BryanKinkel

This skeletal horse revelation is very interesting. The prototype is this Brickshelf folder: http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=46883 And the title of the folder is NELUG/06-16-03 / So the prototype has been kicking around since before June of 2003. This gives you an ideas as to how long it takes to flesh out a new theme that includes new parts and molds. I'm not a member of NELUG (or any LUG for that matter). So I don't know anything about the contents of the user's folder. I just remembered that horse piece and the LUGNET speculation around it. LUGNET thread -- Bryan

Looks like a Brickshelf oddity finally surfaced in a set. Compare the horse in the Castle promo picture to the clear one pictured here: http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?i=430700 -- Bryan

This is like waiting for the ball to drop on New Year's Eve! And a big THANK YOU to whoever is uploading the catalog. -- Bryan

Whoops! :-$

I guess the fate of 9V and RC are two separate questions. It is just stunning, to me at least, that the track packages for RC are on this discontinued list. The RC Passenger Train is also on the list, but not the 7898 Cargo Deluxe train. 7895 Switch Tracks http://guide.lugnet.com/set/7895 7896 Straight & Curved Rails http://guide.lugnet.com/set/7896 7897 Passenger Train http://guide.lugnet.com/set/7897 Does the fact that tracks appear on the list mean the RC line is done? All I can recall about the 9V line is that a decision is being made this year or next and the Ultimate Train Builders Box is coming out this spring (pictures anyone?). Speculation about this type of thing is always fun! -- Bryan

Now what is really interesting about this list is that it contains the new RC Train products - full sets and track packaged. Does this mean the 9V line :-) will be continued as opposed to the RC line :-X ? -- Bryan

Lego Star Wars 2007 pictures can be found Here! I'm not sure how to embed pictures. Can an admin edit this message and stick them in? -- Bryan

Digging through a big box is certainly fun - it kind of goes like this - First you pick out all the obvious things on top such as instructions, baggies of wheels, castle walls, hulls, partially built cars/planes/ships, and complete mini-figures. These are the things that give you your first ideas as to the sets the prior owner may have had. (hmmm a plane fuselage.... which airport?) Then you dig out the smaller specialized parts - trees, plants, wings, plates, jets, etc that you can find just by digging around in the big box. Army men, obvious Mega/Tyco, anything non-LEGO gets tossed in the trash. Now you need to get down to business with extra bins. I pick out a handful and drop it onto a bin lid. Here I'm looking for stray mini-fig legs, torsos, hats, flags, theme-specific items, etc. Good parts are plucked out. The rest gets put into a bin for future sorting and picking. Then you grab another handful and do it again. And again, and again.... The bottom of the box is now visible. Tiny 1x1 plates, coins, etc are all crammed into the corners and under the box flaps. But under the bottom box flaps is where you find a final round of good stuff - mini-fig hats, visor parts and weapons tend to hide there. Bag them. Now the box is empty. Nothing but grit and stray trash (ew). But it was fun. Now it is of to PEERON for instructions. I'm slowly rebuilding the sets one at a time. -- Bryan

A few weeks back my aunt emails us and asks if we want a box of LEGO bricks... "just a lot of basic bricks" she says. Umm... sure! Now they live in Newport News, VA. And my family is in Berwyn, PA (Philadelphia). And as it turns out, my parents took a trip down there, picked up the box (and some furniture) and dropped everything off yesterday. The box is about 2 x 2 x 1 feet. And heavy. As we are unloading the furniture, my daughter gets into the box. Next thing we know, there are little knights, forestmen, pirates and townspeople all lined up on the driveway. It is a *great* box. I did a first pass of sorting this morning * at least 30 castle walls * two palm trees and a lot of foliage (20+ pieces of large & small) * more than 10 Crusaders, Black Falcons, etc * four complete forestmen, likely complete 6054 Forestmen Hideout * 3 islanders, 4 pirates * many, many towns people from airport, racing, Octan, motorcyle sets * White, blue, yellow, red & black Classic Spacemen * Many, many incomplete mini-figs * 10 horses * Piles of windows, doors, etc * 3 baggies full of wheels * Half built planes from one of the airports * Airport baseplates, 4 or 5 road plates * Many green baseplates * Tons of basic bricks, plates, minifig accessories, etc. In general, it is a wonderful early 90's box of mixed sets. All in generally good shape. Very, very low Megablock/Tyco content. Couple of army men, a screw... etc. I'm thrilled. My kids are thrilled. Will try to post pictures later. -- Bryan

Help LEGO pick the next UCS set. Which will it be? R2-D2? Vulture Droid? FX-6? How about an electronic AT-AT that actually walks? News and photos at: http://www.starwars.com/collecting/news/le...ws20060606.html -- Bryan

