Blakbird

Only "verging on"? I was going for completely ridiculous. That's right. I gave it shot with the spice weasel!

Personally, I disagree. Bricks falls apart too easily, especially at this kind of weight. I think the Technic design makes the hull much stronger than it would otherwise be, and it looks great as well.

You can read it on the tire! RC4WD Super Swampers. I got them for the 41999 Boss.

These sets should be at EVERY Lego store within a day or so, so it is probably no longer news to post more such notices. I would be interested to know if 41999 is showing up at stores or only S@H. It is not available at my local store, but the other new sets are.

I decided to kick it up a notch. Bam!

Thanks for the comprehensive and detailed review. This is a very unusual product. I can't help but feel that the inability to build the models "inspired" by the book with the parts in the box is a major flaw. If an independent collection of LEGO parts is required, then why bother to include these particular parts? Personally, I would be interested in buying the book apart from the kit if it was available. I don't really need all the white parts, but I'd be very interested to read the book.

Very good review! Now I don't have to write one. ;). I just finished building mine last night. I was at my cabin on a bay of the Pacific and got to build the biggest set ever while looking at the ocean. Best building experience ever!

I love this model. The flat bottom is cool and I have never seen anyone find a use for that 8421 windshield before.

I think the words "correction" and "fixed" are a little misleading. There is nothing wrong with the gearbox, it is a technical marvel. However, anything so complicated can have some bugs in it. This comes more from the individual build and the variation in rubber bands than the design itself. There is nothing that can be done to the design to make it any better, you just have to experiment with different numbers of rubber bands once you get it built.

You will see news of 2014 sets as soon as such news is available. There was already a thread on this same topic so please remember to take a look before starting a new one.

That's where I live! I'll have to stop by and try to pick one up. I've already placed orders to replace all the red chassis parts with black.

Sorry, I thought you were talking about the regular converter cables.

There is no guarantee that an online inventory is accurate. I have bought many used sets in which I found that the Peeron inventory (for example) was way off. It said I was missing parts but I wasn't. With older sets that have no inventory in the instructions, the only way to know for sure is to build the model. Since this is a Universal set, that really means building 3 models. Of course, I've also bought used sets which really were missing lots of parts. The worst was an 8880 which was missing more than 80 parts. I finally figured out that it was all the parts for an entire seat. The seller did not have the parts boxed, he used the instructions to pick the parts from his pile of LEGO one by one. He forgot that the seats said "2x" in the instructions. He sent me the parts and all was well.

Yes, you can still get these adapters. They are available from LEGO Education or from Bricklink. I think you can still get them from Shop @ Home as well.

It's strong but it only works over a portion of the rotation angle. I think it will fall apart when the top and bottom are 90 deg out of phase, and I think the "rollers" will have trouble re-engaging when coming back into alignment. The truth is that these turntables are only intended to be used as radial guides carrying compression load (weight) and not tension. They are especially ill suited for bending which is what you get from an unbalanced load. This mean you either need to brace the turntable mechanically or balance your load.

No, that won't make any difference. It would have to be something that prevented the threaded axle from getting longer (pulling apart), but if you had something that did that then you wouldn't need the threaded axle in the first place.

The threaded axles are very weak. Although they are a theoretical solution to your problem, I think that structurally they are not adequate which is why they were produced for such a brief time. The cross section available to carry tension is only the core since the flanges are cut away by threads. If you try to use these for a heavy duty application you will only be depleting the already limited worldwide supply by destroying some of them.

My local LEGO store (Seattle) had all of the new sets (not counting 41999) so I picked up all of them. TRU had everything except the crane.

It was incredibly painful, but I finished modeling the pneumatics. Now for the electrical wires.

We already have many topics about 41999, many of which already discuss the release date (August 1st). Please take a look through those other topics.

When news about 2014 sets becomes available, you can be sure a new topic will be started about it immediately. In the interim, there is no need to start a topic asking for news.

I think we are talking about the same thing. By "autovalve", I just meant a motorized valve controlled remotely. This seems to be exactly what you did. I'm not aware of anyone having made a valve that is actually automatic, although I've seen automatic pressure regulators.

She also used a 4 channel HiTechnic radio control receiver that was never available to the public.

I'm not unwilling. But there is no CAD file or instructions so there is nothing I can do. I thought Sariel's was 100% I/R.

Thanks for adding this. The comparison between these three behemoths is fascinating. Sadly, no one will ever own all 3 to compare them visually!