ER0L

From the beginning in 2011 I started with a 7w scheme. My idea was that cars in that scale should be built for the small persons they are supposed to be combined with and that the figs should be able to sit side by side. Placing them in a row never made sense to me. Nowadays that we even see 8w cars here which is too wide in my opinion (and even 10w DeLoreans in city layouts which is completely absurd ) I think the idea was right. Things are getting larger, and with a 7w platform many problems of the smaller schemes don't occur. Today the schemes are a bit more sophisticated, there's a range between 6w and 7w+. All vehicles are supposed to be used in a town layout. This is an overview over the cars being used on the LCS (the slot car system). The red roadster is the smallest car (6w, but it fits 2 whole minifigs side by side anyway). Then there are the vintage cars (not to be seen here, only the vintage truck switching between 6 and 7) with a 6w+ scheme (due to the mudguards). The full size cars like the Impala, the Checker Cab or the Ecto-1 are built in a 7w scheme. It may be surprising that buses (and future trucks) are also only 7 studs wide (I call it 7w+ due to the rear view mirrors), but 8w trucks don't look good in a town - even on the broad SNOT roads we are actually using. Plus it's difficult to get them around the corners. Probably there'll be heavy duty vehicles in an 8w scheme later, we'll see.

Looks great indeed. Could you provide a link to Sean Kenney's original creation so that we can compare both? Not everybody (myself included) might know Sean's design. I guess the Cuusoo Ecto-1 (if that's the Ecto you mean) wouldn't pass through here - it's nearly 9 studs wide (plus GB gear at the side) Good point Only Sinner. You may find the correct icon (with an arrow) for that function directly under the photo. Then "Grab the HTML/BBCode". Select "Medium" and "BBcode" - that's all to get the right code.

Great idea, but it's already existing. In fact pink is the original colour of Freddie's design, mifody has just changed the colour:

As already written on Flickr, this car isn't "based" on Freddie's design, it *is* his design - you've just copied it. You haven't called it a MOC, but it's not even a MOD. So everything pointed out here concerning the design of the car should be addressed to the original designer.

Amazing! I've been to Brooklyn, and it reminds me a lot of it. All those nice brownstones and cars, and there's a lot of atmosphere. Great job, I really love it! :thumbup:

I really love this, it has a sturdy Eastern European look to it, very stylish. That roof is done very well, it's a nice alternative to do it this way. And I love that it fits two figs, too!

I've done that with the museum which was a GE before, but not like it is shown in the picture. There are rather large holes in the wall, a frame of bricks is kept to provide stability. Opening the back serves to get more light within the building. If combined with other buildings back to back there's no need to have double walls anyway, so it helps to save bricks, too.

A great set, congratulations to Brent Waller but also to the designer who finished it, you both did an amazing job! Looks quite progressive from a technical point of view, too, which is nice. Does anybody know if the logos are stickers (which I'd prefer in this case, I must admit ...).

I don't see a point here. When searching for lego bus Google shows a lot of nice Lego buses - there are so many great inspirations that you don't even get to the clone brands. Plus there is the nice Eurobricks Town Vehicle MOC Index with a special department for buses, see http://www.eurobrick...60#entry1053682 There's absolutely no need to even think of any third party stuff.

I really like this, the shaping is nice, and there are quite a few interesting details. Looks very playable, too. I'd recommend to use a neutral background for the photos, though. With that your pick-up truck would look twice as good. Anyhow nice work!

Very nice modular in what could be called "Smaller Kristel Style". I especially like the colour combo and the nice structures of the facade. There's nothing wrong with the balcony in my opinion, I'd rather add an awning to fill the empty space above the balcony door.

Many thanks King Aragorn! I'd like to add another video that gives just an impression of how cars and monorail will interact in the future town. Of course the whole thing will be more sophisticated when finished. As said, there will be a monorail subway, too, but the most exciting thing will be the switch between overhead railway and subway since this is possible with the monorail only. Quite a challenge, I still don't know how this will be done. Again many thanks all for commenting and viewing. Maybe all this is a little unusual but hopefully it serves as an impact to develop even better systems to change our towns to something more lively.

