Ralph_S

Thank you. Without all that little clutter, they did look terribly stark and grey plus I had a lot of fun building it. Thank you. Much appreciated. Thanks. Earlier modular buildings I made were a bit more colourful and it was easier to make them look attractive. The details on this took a bit of trial and error. I too look forward to seeing all of my buildings together with some sort of street scene, but it'll take a while. I've got a few more other things I'm working on at the moment. The netting indeed is supposed to be construction netting. It's a bit course-grained, but hopefully gives the right impression. The scaffolding would probably look better if the poles were thinner. I tried something with rods and clips, but couldn't make it work (too complicated, too flimsy, not enough parts). Anyway, the British tend to take their health and safety seriously, so having scaffolding that looks as though it can weather an earthquake probably scores points somewhere [wink] I do like Cafe corner and the other modular buildings, but their detail is a bit overly elaborate for them to pass as British buildings. I'm glad you like the somewhat barer look of my buildings. Feel free to copy any interior detail you like. Cheers, Ralph

Thank you. The style of the buildings that inspired these tends to be fairly straight and simple, with few decorative details other than the area around the front door. I wasn't sure whether it would look attractive when built in LEGO, but judging from your reaction it worked. Thanks. I've got two 32 wide buildings, two 16 wide ones and now these two. I've also got a small park. Since I built the other biuldings in the Uk and moved to The Netherlands since, they're still stuck in a box somewhere. There are a few more things that I want to build before putting all of it together and taking photographs. I want to build a road to go in front of all of it and a railway viaduct to go behind it. Without the fencework or the flowers the buildings would have looked really stern. Thank you. I am a big fan of LEGO's own modular buildings, but for a British look i think they're often a bit too elaborately detailed. I like to keep things abit simpler. Indeed. I didn't think of adding a fence, but it's obviously quite easily done. The scaffolding looks a bit too beefy perhaps, but i enjoyed builing it probably at least as much as building the interior on the other house. I have completely run out of grey 1x1 round bricks though! I agree that the smaller version looks much more friendly. The interior was a bit tricky and it does look a wee bit cramped here and there. These building are just about large enough to do the interiors some justice. Still, I wish I'd found enough space for a downstairs toilet! Thank you. The nets are really a bit course-grained, but I too liked the look. I felt I needed to add a few splashes of colour here and there on the outside to break up the greyness. I'm glad you appreciate them. Edit: while I was writing my posts, two more posts were added! Thank. I too tried fitting an interior in cafe corner. I couldn't quite make it work. A cafe/bar type thing downstairs was fine, but hotel rooms upstairs were a nightmare. I gave up. Thank you for the blog. I am glad you like it. Thanks for all the comments. They are much appreciated. Cheers, Ralph

About two years ago I built my first cafe corner compatible building, a traditional English curry house. Since then I've been gradually adding more British buildings to my collection. Last week I built two new ones. They are Georgian twon houses inspired by buildings in London. Because these houses tend to be built in rows side-by-side I felt I ought to build at least two. I decided to make each 24 studs wide rather than 16 (too narrow) or 32 (way too many parts required), so that together they are 48 and still meet the modular building standard. Because two of the same buildings are dull, I decided to have one look as though it is under renovation -hence the scaffolding. The other building has a detailed interior with a living room, kitchen, bathroom, an office and two bedrooms. Because the floors are modular too, I can easily remove one and make the building look more suitable for a village than a city. Both of these, my existing cafe corner compatible MOCs and some other bits and bobs that I still need to build will ultimately make up a London street scene, but for now that's still a long way off. Cheers, Ralph

In terms of scale I think this fits pretty well with LEGO's current range of city trucks. Building bit out to width of seven or even eight studs wide does have one drawback: it makes the wheels look too small. I'm no stranger to building trucks of this size myself and I've found that slightly larger tyres look better. Check out my wrecker truck , for instance. It's got a five wide cab, a 7-wide sleeper cab and a 7-wide aft body. Of course it does mean that you no longer use the type of mudguards you've used on your model, because they really are a bit too small, but I think bigger wheels look better. Regardless of what wheels you use, I think the aft chassis beams between the wheels would look better if they were raised a bit higher. Overall I think it's a nice truck, though, and the colour scheme is classic. Especially in the top picture it looks like a fairly modern American truck and looks very tough. Cheers, Ralph

You've really managed to capture the look of these but you've still kept it relatively compact. Nicely done. Cheers, Ralph

