Blakbird

All a matter of perspective. To me there is no doubt that color coding makes the model easier to build, but there is also no doubt that it makes the model uglier. How much uglier varies by model. On balance, I would rather have a model look good than be easy to build. I like a challenge anyway. Although it is true that color coded models can be converted using older parts, those older parts are getting harder and harder to find so this option may cease to exist in a few years.

MOC REVIEW - 8X8 DUMP TRUCK BY LUCIO SWITCH INTRODUCTION Lucio Switch's "Bat Truck" is the biggest vehicle I have ever built. Strictly speaking it does not have the most parts, but with ~5600 it is pretty close. Using 13 Unimog tires, this thing is truly massive. But with all that size and weight does it work? Read on to find out. (Note that there are additional images and larger versions of all images at my Bricksafe.) This is not made to be a scale model, but it is certainly inspired by the Iveco Trakker, their off road heavy duty truck, and it is a very good likeness. Although they offer a 4 axle variant, it is 8x4 with only the rear axles powered. The model, on the other hand, is a full 8x8 with all the axles driven. INSTRUCTIONS Instructions are available at ReBrickable. Lucio has done a lot of work on the instructions and it shows. The instructions are broken into 9 books to keep the file size reasonable. I appreciate this as it makes them more usable on my iPad. After the spectacularly rendered cover, the instructions continue with some electrical and pneumatic diagrams which can be used for easy reference later and are very helpful. To those people who complain about official LEGO instructions being too simple, you don't have to worry about that here. Sometimes hundreds of parts can be added on a single page. But with all the callouts and substeps, everything is still easy to follow. FUNCTIONS As you can see in this cutaway view, this model is packed with functions. As stated previously, all 4 axles are driven for a total of 12 driven wheels. The front and rear pairs of axles are each powered by a pair of XL motors (4 total). There is no mechanical connection between the front and rear axles. This works out well because it allows the motors to share the load based on the torque required in the situation. The straight 6 engine under the cab rotates with the front axle motors. Both front axles are steered with a servo at different rates. There is a motorized winch behind the bumper which uses an L motor and a worm gear. There is also a 2 pump compressor driven by another L motor. The compressor powers the lifting of the bed through 3 new long actuators and a servo driven remote switch. There are also two manually switched pneumatic functions including cab tilt and a PPTO at the rear for a trailer. There are LED lights at front and rear, and an AUX connection at the back which will allow any trailer lights to be linked to the tractor. All of this is routed through a pair of Li-Po rechargeable batteries and 2 SBricks. One note on the parts is that the inner wheels on the dual rear axles must be the 6 hole variant. I originally thought it didn't matter and tried to use older 3 wheels I happened to have but it won't work. So you need at least 4 of the 6 hole wheels. The rest of the wheels can be either the old or new variety. PARTS This image shows the pile of parts on my table (sans Power Functions which had not arrived yet at the time of the photo). The mass of liftarms and panels is incredible. This makes for a fairly slow build because a LOT of time is spent hunting for the right part. Sorting the parts at least to the level that I have shown in highly recommended. THE BUILD The first thing that is built is the rear suspension and axle assemblies. The live axles pivot on suspension ball joints and are stabilized by 6L links. The rear suspension uses an unusual configuration representing leaf springs. The black and gray cross axles above the drive axles bend as the suspension is compressed. This might make purists nervous, but so far as I can tell it works great and has not damaged the parts. Although portal axle hubs are used, the drive axles actually run straight through with no reduction. This means there is quite a bit of torque being carried by the drive shafts here. In fact, all the torque for 2! XL motors runs through a single 8 tooth gear. Lucio has thought ahead and made it easy to remove and replace this gear if necessary. At the end of Book 1, the batteries, Bricks, and rear Xl motors have been added to the rear axle assembly. It is perfectly possible to test out the motors at this point and even to drive it around although there will be no steering. There is ample room for wiring so you hardly notice it in the image, but there is already a lot here. The wires for the rear tail lights and the aux trailer light extension are already present. At the end of Book 2, more of the forward chassis has been built, the front XL motors have been added, and the engine has been installed (although it is hanging precariously). Some of the pneumatic routing is also visible. The two L motors are barely visible just behind and under the engine. One is used to power to compressor, and the other is for the winch. The power of an L motor is probably not needed for the winch, but the pin holes are used as a structural part of the chassis so an M wouldn't work. Book 3 builds the front of the chassis including the headlights, the winch, and the pneumatic actuators for tilting the cab. This is a really solid assembly. By the end of Book 3 the front end has been joined to the chassis. The process of joining is a bit tricky because a bunch of axles and gears need to line up since the motors are in the aft section. Given the size, it is remarkable how rigid the chassis is. It can easily be picked up with one hand at almost any location with minimal flex. I really like that the straight 6 has some filters and other engine details which can be seen when the cab is open. The front axles are quite different from the rear. You can see that the portal axles are actually used for gearing down 3:1 this time. The XL motors do not have the upstream 3:1 reduction like those for the rear axles. In both cases, final reduction at the wheels is 3:1. The servo handles the steering. The 1st and 2nd axles are not quite the same. Besides a difference in the length of the steering control arms for a different steering lock, the 1st axle also has an anti-roll bar. Both axles are very similar though and are supported by a ball joint, some 6L links, and 2 hard shock absorbers. Servos are used for steering. Book 4 ends with the front axles joined to the chassis. Although the instructions do not call for it at this point, I could not resist installing the tires and driving the naked chassis around the house. There is still one more motor to add which is the servo for the pneumatic switch. At the end of Book 5, the exhaust stack has been added as has the mechanism for pneumatically tipping the bed. A servo is used to control the pneumatic switch. The fenders, fuel tanks, and other chassis details have also been added. The rear fenders are particularly massive assemblies and use more parts than some entire LEGO models. Next up is the cab. Although it does not contain any wiring or motors, there are gears here for the operational steering wheel. The dash is nicely detailed, and there is even a fire extinguisher inside. The light bar on the top is not functional. The "bat grille" is in full display here and looks just awesome. The final part of the assembly is the bed which uses 30+ LBG 5x11 panels. I like that it incorporates a slope at the front and rear so it doesn't just look like a rectangular box. When just looking at a picture of the bed without any context, it is hard to appreciate how big it is. With that in mind, here's a picture with the "tiny" 42043. Incidentally, 42043 is a pretty similar model of an 8x8 white dumping truck. FINAL IMPRESSIONS The model is finally complete! This is a really good model, whether you consider the scale or not. Almost everything is done with Technic; there are only a few System parts here in the grille and light bar. The model drives perfectly fine and with reasonable speed, although if you try to run over obstacles or do any off road driving you can expect some broken gears. The mechanism to tip the bed is at the limit of the LEGO pneumatic system. Using my manometer, I found that about 25 psi is required. The pumps are capable of 40 psi, but I found that several of my switches started leaking at about 15 psi. I had to try several switches before I got it to work. Even then, it takes quite some time for the compressor to tip the bed, but it does work. The cab tipping happens much more easily. It is controlled by a manual switch on the left. The right hand switch is for the unused PPTO. I found that a hand pump can be connected to the PPTO if you want to drive the pneumatics manually without the compressor. This model is not cheap to build, but it is well designed and functional and will really stand out in any collection. Even mine! MOC COMPARISON I thought I would end with this render of the truck next to some other large 8x8 dump trucks. Pictured are Designer Han's truck, M_longer's MAN TGS, and LasseD's cement truck. I could not take an actual photo because the truck barely fits on my photo table even by itself.

