Jeroen Ottens

Hi, Thank you all for all the positive comments. Yes they are. Thanks. For the headlights I had a similar experience. I have lost count on the amount of variants I have tried and I agree it is not perfect. There was just so little space and so many curves in that area that it was a real struggle to get something that was not too bulky, captured the headlightshape, did have enough room for attaching the lifelites (the edge is also lit BTW) and was sturdy enough for my standards. There was quite some back-and-forth communication with my client about this part of the design . My experience with the lifelites is similar. During the testbuilding I didn't push the connectors all the way in because I was afraid I wouldn't be able to take them apart anymore. I also struggled with the size of the leds. Some were just too small to fit snugly inside a pin, making the lights fall out a bit too easy. Thanks, I do not have the model anymore, so I won't be able to share any inside pictures. I didn't know either until I got the request to make this model I'll always to try to be as purist as possible. I won't wander too far into the dark side The steeringmechanism is indeed Claas-inspired. Instead of manually moving the control stick from left to right I use the rotational input from the sequential gearbox selector to drive a gearrack which pushes the stick from left to right. When going into reverse the wheels are still in the position dictated by the sequential gearbox, I did not see a way to decouple that as well in the limited space I had in this car. It is jampacked as it is Once again, thank you for all the positive comments. Jeroen

Hi, I'd like to present my latest MOC, a 1:10 replica of the Mercedes-AMG GT R. It is a manual car with the following functions: independent suspension on all wheels steering with HoG and working steering wheel V8 fake engine working lights (with custom lighting bricks) opening doors and hood adjustable seats (with a gear behing the seat) adjustable spoiler (with another gear behind the seat) detailed interior and engine bay a 4D+N+R gearbox an active aerodynamic spoiler (this is some kind of marketingbuzzword from Mercedes-AMG) in the front which opens when 4th gear is engaged four wheel steering with speed (read gear) dependent behaviour: - in 1st gear the wheels steer against each other - in 2nd gear only the front wheels steer - in 3rd gear the rear wheels steer a bit with the front wheels - in 4th gear the rear wheels steer with the front wheels Here is a video showcasing the functions: This model was a first for me in a couple of ways: It has 3D-printed rims (thanks @SevenStuds for the design) It has 3rd party lighting from Lifelites It has custom stickers from @jaaptechnic Here are some shots with the lights on: And here are a top and front view: As usual comments and questions are welcome. Leg godt, Jeroen

Incredible! I really like the way you thought about the controls. It is a perfect balance between playability and realism. This is the true spirit of a LEGO Technic set, enticing the owner to understand the real mechanics by offering a model that is easy to play with. And of course to get all those linkages in such a small frame without making it look bulky is fantastic The colourscheme gives it a futuristic vibe to it with all the darkgrey/white and a few touches of red to spike things up a bit.

Vey nice Impressive turning radius, very smooth bodywork lines and to have all these opening elements at this scale is impressive. I really like the 'rollcage' like structure around the engine.

Thanks I share the sentiment about the controls not being functionally accurate. In my older (grey) version I used the flexcable system for the joystickcontrols, however this actually worked pretty poorly. The flex you get in these flexcables over 80 cm is so significant that the input of the joystick was lost in the cables. I principally refuse to design something that relies on friction (like push & pull axles), so I would need a long set of beams attached to each other running from the cockpit to the rear to transfer the motion, taking up 2x more space than rotating axles. I have not considered using wires though, maybe that would have been an option (although also these will probably suffer from too much elongation when force is applied). So yes, it is definitely not functionally accurate, but with the (very) limited space I had to work in this was the only solution I could think of.

The ninjago set Garmagedon^3 has large panels in sand blue... That is the 6th blue colour we get, right

Thanks for the comments Pitch, jaw and roll are the three rotations a plane can make. Pitch is when the nose goes up and down, jaw is when it rotates like a car (so it stays horizontal and moves to the left or right), roll is when it rolls on it's side. Since planes normally combine jaw and roll when turning I combined these two controls. The vertical controlsurfaces in the two big vertical fins are used for jaw, the rear wings are used for pitch (both moving up and down simutaneously) as well as roll (then they move against each other).

I am sorry, something went wrong when making the video. Do you know whether I can edit this in youtube or do I have to upload a new one? Thanks for pointing this out, I have uploaded a new version which is OK now I hope.

Hi, It has been a bit hectic, but at last I was able to shoot a video. It doesn't showcase the electric functions, I'll shoot them separately. Thank you all for the comments and compliments. And thank you Jim for frontpaging. I am sorry, but I will ony sell this as a set. It wouldn't be fair to my existing customers to start selling instructions now. I haven't really considered this, but like Blakbird says, it should not be a big issue. Ah the nose... That has been quite a headache. I do agree it is a bit too blunt, but I couldn't figure out a better solution so in the end I settled for this. Well found. I actually still have this one... I'll see if I can dust it off and make a photo with his younger brother. Thank you, I do appreciate your reaction a lot. I do intend to keep making models for sharing. If this venture turns out well I will be able to spend more time designing more models... Thank you for your honesty @Blakbird I still owe you a photo with something else for scale. It will come, I promise. Once again, thank you all for your kind and honest comments. Leg godt, Jeroen

It is indeed ingenious. I guess the reason you chose not to use double crossblocks was to prevent the slack a 3L axle would give, right? I am a bit surprised that the pivot point seems to be half a stud more inward, apparently I never really checked the geometry of the normal hubs...

