gyenesvi

That's a cool vehicle with some nice extras!

Maybe some more technical info about these? And some more description in general?

I'm not volunteering for review, but I'm curious what people will think about this product. I have also been approached by this company quite some time (maybe 6 months) ago with this. I asked them why they came out with this particular form factor as I find it quite impractical. I never got a response. Why I find it impractical? For batteries, I find that small footprint is more important than height, so I'd prefer something like half the footprint but double the height. In my experience, it seems easier to hide/place something with a small footprint than something with a small height. Also, my assumption is that this is not useful as a body panel; for that it would have to come in multiple colors. But probably there are use cases when this form factor might be useful, I just don't see them, so I'm curious. Aren't trains 6 studs wide? How would this 5 stud wide panel fit in there?

Ah, sorry to hear that. Although, I haven't bought any model this year either, only parts..

I wonder if the wider rear tires were introduced for this set specifically, because they don't seem to make such a big difference to justify the new part. What do you mean by that?

Pretty cool little thing! I think just exactly one year ago, I have seen one of these IRL in the mountains of Montenegro, and was thinking it would deserve a build some time. It has an interesting suspension system that I tried to make some pictures of from underneath, some kind of Tatra-like swing axles but with portals incorporated. It would be cool to replicate, but would require larger scale probably.

Last weekend in this year's Buwizz camp, I had the chance to race this model again on a varied and challenging track, this time with a more appropriate scoring system (points based on obstacle difficulty / penalties, instead of just plain runtime as last year), and I was really happy with the performance of the model, took all obstacles smoothly without any mistakes (not touching gates), and finally took second place (well, an 8 wheeler beast with 2 buwizz motors did it faster). I feel like it was worth the effort to make a good suspension / ground clearance and precise control :) Hope we'll have more such events, and maybe some videos of it will become available soon!

I guess most people will not tell you that their paid instructions are untested or contain flaws, not (only) because they don't want to admit, but rather because they themselves have low standards or are not meticulous enough. You need to learn for yourself which builders make good quality models, and reviews/comments can also help with this. I also put out free models that people can use to judge my style. As @keymaker says, a video of the model in action is also a good indication of proper testing :)

@Attika it seems there's an easy to install option (.apk) for Android.

I was so sure about a Batmobile alternate arriving quickly :) Nice build!

Pretty cool machine and review as well!

This brings back the nostalgia of the 90s motorcycle that I never had, but always longed for. I don't like the angle of the front fork, but the rest looks kind of cool. Great to know that the new 6L spring is on par with the 6.5L one in terms of hardness.

That's a really great alternate build Nico! Very smooth looks with great part usage and impressive list of functions.

Nice work on the brown, cool that it could be done with the limited inventory, interesting vintage model! I like the steering solution too, if I see correctly it is linkage based. I agree that the hood of the first version was a bit too round and too angled. But the second version looks a bit too low to me. I think that the front grille should be raised a bit too, about half a stud, then the corner of the hood would align better, and then the hood should be raised back half a stud too, but keeping it close to flat.

In a way, in a model that's designed to be sitting on the shelf, and not to be played with, almost everything is included just because we can. So I 'd say, things make more difference in smaller scale play models, and especially in RC models, where technical differences can actually translate to better performance. Also, furthermore since sportscars have virtually non-functional suspension (max 1mm travel), all those technical differences of suspension design would make more difference in off-roaders. For example, a gearbox can lead to better torque-speed tradef-off, a responsive suspension or more ground clearance can lead to actually better passability, etc. In case of off-road suspensions, there are tons of details that could be improved (more compact live axles, portal hubs), or even ones that are not even possible with existing parts (a basic independent trailing arm is pretty much impossible in a robust way, unless it's way too big for RC models).

I agree, I have been thinking a lot about the best solution for this issue, and the more I think about it, the more I believe there is no clear cut solution; some compromise is needed. This sounds simple at first, but it's not. The crux is that having those toggle switches for channel selection only worked because of simple separate two-port IR receivers and overly basic bang-bang controllers with two parallel joysticks (not really good for steering). Once you want to improve those, which is definitely required, than you loose the simple config option. So I think the crux of the problem is the configurability. And then the core question is where to put the configurability; into the controller (like RC transmitters), or into the hub (like PU / Buwizz / SmartBrick)? The problem with putting it into the controller is that it would be prohibitively expensive to include with each RC set. So the only option is to leave it to the hub. But then the next problem is that if there is a cheap/dumb physical controller, how could that connect to multiple hubs? And where does the config happen then? I think the only way out is to have a one-to-one connection; one cheap/dumb controller and one hub that has enough ports in case of large models, and is configurable. Of course there could be smaller and larger hubs for different model sizes, but then again it's more expensive. Config could happen through Bluetooth, from a single BT enabled web browser interface that works on all kinds of devices and is simple to maintain. Config could be done without programming, and there could be predefined profiles for sets and for basic setups like simple drive and steer models. An interesting direction that could be further explored I think is the separation of drive motors and servos. Most functions don't need powerful motors; those could be reserved for drive, and all others could be run through angular and speed servos, which exist in small form factors, and have their control circuits integrated, so don't need speed controllers inside the hub; thus can have many output ports in a small space (a small RC receiver can run 5-6 servos). Would be interesting to see how that would impact builds. A hub with 2 power outputs for drive and 6 servo ports for other functions would be really interesting.

