Hanso

And how do I become LUG? I checked the Lowlug site but can't find a 'become a member' button...?

Three sets.... never built one.... I think there are some people out there who are a little bit jealous.... Do you have the plates I'm looking for (dark blue, 2x2, 61x) for building the VW Beetle (see my other thread)? Willing to buy! /Hans

Please let me know where I can buy these plates at Lego. I have looked at "Missing pieces" (= not available) and in the Pick-a-Brick (= not listed). So if you know additional sources, please let me know. And what do you mean with "If you are a LUG member, there is another option". I am not a LUG member (yet). /Hans

More detail of step 2b: Buying the rest of the needed bricks The most easy step to start with, is going to the Lego.com site, Customer Service, Missing Pieces (MP). This MP site is (as the name already reveals) meant to buy missing pieces. So, suppose you have accidentally lost all your pieces of the set ;-) You could just add all the missing pieces of the set, change the number of pieces to the corresponding numbers of your list and you're done. In principle, this is correct. But. In most cases, not all pieces can be bought, especially if the set is old(er). And next, you need a lot of money to buy all the pieces using the MP site. But if you don't care about the money, most of the pieces can be bought at this site. Strange but true: the other official Lego site Pick-a-Brick (PAB) has sometimes different availability and prices. Sometimes, bricks that can be bought at the MP site, cannot be bought at the PAB and vice versa. And sometimes, MP is cheaper than PAB and vice versa. Especially if you have to buy large number of a piece (e.g. 150 pieces) and the price differs 0,11 euro, it is worth the money (extra shipping cost) to buy some parts at MP and some parts at PAB. And then there is Bricklink.com (BL). This is my best Lego friend until now ;-) I haven't seen that there is a Lego piece that isn't sold somewhere in the world. In fact, I have my own Lego store to sell some leftover bricks as well. I normally start to update my list with finding the bricks at MP and PAB: what is available and which one is the cheapest. Then I start to find the bricks that cannot be bought at MP or PAB and if the price is doable. As said, I haven't had a brick that cannot be bought at BL. But I didn't say that it is also affordable. A door for my Cafe Corner is sold for 45 euro. A 2x2 plate for the Volkswagen Beetle is sold for 2.50 euro .... and I need 61 pieces. That is the frustating part. But for most pieces, it is even cheaper than PAB or MP. So when I find a shop that sells a piece that isn't sold at MP or PAB, I start looking for other pieces that are on the PAB/MP list to check if I can get it cheaper. It is a challenge to find BL shops that have the pieces that aren't sold at PAB or MP and have cheaper pieces than PAB/MP as well. Due to the shipping costs, I try to keep the number of BL shops below 5. So, by this time I have a 'needed list' with three names where I buy the pieces: BL shops, PAB and MP. But there are still some empty places at the list: until now, not because the pieces cannot be found. But because of the extreme prices of the bricks. Then you have two options left: look for sets containing the needed parts and look for alternatives. Sets containing the needed parts I normally use Brickset to find the parts that I need and check which other sets have the pieces that are too expensive. Until now, I did find some sets but they are expensive as well. I assume that I am not the only one hunting for some rare pieces. Don't forget that I am looking for pieces that are not sold at MP or PAB and are extremely expensive at BL. But it is an option and you might be lucky in your case. The last option that I follow, is finding alternatives. For example, the windows (id: 4218638) in the Cafe Corner were extremely expensive. That is, I need 5 pieces at appr. 14 euro each. I call that extreme. The alternative 60598 are quite similar and cost (new) about 15 cents. I don't need to think that long if I am going to spent 70 euro's or 75 cents... But there is not always an alternative that is both affordable and good looking. For example, I don't have an alternative for the 2x2 places in dark blue. The final option is waiting and hoping that the needed bricks will be available cheaper. Or rob a bank and buy these stupid bricks ;-) /Hans

Ok, now the fun part starts. But it is sometimes also frustrating if parts are not available anymore or extremely expensive. This is how I look for the bricks. Step 2a: going thru my own collection Sounds logical, isn't it. The first thing I do, is to check my brick collection what I already have. In the picture below you'll see three drawers (of a total of six) containing all the new Lego that I have. I do have even more Lego from my childhood, but that Lego is old, dirty and the colors slightly differ from today's Lego. It is always a big surprise if I have the specific bricks or not. Sometimes I am convinced that I have the brick(s) and I don't and sometimes it is the other way around. So, it is always a kind of surprise that leads to a 'hooray' if I can remove a part of my "needed list". With the rebuilds of the Lego Cafe Corner (10182), Lego Street Market (10190), Eiffel Tower (10181) and now the Volkswagen Beetle (10187), the number of parts that I already have is typically between 20 - 30% of the total needed. I make notes on the printed part list to know how much I already have and thus what I still need to order. And then I can go to step 2b. Step 2b: Buying the rest of the needed bricks For buying the rest of the needed bricks, there are (as far as I know) the following possibilities: Pick-a-Brick Missing Pieces Bricklink Sets containing the needed parts Look for alternatives In the next part, I will go into more detail how I differ between these options. /Hans

Thanks for the suggestion. Brickset has also a complete list of the needed parts, so in principle you don't need any manual work. Until now, I only found one error at the Eiffel Tower. All the other sets were correctly listed. What is your experience with Rebrickable? /Hans