This looks very nice indeed. The advantage of a stable grid structure is that you can even relocate the girders here and there when room is needed, e. g. for a subway curve. I couldn't do something similar since I needed the room in the center pit. In fact the buildings themselves provide enough horizontal stability, they only have to be supported at the corners. I'd be very interested to see how this looks like when roads and pavements are applied.

Thanks UrbanErwin, glad you like it. Thank you. Some more details see below. Sorry, but I don't quite get the "angle" aspect. What do you think would be the effect of that? Yes, I've seen that, very nice! We've experimented with that type of chain, too - didn't work out for a larger layout. But I think the main aspect here is not so much the tracking system but the slot road invented by Altezza which opens new possibilities. Without that all this wouldn't have been possible. Took quite a long time to synchronize the different elements until there was a reliable system though. Thank you. Well, the Legoland displays are a bit more sophisticated than what we have. On the other hand our system is made of 100% Lego - which is obviously not the case in Legoland ... Some more details, as requested: Underside of a slot car (the catch has been improved since): Snotted road plates: The school bus is an example of the future so-called freerunners which move on the outer lane (without chain). Such vehicles would even be possible without the whole substructure. Hope this helps a little.

This seems to be more or less the same problem I was dealing with when developing the LCS module standard for an elevated city with moving cars and a monorail underground. One important idea of the LCS standard is to omit any baseplates or roadplates (at least in their original function) since they have quite a few disadvantages (on the other hand they are very useful to carry the whole substructure). Buildings, pavements and roads (both built SNOT-wise) are completely separated, buildings are resting on pillars, connected via a few studs only. For transportation purposes buildings can be detached within seconds, pavements (street lights and stuff included) are detached, too, and put into the center pit of the module. I even hope the modules to be stackable. This is the profile of the substructure: Buildings are set upon a kind of strip footing (5 layers, this matches exactly the height of street plus pavement).

Thanks Oran, glad you like it!The subject doesn't seem to be of great interest, perhaps it's more convenient to show it in its designated town surrounding. But this will take some time. As a foretaste I'd like to add a last video which shows how the different elements interact: Roads, pavements and buildings aren't connected to each other. That means you can easily lift a road section when there's something wrong with the chain. To switch to "transport mode" buildings are taken away and stored separately. Pavements (street lights included) are detached and stored in the center pit of the module. Roads stay in place, their surface is the base for another module when stacked (which hasn't been tested yet). Many thanks all for commenting and viewing. The next photos and videos will hopefully show the growing city.

Many thanks LazyChicken and LT. Guess this thing will grow further ... When watching the video once more I recognized that I have forgotten to show that the cars are able to move much faster than before. What you see in the original video is cars moving quite slowly which is required when there is dense traffic in a city. When moving at full speed it looks like this: Sorry for the poor quality, it seems a better video equipment is required. Too bad the policemen in that car will never catch a traffic offender in front of them ...

Thank you, glad you like them. Hopefully I'll be able to build some more of them soon - at the moment it's rather road construction ... [Edit, 05 February 2014] Probably cobalt 1959 has given up on his little LDD project, but the good news is that fellow bricker Nightfall has just finished his LDD version which may be downloaded here. Many thanks Nightfall! [/Edit]

Nice. I think the designer of the shop (thanks for the link LT) should at least be named once in this thread: it's danthaman11.

