CP5670

I went to the Brickfest 2006 event at the same location, although I only had time to go for two of the three days. I remember they had one room with a large selection of sets at 25% off (brought over from one of the nearby Lego stores I think). The independent seller marketplace was a bit disappointing though. Most of the things for sale were at the upper end of Bricklink prices, except for people selling custom parts like Brickarms, and I ended up not buying anything there.

Sure, I'll take a few tomorrow and post them in the MOC project thread. It looks pretty unfinished at the moment though, as the top wing is not yet built and there is not much detail on the exterior yet. I've had to put this project on hold for a while now due to a Bricklink order that's been delayed for almost a month.

Here is what I've got: This is only about half of my collection; numerous other sets are unopened due to lack of space (and time to build them, for that matter). I have an extra room available, but need to get more of those shelves for it. Some of my MOCs are mixed in among the official models.

I'm planning to attend. I better make sure I register in time.

As far as MOCs go, I find many stickers to be quite useful, especially generic, multipurpose stickers like license plates, numbers or control panels. The Cosmic Enforcer model in my Brickshelf account uses several tiles with computer panel stickers from the Technic 8839 Supply Ship. I'm also using an unused mirror sticker from the 8458 set (supposed to be for the alternate model) as a large overhead screen in my current project. Thanks, that has some useful information. I'll try getting their 5 pack of decals and see if I can get my printer to produce anything good with it.

That's what I thought too.

This is a great little set and has a large number of printed tiles and other special parts for its size. I've been meaning to pick up one off ebay for a while now. Your classic space version is a nice adaptation of it. On a side note, I was looking through some old catalogs a few days ago and the cover page of the 1987 US catalog shows a race between this model, a cavalryman and a town race car.

I decide whether to use stickers based on their material and color, as well as what they're placed on. White paper stickers with white, red or blue components seem to peel off and crumble automatically after one or two years from UV exposure, so I generally do not use these stickers (unless it's a really good one, in which case I cover it up with clear tape after putting it on). White paper stickers in other colors and stickers printed on clear paper don't suffer from this and last much longer, so I usually put those on. My favorite kind are logo and control panel stickers, so I almost always use them. On the other hand, I usually don't apply stickers to transparent windscreens and rare parts in general, and hardly ever use anything that spans multiple parts. Speaking of stickers by the way, I want to try printing out some custom decals using the vector logos in another thread around here. Is there any noob-friendly guide on how to do this? I would be interested to know if there's any specific decal paper that's good to use, and how to cut them to the right shape and size for Lego pieces.

I also keep a detailed spreadsheet of all the Lego I have. Sets: 295 (excluding Bricklink orders) Average parts per set: 285 (excluding Bricklink orders) Total parts: 89978 (including Bricklink orders, probably off by 100-200) Earliest set: 1981 Latest set: 2007 Average year: 1994 Town/City: 22.7% Space: 32.2% Aquazone: 4.4% Model Team/Creator: 4.7% Technic/Mindstorms: 21.3% Service packs: 5.4% Other: 9.3% (includes a few of each: Alpha Team, Star Wars, Trains, etc.) These percentages are in terms of sets; if I look at pieces instead, the Technic percentage will be much larger since most of my Technic sets are the bigger ones. I don't keep track of minifigs so I'm not sure about those.

I just had this happen today. I got a supposedly MISB 6549 Roadblock Runners set off ebay (it was part of a lot with two other sets, 6190 and 6856), which turned out to have a bag of random megablocks in it with nothing else. The box was pretty smashed up and there was no attempt made to reseal it. Hopefully the seller will be cooperative. The 6190 set was also opened and was missing a rare minifig too (obviously ripped from the parts tray), but it has a lot of other unique parts that are in the sealed bags so I'll probably hold on it if the seller lets me only return the other one. A real pity too. This would have been an excellent deal if everything was as it's supposed to be. This is the first time I've run into this issue though in almost 200 ebay and Bricklink purchases, so it doesn't seem to be that common.

It was $30, which was a pretty good price given the condition. It had no box or instructions though. This set is actually fairly common on ebay though, considering how old it is. I see them pretty frequently on there. I just modified mine to make everything fully enclosed:

This is a great little set. I like how it combines two very different color schemes for different parts of the model. I have made some slight modifications to mine, adding a roof on the vehicle and a back wall on the outpost. Also, those white 1x1 headlight plates at the front are thinner than the modern kind and seem to be quite weak. I got this set off ebay a while ago and one of them was broken in shipping, even though the set was otherwise in display model condition, and the other one broke off while I was building the set. I replaced them with the newer variety. The only bad thing about this set is the name. It can't even roll over a single plate's height. Not very "All Terrain" at all.