Thanks, Phes. Just wish we had the larger images up there. You can't really tell much from these images. I do hope Duplo Pirates = System Pirates for the future. Although my wish for Duplo Thomas Trains = System Thomas Trains has yet to come true. -- Bryan

Check Brickset for some new, teeny tiny images of the Duplo Pirate line. 7880 Pirate Ship 7883 Treasure Hunt 7882 Shark Attack 7881 Ghost Ship -- Bryan

Check this out - 5475 Girls Fantasy Bucket Unknown number of pieces. Anyone have any additional information about this? I have two girls under 6. Pink bricks are good. -- Bryan

This looks like a newer set. Brickset link Peeron link -- Bryan

Christopher, Where did you get the printed Harry Potter (I assume) mat that is in your signature? -- Bryan

Old grey or classic grey is simply "light gray" on bricklink. New grey, or bley is referred to as "light bluish gray" (hence the term "bley"). If your looking for classic dark grey, yes it too is simply referred to as "dark gray". Just remember, with the discontinuation of grey in 2004, prices are only going to go up, and its going to be near impossible to track down new lots of classic grey. Its not uncommon to see grey listed at prices 2 x3 times higher than a few years back. Later. I'm building some modular castle walls to surround my town buildings. I have a decent classic castle collection, but I gave up on trying to augment it with standard light gray from BrickLink. Light bluish gray was a half to a third of the price. Simple economics won out in the end. -- Bryan

Thanks for the input, Cutty. As I mentioned before, I try to watch 1000steine to see what is going on in the German market. It is good to see LEGO and S@H reaching out to the AFOL community to get input on future products. It will be interesting to see what becomes of their recent inquiries. -- Bryan

The whole thread can be seen here: http://www.1000steine.com/forum/ The thread subject is: 1000er T

I try to follow discussions at 1000steine.com. Being an American, I have to rely on the Google translation. Of course, this is rough at best. Can anyone tell me what this thread is about? http://f24.parsimony.net/forum61776/messages/112388.htm -- Bryan

I have often thought a subscription program could part of the marketing program for LEGO. BrickMaster has the automatic delivery mechanism in place, but unfortunately the sets are not exclusive or unique. Instead you get a smallish set from whatever the current hot product line is. LEGO takes a tremendous amount of time to get a product to market. But this time has been cut significantly over the past few years as part of the turnaround operations. And I believe Jakes said recent train offerings from Shop At Home have been produced in a matter of months. Train fans have generally been well served by LEGO. There have been several new trains, service packs and re-releases since 2000. We have all seen what LEGO is doing with the "Play Train" line (new track and RC) - it will be interesting to see what, if anything, LEGO does for trains distributed via S@H before then. -- Bryan

I have been picking up the Playmobil catalogs since 2003. As Hobbes mentions, they are filled with intersting themes. And they contain plenty of inspiration. One note - Playmobil also has a small service catalog inside the main catalog. There you can find *army builders*. For example, they have a 3-pack of red coat British soldiers for US$ 6.99. Want a red coat captain? US$ 2.99. Same thing goes for their various factions of knights (Black Lions, Green Dragons, Gold Dragons, Fierce Knights), Vikings, Pirates, Indians, Cowboys, Union Soldiers and Rebel Soldiers. Very cool. Pick up a catalog if you see it. -- Bryan

In 1980, my parents took a trip to Germany. They came back with a stack of LEGO catalogs and set 361 for me. (picture) One of the catalogs was the classic 1980 European Trains catalog. I've been hooked on LEGO trains ever since. At that time, both trains and castle (yellow) were only available overseas. I think that is one reason I like "European" looking sets. -- Bryan

Here is a question - what style trains do you like? The 12V line included German style steam engines (such as 7750) and the classic 7740 Inter-city set. Both of these are based on prototypes from Germany's DB line. The 4551 Crocodile engine looks like a European design. LEGO then did some American style trains in the 9V line. The 4558 Metroliner comes to mind. And of course the 10020 Sante Fe Super Chief and 10133 BNSF locomotive are American. Now LEGO seems to be moving back towards European designs with the 2006 RC line. So which do you prefer? This may be a loaded question considering this is Eurobricks. Me? I prefer the European styles. I enjoy flipping through the Marklin HO catalog for building ideas. -- Bryan

One thing that has been discussed on other sites is the battery pack. It is attached to the bottom of a standard train baseplate and cannot be removed. I think it would have been a good move if the pack simply snapped (or clipped) to the bottom of the plate rather than being a permenent fixture. Despite some minor problems, the RC system looks pretty nice and the set designs are quite sharp. I love the cargo train with the green cab pieces. And it was a good move by LEGO to have AFOL input on the design of the new system. -- Bryan

This calendar will look great in my office. Where can I get one? -- Bryan