Hi all, first off I must say that this is the fulfillment of a dream. From the beginning I was not only interested in building cars but in building cars suitable for minifigs and in finding ways to combine them with a town surrounding. Now what could be nicer than to have even moving vehicles within a town? So many thanks to my dear friend Altezza whose invention of a slot road (when thinking about ways to get his cable car move) made this possible. Many thanks to Nils O for many useful advices, and last not least to Na Dine who provided quite a few parts. At first sight you might think that this layout doesn’t differ too much from the prototype presented here some months ago. In fact it’s totally different. It is twice as large, much stronger, it works much better, it is 1000 times more reliable, cars are connected to the chain in a much better way, it allows a much higher speed, and last but not least it’s standardized or at least 90 percent standardized until now. That means that it could be copied and would probably work as well. Plus it fits in a town surrounding - which of course must be modified. When working on this I soon found out that one slot circle - or a block, as we call it - should be kept as a separate and compact element. There’s no use in breaking it up and build it up somewhere else - until the slot (the chain, that is) is running well, the event has passed. That means that a slot circle must be built as a module that can be kept and transported as a whole. A module made of 4 x 3 baseplates fits in each car and can be carried through most doors, so this seemed to be a suitable measure. When roads are installed the center pit of a module (or a block) has a surface of 3 x 2 baseplates exactly, so that some four or six usual modular buildings will fit in. Another consequence of this is that each module or block contains only the inner lane of the road. Where two modules meet you have two-way traffic. The outer lane (the great circle, as we call it) that leads around the whole layout has a modular design, too. It doesn’t have a chain, though, which would be much too long. Now some words on the construction: The module is built upon a plate which only serves as a means to place and to transport it, it doesn’t provide any stability, baseplates aren’t even fixed. This is required to keep the “100 percent Lego” status. Another advantage of this is that you can even stack several modules when transported. You only have to detach the buildings (which are transported separately) and pavements which rest within the center pit. Roads stay in their place although they are detachable, too. This is required to keep the chain and drive train accessible. Here you can see the road profile of such a module. In fact it's just a further stage of the road system already presented here, see http://www.eurobrick...showtopic=83287 The idea was that using baseplates and road plates has quite a few disadvantages when building larger layouts and that the separation of pavements and buildings (which in reality are completely separated, too) allows more flexibility. Roads and pavements are detachable, buildings are resting on a few pillars. The height of the whole thing is a result of the requirement of installing a monorail underground - once you lift the whole thing, you may use the space underneath for some nice features (there are quite a few ideas ... ). Of course the city will have street lights which can be installed easily (but this would even be possible with the original road system). And now - the slot cars. There are already quite a few of them - especially the full-size cars like the Impala (which already had a working suspension) have proven to be suitable for that purpose. Real slot cars have a self-steering front axle and a rear suspension which is necessary due to the unevenness of the slot roads. So what do we have: School Bus (motorized freerunner). You may have already see one or two videos with this one. It is meant to be moving on the great circle. Ecto-1. To be honest the Ecto is not the most suitable slot car until now. A few laps are possible, but due to its weight (there's the battery box) the car breaks down sooner or later. It will be rather used as a special feature. Chevy Impala Convertible. If everything is fixed properly this car may stay within the slot for an hour or so before anything bad happens. Checker Taxi Cab. Since this car is built to be used in the slot it is the most stable and reliable car. It will move for hours if required. Impala Police Interceptor. Same as the Impala Convertible. Roadster. No real slot car, rather used to compare the different types of vehicles. It doesn't steer and is unsprung, so it doesn't look too good in curves. On the other hand it can go on full speed for several laps due to its lightweight construction. It's quite stable, too. Vintage Truck. Quite reliable, too, the big wheels don't come off easily. CHiPs. Can't be called a MOC, just an idea how to involve motorbikes. 1477. This is rather a personal reminiscence since this car (with the proper dust on it) was - apart from two 2x4 bricks - the only remnant of my Lego collection after my dark ages. ​That's why this car is featured in the pre-title sequence of the following video which shows (nearly) all the cars in action: Many thanks for reading all this stuff, c&c welcome as usual.

Thanks for the great review which more or less meets my own thoughts upon this. I agree that it's quite a step forward - it just looks like such a behemoth is supposed to look: neither too short nor too narrow, proportions are excellent. Then there's the playability. In my opinion 8w is the right width for this since those vehicles are considerably broader than usual trucks. On the other hand the gap between the usual 6w trucks and this scheme is much too big, but well, we won't see any vehicles with an odd width in the near future, I guess ... Of course the whole thing can be refined, details can be optimized (that steering wheel is but a joke) but that's where the fun is anyhow.

No, you won't lose anything but probably win some clicks or even faves. A photo can be shown in several sets or groups, that doesn't affect the photo as such. But since this is off-topic you may contact me via Flickr if there are any questions left.

I forgot about that - that surely is an illegal connection. The gangster truck doesn't have the original steering setup, however, the wheels are adjustable to mock a steering function.

Looks cool so far. Nice idea to widen the truck bed. Maybe this helps:

Great oldtimer cars! I especially love the shaping of the bus and the use of the new 1x2 curved slopes for the front fenders. The smaller car is very nice, too. I've invited all three of them into the Vintage Cars Group on Flickr. Would be glad to have them.