Wow, nice. You probably have enough to make that scene on the box picture. I got one pack off ebay a while ago and have another octagon plate from the Blacktron 6988 base. I'm building my carrier MOC around one but don't have anything planned for the others. These baseplates are still relatively common on ebay for their age. I see MISB packs on there every few weeks and they tend to sell for around $20. The older kind (in the OP) are much harder to come by.

Bricklink: 50% ebay: 40% Lego S@H: 10% My focus is more on MOCs than sets these days, and even with current sets, I often find them cheaper on ebay than at S@H. I rarely buy any Lego at retail stores (the last time I did was over 8 years ago ).

Cool little model. Many of the space factions had two different transparent colors, a "primary" one for windshields and other large parts, and a "secondary" one for most smaller things like lights and antennas. Futuron used transblue and transred for these respectively, so those colors fit in perfectly fine. Although I think it would look nicer if the two radar dishes in the front were the same color.

I sent them some space model for this in the mid 90s. Back then, they told you to send them "your original model making instructions" instead of photos, so I had drawn up some sort of instructions on paper. I remember thinking that my submission was way better than most of the stuff they featured and used to dream about getting an 8460 Pneumatic Crane Truck through this, but I never won. Anyway, today I would get the big Agents command truck. It makes sense to get something as close to $100 as possible, without being over it.

It might be good to pin/sticky this thread again. I always like to see what other people are building.

This new differential looks similar to that old one they used until 1994. It would definitely be less useful than the usual one. Having gears (and standard, "flat" gears) on both ends allowed you to use them in a variety of other places apart from car axles, like putting them through the center of a turntable to give two independent geartrains on top of it. I like the small 3-length universal joint though. Among other things, it would let you make some types of drive/suspension assemblies (like the kind on 8458 and some of the Ferraris) quite a bit smaller.

These are pretty good, but I think they look too much like the standard town roads from that period. I like the black space plates from the early 90s better (6710).

I would much rather have the back walls there, as is currently the case. I always found the lack of rear walls on Lego buildings a bit annoying even when I was a kid and frequently added them on myself. You can have the best of both worlds though by simply putting the wall on a hinge, so you just swing it open whenever you want to play around inside.

Well, I'm fine with the overall war aspect of it, but it would be better if they sold the human and alien models separately (like they did with old space) instead of these battle scene-type sets. My main issue with MM is that most of the sets have lousy interiors and generally seem hollow and empty on the inside, having gaps and open spaces everywhere and a lot of non-brick based construction. Several models have cramped cockpits that don't allow the minifigs to sit properly and lack any sort of controls. Some of the alien ship designs are pretty impressive in terms of their overall shapes (they actually look alien), but they are even worse in this respect and have essentially no interiors at all. Even the minifigs are a little disappointing; maybe I'm old fashioned, but space guys without any sort of airtanks at all just seem weird to me. And the less said about the jelly aliens, the better. The small Mobile Mining Unit is a notable exception to all this and is the one MM set that I want to get, but that's the only one I can think of.

I seem to recall that he was already banned under a different name anyway. Back on topic, I'm mainly interested in City, Technic and Creator at this point. The 2008 Technic line seems to be a little disappointing so far, so hopefully we'll have better stuff next year. A new space line could also be interesting, but I never really got into Mars Mission; I really like the color schemes on both the alien and human ships and have picked up many of their parts off Bricklink, but most of the actual sets seemed lacking in substance and didn't really appeal to me.

If I exclude things that I already have, these would be my three: 6399 Airport Shuttle 6985 Cosmic Fleet Voyager 6931 FX Star Patroller On the other hand, if this is supposed to be a list of favorite sets, including stuff I have, then I would pick these instead: 8868 Airtech Claw Rig 6781 SP Striker 6990 Monorail Transport System

Glad you liked this review. I agree, I think BT1 as an overall theme is better (in terms of the color scheme and minifigs) but many of the BT2 sets are at least as good as their BT1 counterparts. The only major exceptions are the bases. I like this Aerial Intruder set much better than the BT1 Renegade.

I had to disassemble this set for parts and wanted to test my new camera on something, so it was a good chance to make one of these review threads. This model is the closest thing that Blacktron II had to a large flagship. I really like the overall look and shape of this set, even though it's a little lacking in interior room and minifig equipment. Top view. The radar dish on the top spins freely. The two cockpits pods are detachable, although you can't connect them together (like you can with the 6988 pods) without some modifications. Front view. There are two large lasers in the middle and I guess these things near the two cockpits are some sort of smaller miniguns. Back view. There is a BT2 jetpack stored here. Two small cars are stored under the big transparent panel. You can release two latches under the arrows and lift up the panel, which causes a ramp to come down and the cars to slide out automatically. Fun to see in action. The cars are balanced at an odd angle and the minifigs face downward if you put them in their standard sitting pose, although they can be tilted back up. I think they did this to make the whole slide out mechanism work properly. Night shot with a UV light.