Yes, eventually. I file has gotten large enough that it is pretty difficult to work with, so I'm going to wait until I have all of them ready.

I'll second the opinion of the others who have advised you to get the Code Pilot. While the model itself is excellent, the Code Pilot is a really unique and marvelous piece of LEGO history, and it works very well. This is among the most playable sets with it. Without it, the set is still good and you could run the motors manually, but it is not the same. The Code Pilot even has engine sounds that change pitch as the model is moved!

Wait a minute, you are from the Netherlands but you are complaining about weird vehicle colors?

Instructions for Akiyuki's Wheel and Steps Module are now tested and complete and are available here along with a Brickstore parts list. 87 pages 1198 parts Most of the credit for reverse engineering this module goes to Courbet who did the work making an LDraw file with instruction steps. I had the easy job of formatting the instructions. I have not actually built this module myself. The crankshaft sets the timing for the steps, but the relative timing of the wheel and steps probably needs to be set to allow a ball to drop from the wheel when the first step is down. This module was never presented by Akiyuki in it's own video, but it appears in several of his layouts. The video I've included below is from his most recent 2016 layout. The wheel and steps module can be seen at t=2:47.

Please don't post videos that don't show anything in topics with titles that don't say anything. This video claims to be an "official" LEGO video from an official designer but it is obviously not.

By popular demand, I have created an LDraw file of my mod to the crane loader module for the train. You may recall that I had trouble getting enough power from the train to run the crane and that I had lots of gear skips. First I added an L motor to the back of the module as shown below: I want this motor to run only when the train is present in the station, so I created the mechanism below: The 4 bar linkage attached to the polarity switch is contacted by the train motor and turns the crane motor on. The L-motor should be attached to the switch. The black ball joint on the end of the linkage should be aligned with the lateral axle on the train. When the spring mechanism hits the axle to make the train leave the station, it should impact the ball joint and pull the linkage to shut off the switch. The exact position of the yellow 1/2 bush and black perpendicular connector can be adjusted to get the motor to shut off properly. The yellow block on top of the track buffer is used as a stop for the linkage. You don't want the link to rotate too far and reverse the crane. I have tested this config extensively and it works perfectly. The LDraw file can be downloaded here.