I have the feeling that the 6L will be just as stiff as the 9L, and will be just as hard to use in smaller builds. I guess this car needs substantial support, and since the long spring is horizontal on a short lever pushed by a long lever, it needs quite a bit of help from the small springs. At first I also thought that the 6.5L is annoying, but now I think it makes sense for many setups. I think it was originally designed for independent and trailing arms setups of off-roaders, in which it is used either vertically or kind of diagonally. If it was 6L, in both cases, the arms it controls would become close to horizontal, supposing that the other end is fixed in a proper grid position. In the vertical use case, it would make the arm horizontal no matter where you mount it, and in the diagonal use case it would often be close to a 3-4-5 Pythagorean triangle, again making the arm close to horizontal. This is why the extra half stud length is beneficial, it makes the controlled arms slanted in most cases. Furthermore, the half stud offset is also very useful when building small scale live axles, where longer springs are out of the question. The control links of the live axle are typically 6L links, which should stay close to horizontal (parallel link setup), because if they are not horizontal, it would result in the axle being pulled to a non-grid position horizontally, resulting in all sorts of problems (like driveshaft length, not being centered in the fenders, bending vertically mounted springs). Now the simplest way to achieve close to horizontal control links is if the axle end of the link moves from -0.5 to +0.5 vertical offset relative to the chassis end of the link; and this is exactly achieved by the 6.5L spring, which becomes 5.5L when compressed completely, giving the axle a 0.5 off-grid position at the two extremes, resulting in quite clean link geometry, and the axle position not deviating much horizontally (about half a mm) from the grid position. That said, I think the new 6L links are targeting different use cases, for example when we explicitly want the control arm to be about horizontal, such as in sports cars.

What's the length of those short springs?

I totally agree with @gheneli on this one, I had the same thoughts. It's just marketing bullsh*t. I mean I appreciate the complexity of making a bodywork that size/shape and complexity out of lego parts, it even has interesting techniques for building a good looking surface, and it's impressive that it does not fall apart at that speed, but that's the actual engineering feat here. The rest is just a marketing lie. It's not a lego car, just a lego body, and it's not the fastest lego thing that drives, because its core is not lego. I don't really like these kind of gimmicks, I find it to be a great waste of plastic. I wish they instead put the effort into designing better parts / models. Spot on :) About the model itself, it's really great that we are getting a bunch of new parts, and that Lego was forced to up its game, but it's kind of sad that it's only due to the hard push of an engineering focused licensing partner. I wish the Technic team/management had the same kind of drive in themselves, and treated most licensed models like this. Thinking of that poor Unimog suspension; that's the price we paid for this model :D Build for real!

Those new gears are really exciting! I'm just building an RC model, where I'm struggling with the right gear ratio, and I just figured that a 14:18 would solve my problems perfectly, and then boom! there it is.. almost, since the 18T gear is a free spinning one with clutch, so we cannot yet use it in a regular gear train, but I really hope that a regular 18T will also appear soon! Those 6L springs are interesting too, though I guess they are probably quite stiff ones.

You're really fast with these cool little alternatives! Although, the scale is your area of expertise :) Have you ever heard that you can dismantle a lego model to build something else out of it?

This blew my mind as a child when I first understood how it works! They don't make them like those any more..

Exactly my thoughts. Good to see new suspension parts, but I really hope at some point in the future they will also make more reusable / generic suspension parts. Like smaller / softer springs with long travel.

Exactly, what would actually matter is the acceptance (after so many years) that it is useful and needed, and to have the mould done. After that, designers would use it everywhere and TLG making it in various colors would happen quite rapidly.

I like the overall looks and the modularity, and its functionality; it does stand out from the long series of cars. If it offered something new in terms of suspension parts, that would allow building a proper axle with usable steering, I'd definitely buy it. But this way there's not much in it I could not just build today from my own parts.