Thanks for all the positive comments. The pricing certainly has spiked some discussion, so I will comment to that further down in this post, but let me first answer the other questions. I will make a video of all the functions, but it will take some time. Days are short here in the Netherlands and I have to rely on natural light for the shooting. Thanks. The AMG is finished and ready for shipment, but my client lives in Puerto Rico and as you can imagine he has other priorities at the moment. I'll post the model when I have shipped it to him, but I have no idea when this will be. I'll make photo with some reference for scale. A LEGO Technic figure is about the right scale I think. Is that a Freudian typo or do you refer to the pneumatic hoses? These hoses are tough to work with, they are so out of scale that I normally don't use pneumatics. However in these wings I could not think of another option. Thanks. If I would put this model on LEGO ideas the first thing that would happen is that I sign away the rights on this model, regardless of the number of votes. And if even the Landrover of Sheepo didn't get through the selection committee I have very little hopes that such a military plane would go through. Thanks for the advice. I'll take another look at the stand, there is indeed room for improvement. So a few words on the price. As Brunojj1 so eloquently puts it, it is up to the market to determine whether the price is right. Nobody is forced to buy this and it certainly is not a necessity of life. Most people think the price is too high and I can understand if you feel that way. For me this is also a learning experience. I have not done extensive marketresearch to see what the market is for high-end technical models (if there is such a market at all). Maybe there is nobody in the world interested. If so, I will lose on this deal and I will learn from it for my next project. And maybe there is a market. In which case I will be able to spend significantly more time on designing more models (including models without a commission). I love what I am doing when I am designing with LEGO Technic and finding a way to make a living out of it is an interesting journey and this is a step towards (or maybe not) that goal. Thanks again for all the positive and constructive comments. Part of the love of what I am doing is coming from that feedback. Jeroen

Hi, It has been a while since I posted a MOC, but I have not been sitting idle. Here is my latest creation, a LEGO Technic replica of the infamous F14A Tomcat: It is as densily packed as I possibly could with features. It has seven electrified functions (driven by one M-motor), six pneumatic functions and four manual functions. Driven by one M-motor and using a manual gearbox the following functions are electrified: - The engine turbines (directly coupled to the M-motor) - The rotating Gatling gun on the port side - A small pneumatic pump - The canopy - The landing gear - The eight landing gear bay doors - The main adjustable wings (in the picture above they are in the low speed, extended position) Next to that there are six pneumatic valves controlling the following functions: - Switch between the internal small vacuum pump and the external large vacuum pump - The bleed doors in the air-intakes of the engines - The delta wings at the side of the air-intakes - The arresting hook - The front and rear flaps on the main wings - The two air brakes on the main wings and the three air brakes at the end of the fuselage The plane also features a couple of manual functions: - A knob to control the pitch of the aircraft. The rear horizontal wings and the joystick are controlled with this knob. - A knob to control the roll & jaw of the aircraft. The rear horizontal wing, the vertical control surfaces and the joystick are controlled with this knob. If the landing gear is down, the front landing gear is steered with this knob as well. A special differential control mechanism is used to combine both pitch and roll control and feed only one signal to each wing. - The nacelles that contain the turbo engines can be opened and the engines can be taken out. - A double lever to activate the ejection seats. The canopy is ejected at the same time as well. This model is available as a limited edition exclusive set on my website. Finally some fun facts: The model weighs around 4 kilograms and is just shy of 4000 parts It is 87 cm long, 101 / 66 cm wide (main wings open / swept back) and 33.5 cm high when put on its stand It has ten small pneumatic cylinders and nine shock absorbers It has 549 axles, 110 gears and 111 panels Most of the functions are color coded so that you can distinguish them during the building process Comments and questions are welcome as always. Leg godt, Jeroen Ottens

It looks like steeringwheel is connected to the sailboom as well. So there are three ways to control the rudder and sail. That's really neat. I'm normally not so much into these midrange sets, but this is a good one!

These parts have a very high friction. They click through different angles and it takes some force to do that. It most likely will hold the weight of your chicken, but if you want to motorize the legs you will need a very strong mechanism to do so.

And +1 for the modular construction. That is an unexpected bonus

Great looking model, it looks sturdy and the steering is ingenious.

That is a nice stepper, but I don't understand how the gearswitching works. As far as I see the switchingknobs have 4 positions instead of the usual 3. So how do they engage the driving rings?

Squished and out of proportions in all possible ways, but I like it . It has a chubby vibe to it and packs a lot of character. I really like the small panels in the front grille, those have definitely a BMW-esque feeling to it. I might steal that idea one day.

Another great model from you The front fenders do look a bit busy with all these connectors, but I guess that is the only way to get some rigidity into the shell. I like the fact that the bodywork can be separated, it's one of the things I still have on my todo list. The red accents really work for me as well.

Impressive Is there a reason you used the old crown gears? Theoretically they have a much worse efficiency than bevel gears. Of course in LEGO everything is inefficient, so maybe in practice this doesn't matter.

Jim will love the catamaran , a lot of new dark azure pieces: 1x7 beam 1x9 beam 1x13 beam 3x5 half beam, quarter ellipse 3x11 curved panels #5 & #6 and something with a 3L length, like the 3x5 beam or a dogbone frame

How can I find the B-models?

I was curious about that part as well, but I think it is just a 1x3 half beam in blue. At the front there are two 1x2 half beams.

Wow, that is incredible. I'm looking forward to hear more details about the functions.

Can't you use a 5.5L axle?