Instructions for Akiyuki's Pinball Module are now tested and complete and are available here along with a Brickstore parts list. 56 pages 992 parts Most of the credit for reverse engineering this module goes to Courbet who did the work making an LDraw file with instruction steps. I had the easy job of formatting the instructions. I have not actually built this module myself, but it is simple enough that I am not worried about any problems. There is no timing to set. The only moving part is the belt conveyor. This module is more colorful than most of the others and will add some contrast to your Akiyuki display. It was never presented by Akiyuki in it's own video, but it appears in several of his layouts. The video I've included below is from his most recent 2016 layout. The pinball module can be seen at t=1:15.

The synthesized parts look really good. Does such a simple module really need an L motor?

Thanks for looking closely. I have made those corrections.

Did you mean zig-zag stairs? That's a different module than zig-zag lift.

Or make your own.

One of them came with a CD-ROM and the other didn't. Always check Technicopedia for this kind of question!

Mechanically it would probably not be that hard to reverse engineer and build, but all the magic is in the programming. This thing doesn't just drive each motor individually, it can do complex things like move the output in a straight line which requires driving all the motors at continuously varying rates. It is quite impressive. However, as has been noted this topic is only about the HGBC modules. If I was doing Akiyuk's other creations, I think I would do the harmonic drive which is just incredible.

I like that Audi! I think that will be it.

That's an excellent candidate, thanks. Is there a topic for this MOC? I need to know more about it. Although I was kind of looking for a non-motorized model next. My investigation into the number of #3 red connectors I have was kind of fascinating (to someone who likes numbers and data), so I decided to do the same thing with black friction pins. According to ReBrickable, I have 34305 of these. This is the pin with slot (2780) and does not count the old solid pin (4459). It also doesn't count MOCs which are not in ReBrickable, so I did some searching and found that I have another 7998 pins in such models, bringing the total to 42,303. I think I am safe in saying that I have more of this part than any other.

I will probably make his Jeep MOC, but it doesn't go on my Supercar shelf. It goes on the off-roader shelf with the Defender and Hurricane.

Not even close. With nothing but the Step 5 (which requires no extra parts) my model works completely fine. Most of the things in this thread are improvements to make it better. Any set could be made better, I suppose. Rather than the most flawed, I would say it may be the furthest from the expectations of AFOLs, but that is at least as much due to high expectations as low quality.

Good question. I'm not sure. Let's check Rebrickable. If you own all the official Technic sets, you get: 8448 10 8070 6 8674 4 8068 2 8146 2 8682 1 Total 25 Now if I look at MOCs I have built, I get: Mustang GT500 41 Porsche 997 21 Supercar Deluxe 16 Koenigsegg CCX 12 Concept Car 10 Ferrari 458 6 Alfa 4C 4 Madoca Supercar 4 Lipko V12 4 Zonda 4 Aventador 2 Bughatti EB110 2 Muscle Car 2 CVT Truck 2 Total 130 So altogether it looks like I have about 155 of them. Correct! There are two models on one shelf from different builders, so I blocked the opposite one on each image. By the way, you might notice that there is an empty spot above Pvdb's Koenigsegg One:1. I wonder what I should put there?

After cleaning out the LEGO room as mentioned above, I had the opportunity to rearrange my cars when I put them back and arrange them by builder. This revealed several things. First, I have a lot of cars. Second, I have no space to back up and take a decent picture. Third, my iPad takes terrible pictures for which I apologize in advance, but I still thought is was worth sharing what's on the shelf. Official cars: Crowkillers block: Kuipers block: Leppen block: Brunojj block: Jurgen block: Madoca block: Lipko block: The others are only one car each. Jeroen and Skyliner: Pvdb, Steffan, and Jovel: And finally, Sheepo's monsters don't fit on the regular shelves:

I also didn't find a "select all" button. I had 700+ parts in my list which take up 28 pages, but you have to select each page individually to search. This is a new feature of Bricklink, so I'm sure they will improve the code as they get feedback. Even though the old system was a kludge, I was really good at it and had a good system after so much use. The new version is very different so will take some practice.

It may be a matter of how big your wanted list is. I had over 700 different types of parts on my wanted list. After you buy something, it has an option to apply an order to your wanted list which seems like a good thing. However, it only marks the parts as "have" but does not remove them from the wanted list. Therefore if you search by store it still looks for parts you already have ordered.

Glad to hear (and see) it. I have updated the first post.

Then you are doing much better than me. I can't seem to make the new wanted list do anything, and I can't get the old way to work either. It has been a nightmare trying to order parts lately.