and don't really compare that well to other sets. In 2012 there was the Logging truck, which could've been a flagship, but I guess the Crawler should be considered the flagship of that year. Either way, it was long ago.

Yeah, the days of the non-motorized flagship sets are gone. Depending on which sets you think as flagships, it's been at least 9 years since the last non-motorized flagship, maybe more. Personally, I find the motorized sets interesting, but I can see the problem of costly electronics and if you're someone who likes to buy sets, at some point you're going to have much more electronics than you can make use of. In the PF era you'd amass dozens of useless battery boxes, but those are a relatively cheap component, PU hubs are another story, so it would be nice to see resurgence of sets which are sold without any electronics but are designed in such a way that motorization can be added easily.

So they finally made a set which actually makes functional use of the internal sensors of the hub, instead of just providing some nice graphics on a screen.

Delete this.

I think a bracing could be added, just put another 36T gear (or whatever) on the other side of the assembly, and then a longer axle through it to a static bracing. Still not enough for an RC offroader (unless you can find a way to replace the 8T gears with something bigger), but could be useful for something less demanding.

I'm planning for a simple collision detector, nothing too fancy (can't even do that much with just a single sensor anyway...)

Ok, if these things are true this set is starting to sound like a definite buy for me.

I wanted to make it larger, in order to fit all the functions I want without too cramped chassis. It's going to make an interesting comparison between these two! Good luck to you too!

I wanted to enter this contest but I couldn't really think of any original concept which would feel like remotely doable (with my skills anyway) so I thought that the original transforming robot set would make for a fine enough entry, if made with today's building style and perhaps pimped out with additional functions so that's what I set out to build. As you know, the original thing has basically one function, that is transforming between the robot form and the vehicle form, and in addition it has a HOG steering. Replicating this transformation is of course the main goal here (with variable length wheelbase and lifting/lowering the cabin-head-thing) but the scope of this contest enables additional features too. So my aim is to do the following: - RI hub for power and functions control - Transformation (2x hard-coupled L-motors) - Drive (XL-motor) and steer (angular L-motor) - Colour sensor to detect when the transformation is at either extreme to act as a limit stopper And if I have time I will add: - Distance sensor (to detect possible collisions and stop the driving) - Ability to stop the transformation at any intermediate position, combined with the colour detector to take it to either end and stop at correct point - Remote control with PU remote (so that there's no need for smartphone) - The original had a sort of arms, which I might want to also replicate in some fashion - Some sort of face/lighting system using the hub's 5x5 segment display Here's my progress so far: The hub will be positioned at the top and I intend to have two linear actuators to perform the lifting action, driven by the same geartrain which extends the wheelbase. I'm not yet sure about the rear dual axles, but at the moment those feel like a good idea. XL-motor not positioned yet in the photo, the other three motors are in place, and the lifting assembly for the hub is just a mockup, I will at least have to raise it 1 stud in order to fit the cable connectors on the other side of the hub. Sensors are also absent at the moment, but the colour sensor will be hidden inside and the distance sensor to the very front (as far as the cable length allows).

I believe the reason for the scale is simply that they intend to start a new line of large motorcycle sets, and this being the first of those comes with very little functional improvement over previous motorcycle sets, but it just introduces new parts necessary to get the line started. Hopefully the next motorcycle will have better technical features.

I think the Sian has pretty nice technical functions, but despite that it's just a display model with very little play value. So you're entirely correct, the 18+ rating appears to be for sets which are first and foremost display sets and stuff that's made to be playable is rated for younger people.

4 speed is relatively easy to fit in small space though, because the wave selector enables such a thing, 6 speeds is going to be much larger - unless new parts were developed. That would be nice of course, but there were already other parts to be developed for this set and they were such that it couldn't have been done without them.

Ah, true, there's no space for an axle to bypass the tan gear. Still, replacing the 36T gear with the aforementioned part would free some space that could be used for bracing or something in a vehicle or whatever.