idlemarvel

Thank you all for your kind comments. I'm now working on some passenger cars to go with the loco.

There have been quite a few models of the crocodile-style locomotives over the years. This one is based on the Austrian railways Co-Co class 1020, in red livery. This is the prototype (from Wikipedia). https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:ÖBB_1020.37_TRS.jpg Although it is 12V style it is battery Powered Up driven, so the wheels and bogies are not 12V. It is 40 studs long over buffers. I built it first from the ground up and then did the studio model. One of the advantages of a limited brick and colour palette is you are more likely to have all the bricks you need rather than having to wait for bricklink orders! The only concession to the 1980 brick and colour palette are the 2877 Brick, Modified 1 x 2 with Grille / Fluted Profile red and black bricks to represent the grills on the loco. I did try using 4175 Ladder 1 1/2 x 2 x 2 but they looked odd unless they were recessed by half a stud but then there was no room for the battery box. I'm quite pleased with the articulation joints. It runs very well and can pull quite a load.

Perhaps not so good... I got a new Fire HD 10 (13th Generation) tablet and downloaded the Powered Up app (4.1.1). After it started it kept asking for Location Permission even though it had been granted, and would not progress to let me make a Bluetooth connection to a hub, which is a bit of a showstopper. I did all the usual reinstall / revert to factory settings etc but it made no difference. I saw some reports of this on Reddit implying that users on 4.0.3 did not have this problem. Unfortunately it is not that easy to install an earlier version of the app as the Google (and Amazon) Play Stores only download the latest version. If you have a Fire OS tablet and it has the problem outlined above, this is how I reverted back to 4.0.3. a) download the Powered Up app 4.0.3 bundle (.apkm file not the .apk) from some trusted site such as APK Mirror b) install Google Play if you haven't already (see instructions on HowToGeek) - you need this for step c) c) install APK Mirror Installer (beta) from Google Play Store - you need this to install the bundle - Fire OS / Silk can only install simple APK files This took about an hour. Version 4.0.3 seems to work okay so clearly something up with 4.1.1 on my device.

Very clever and deceptively simple. It would make quite a nice small Lego set.

Lovely little loco and wagons as well. I particularly like the low sided wagon with the tarpaulin cover. It's a pity Lego don't make a wheel with hole for coupling rods for more modern motors, although I know they are available from other parties.

Running your own web site it a PITA trying to protect it from hackers and such. If you don't have that many and it's just for photo archive I would have thought any of the mega IT providers would be a safe bet. I mean MS or Google or Amazon. They all have free storage, amounts and Ts & Cs vary. If you're worried about one if them going under or pulling out use rwo of them. All my photos are on Google drive and Amazon photos.

Nice job. You've pimped it up with those sports wheels!

I have just installed and run LEGO MINDSTORMS Inventor on my Android 12 phone from the Play Store. I am based in the UK. I can't test it as I have no Mindstorms kit but it seems to run okay. Hope this helps.

The excellent video shows all the mechanics behind the flapping.

Related to post headings, in dark mode it's hard to distinguish between the blue heading and the dark background, it could do with bigger contrast please. As others have noted the site is much faster now thanks!

Yes those pesky half screen ads seem to have gone. Thanks!

Thanks for this link @XG BC however this view seems to only show a "limited preview" where only about 1 in 10 pages can be seen. I tried logging in with my google account to "borrow" the book but it made no difference. Maybe I was doing something wrong. However I then did a search for the book and went to: https://openlibrary.org/works/OL8989090W/Getting_Started_with_LEGO_Trains ...and logged in again with my google account and I was able to "borrow" and read the whole book. Go to page 19 for the GB-38 loco build.

Delightful. I especially like the concrete sleepers and light grey railings, and what I guess is an electric car charging point on the roadside of the ststion.

Yes it's used in the green and black Express Train set (possibly others) to hold the light cable in place. Very useful.

I note the Powered Up app has been updated (sometime around December 24) to version 4.1.1 (16059). Lego say it provides minor bug fixes and performance improvements. I haven't had much chance to try it out yet but I haven't noticed anything different so far. Does anyone know if it supports the new Technic Move hub/motor/lights? I have one but I won't get a chance to test it until the weekend. Anyway good to know the app is still being updated.

Happy New Year everyone. Not sure what AI has to do with whether Powered Up is being retired or not. And anyway as far as I can tell no two people can agree what AI is. If as @JopieK implies if-then-else constructs are AI then almost any software is AI. Retiring Powered Up would be a big proposition for Lego. There are deployments in City (trains mainly) Technic (Control +) and Education (Spike) themes which to my mind shows how versatile it is, and publishing the interface so that third party tools like pybricks could blossom makes it even more so. In general I think Powered Up does a good job so replacing it with something better (which one hopes would be the objective) would be no easy task.

I (and my grandchildren) just want to lay down track, place a train on it and go. We don't want to be plugging things in, checking wiring, cleaning track, worrying about isolating sections, etc. Wireless and bsttery power is the way to go, and powered up is a pretty good implementation. Sinple remote controls controlling up to 5 trains with more advanced programming and computer control if you want to go down that road. I agree some of the 12v era accessories would be nice (points, signals, uncouplers) but such things can be done with powered up if wanted. I guess at some point powered up will be retired but you can still get 12v stuff 40 years after it was last made so I'm not worried.

On UK Lego siite (lego.com/en-gb) nothing in the powered up range is marked as retired or retiring soon, but most items are out of stock including the remote and move hub, both of which had a hefty 40% sale discount. The (Smart) Hub, Technic Hub and Battery Box sre all available. On the description of the Hub it has a line which reads "Software Security Updates at Least Through 2027". Make of that what you will.

And he runs on 45mm gauge track not Lego track.

You have to connect the app to both hubs by pressing the bluetooth icon. By default they will be numbered hub 1 and 2. Then in your code you have to specify any hub other than the default (1) using a maths block (the pink blocks) as input to the port on the motor block. With that you can specify the hub and port that the train motor is connected to.

You can download a book on powered up app programming here on this site. It's free to eurobricks users.

The hub in that set is the Smart Hub or City Hub that is normally used in trains but you can attach any powered up motor or sensor to the two ports. So you can have two motors attached one for drive and one for steering. You can control it with the Lego powered up app on your smartphone or tablet. There are some provided apps for RC cars but you may have to write some code to make it do exactly what you want. Alternatively if you are familiar with python you could use pybricks.

You should look on bricklink. If you srarch for Lego set number like 88007 then look at the inventory of that "set" it will list the bricklink part number for the sensor. Buying the sensor part is generally cheaper than buying the set.

Excellent news thanks

Well I suppose you could use Lego colour sensors to detect the output from Lego infrared remotes under pybricks control, but why would you want to? Bluetooth / BLE would be better for many reasons.