Step 1: Finding the building instructions and the list of needed parts The building instructions can be found at the Customer Service of Lego.com (service.lego.com). Just enter the number of the set and you'll find your instructions for most sets as PDF. For the list of needed parts, you could use the building instructions. At the end of most instructions, there is an overview of all the parts contained in the set. But the quality of the PDF is not that good and for some colors it is really difficult to see what color is exactly listed. Fortunately, the design id is also listed which is unique for each Lego brick. For large sets, it will take some time to convert it to a list. Then there is Peeron (peeron.com) and Brickset (brickset.com). I always use the last one. It is a very easy site to navigate thru and especially the part list is really clear. But .. as you could have read at my article about the Eiffel Tower, the numbers are not always reliable. It seems that numbers > 200 are maximized to 200. So, for the larger numbers, I have crosschecked the numbers of Brickset with the building instructions, in the case of the VW Beetle there were no differences. So, at the end of step 1 I have the building instructions and a part list. Now I can start hunting for the needed bricks .... /Hans

In this thread, I will share my experiences (and sometimes struggle) for finding and buying the bricks for building the Volkswagen Beetle 10187. At Bricklink, this set is available starting at 450 euro's (used) or about 600 euro's for a new one. It is a challenge to find and buy the separate bricks and have it cheaper than a used set. If there are particular questions, please let me know. More to come later. /Hans

I agree, although building the Taj Mahal is (apart from time consuming) sometimes boring. If you take a look at the building instructions, you will notice that lots of the parts are "do this four times". Since finding the bricks in the bags is the part that takes most of the time, I build the four times parallel. But I'm not complaining. I'm happy to own one of the original sets. The current price for a new set is now at Bricklink around 2000 euro's and even the instructions are new at BL not under 249 euro! I cannot believe that there are people out there that pay these prices.... /Hans

Having a baby is definitely a good reason. So thanks for the information. I'll keep my fingers crossed to have our article in the newest Railbricks (whenever it comes). /Hans

If this is serious, than I could understand that he is occupied now. But still: why doesn't he just send a short email that he is too busy right now? /Hans

Thanks B for the suggestion. Will have a look at the prices and will let you know what I'll do. Started a new thread for the Taj Mahal: http://www.eurobrick...owtopic=111290. /Hans

Started a new thread. Just started building the Taj Mahal 10189. Bought this set two or three years ago, built it just once and now building it again. Most time of the building is searching through all the bags with these huge number of bricks.... You can follow my progress at my Flickr page: https://www.flickr.c...157654717414960 Enjoy. /Hans

When I posted the topic, I (re)send an email to the editor. Still no reply . He is probable abducted by Aliens. /Hans

Work in progress of the Taj Mahal: /Hans

And finally done! I'm impressed by the size of this Lego structure. Glad I took the step to build it by buying the separate bricks. /Hans PS As you can see in the left-bottom corner, I started building the Taj Mahal. This is a set I've bought just before Lego stopped the production. So, I got it for a 'normal' price of 440 euro's. If you look at the current price, you can almost add a zero ...

Hi all, Does anybody know what happened to Railbricks (www.railbricks.com)? My team and I wrote an article about our fully automated train layout, send it to the editor in November. He promised to published it somewhere around January. Contacted him now and then and he promised each time that it would be published 'soon'. On my latest email, he didn't respond. Does anybody know how he is doing? /Hans

Really great! I'm 'jealous' on these kind of building qualities. /Hans

Hi all, Just finished building the Candy Rotation Stock, which is part of the Sioux.NET on Track: a fully automated train layout that is controlled by a PC application written in C#. The CRS is responsible for delivering the right colored container to the Candy Crane, which loads the candy into the wagon. The color is chosen by the so-called PUI (Physical User Interface) which is operated by the visitor. The candy is than delivered to the customer. The complete layout can be viewed at our blog: siouxnetontrack.wordpress.com. Interesting part of the CRS is, that it gets the chosen color passed by a message using the Motor Protocol. More about this motor protocol can be found at another forum thread of mine. The video below shows the CRS in action (in a test set-up, where a NXT brick is used to read the color and passes the color by the Motor Protocol to the two EV3's). Enjoy. /Hans

The code can be found here: NXT code: https://www.dropbox.com/s/f4q218n6jay5lop/MotorProtocolNXT%20v2.rbt?dl=0 EV3 code: https://www.dropbox.com/s/lxsppjjk5qorzsg/MotorProtocolEV3%20v2.ev3?dl=0 If you have any questions, please let me know. /Hans

The answer is (partly) in de code. The answer is mostly in the fact that ... ... the motors are physically connected (so if the EV3 motor rotates, the NXT rotates as well and vice versa). ... the motors can be use as actuator (= motor) and sensor (measure the number of degrees) So, if I want to pass a message from the NXT to the EV3, I let the NXT motor rotate (e.g. 90 degrees). The EV3 motor 'notices' the number of degrees and can act upon it, for example +90 degrees is action#1 and -90 degrees is action#2. Hope this makes sense ;-) If not, please let me know or send me an email if you want the NXT/EV3 source code. /Hans

Almost done! See my updated Flickr page with some additional pictures: https://www.flickr.c...157653925657018. Enjoy. /Hans

Another problem... not a big one, but hence... order the wrong '2543' pieces... I order the ones with the solid stud on top (2543b). Wrong, wrong, wrong ... See image why this is so very wrong :-( Have ordered the right bricks now... so be warned if you're going to order the separate bricks as well! /Hans

In the final layout, the brick that is used to 'send' the messages to the other brick, has no free sensor ports. That is the reason. And using the light sensor has always the risk of wrong interpretation of the color. /Hans

The total cost mentioned, is excluding the bricks I already had (approximately 100 - 125 euro if I would buy it new). Today the missing bricks should arrive, so I can resume building. Next, I have almost finished my Market Street, also waiting for a small shipment from Berlin. When ready, I will post some pictures. /Hans