I too buy some specialised parts from bricklink, but sets are still a good source for parts and if I can get good ones at a decent price, then I will. 6753 is an excellent set if you want to get into some vehicle building. I bought one a few weeks ago and suspect there are very few parts in there that I won't be able to use for something in the future. Cheers, Ralph

Welcome to Eurobricks. How you decide on what you build and how to get started probably depends very much on what sort of thing you are looking for. I tend to see LEGO as a model building tool. Most of my inspiration comes from stuff I read about in books, see on TV or in real life (think buildings, vehicles, aircraft) and I always have a long list of things that I'd like to have a go at in my mind. That means I usually know exactly what I'm going to build whenever I sit down with some bricks. I know that there are a lot of sci-fi /space / steampunk (and whatever other sort of fantasy-like genre)-builders out there who take a completely different approach, sitting down with some random parts, putting them together to get something 'interesting' and decide what it's going to be as they go along. Creator sets are fantastic sources of the sorts of parts I use a lot of and the price per part is generally reasonably low -especially compared to sets in licensed themes (Star Wars or Indiana Jones, for instance). What makes a good source for the parts you need will probably depend on what it is that you want to build. If space ships are your thing, Star Wars might be the way to go. I don't design MOCs on a computer. I tend to have a general idea in my mind of how I want to do certain things when I start building and might make a few small sketches on paper. I'd rather build with actual bricks. Cheers, Ralph

Thanks. I have no intention of building a station for it, but it seemed a shame to build a train this big, with enough space for working bits, and not add working doors. Thanks. I haven't got any plans for any at the moment. I've been telling people that I was never going to build trains for years and yet I did, so this time I'll not say never again Thank you. Very flattering comments. Unfortunately the radius of LEGO rails precludes having this model running on an actual layout. I suspect that the reason why most people who do build larger layouts stick to smaller six-wide models. I did see the train tech contest but simply didn't have the time to build this sooner. I was too busy finishing things for the Great Western LEGO show. Thanks. The various bits of equipment under the train and the front were the parts that I enjoyed building the most, so I am glad you like those. Cheers, Ralph

I'm not really into trains and haven't built any in decades. However, for a while I have had the intention of adding a few more bits to my English High Street. I want to turn it into a scene reminiscent of London and part of that will be a railway track running along the back of the buildings (preferably on top of Victorian arches). I know that if you get a bunch of LEGO train builders together and get them talking about which width is better, you'll have a long discussion on your hands. I chose eight-wide. This obviously means I ended up with a train that is much too long to go around on LEGO's normal curved train tracks, but I was going for looks here and have no intention of ever running it on any sort of layout. The train in question is a British class 158 Diesel Multiple Unit in the colour scheme of Southwest Trains (the train company that operates in the part of the UK where I used to live). I didn't want it to be too long, so I looked for a train with just two carriages, and I wanted a colourful livery. This fit the bill. I hope you'll enjoy my little excursion into this theme. It was a fun build, although I already got a bit bored by the time I started building the second carriage . Cheers, Ralph

Thanks guys. I briefly considered using a one-piece LEGO boat hull for this, but the ones I've got didn't seem to have the right shape for a sailing yacht. Building aircraft proved to be a useful exercise for this sort of thing. A few weeks ago I also built a cabin cruiser using a similar technique for the bow Cheers, Ralph

I love the cars from the Ultimate LEGO book. They were a large source of inspiration for many of mine. I know your Impala sedan and the Bel Air from your brickshelf folder and am glad you hung on to them. They are very nice models. By turning it into a convertible you've only made it nicer. The interior is very nicely done and the tiger pattern gives it just the right amount of cheeziness [wink]. I do have a suggestion: since the sides of the passenger compartment are two studs thick you have some space to add interior panels on the doors as well. That would probably look nicer than seeing just red. Cheers, Ralph

My current photo set-up is no good, certainly not with the weather being as muggy as it was when I took these. I couldn't wait for better conditions though, because this will be going to The Great Western LEGO show in the UK later this week. I'm flying tonight. I hope to take better pictures there when it's part of a layout. Should give a nicer backdrop than my desk and window. Thanks. Having rolled up sail seemed the only option short of getting out some cloth and scissors! Thanks. It's a shame the ship itself looks a bit dark though. Thanks for blogging it. Much appreciated. Thank you. Who could ever have guessed that one of my MOCs would end up on the classic pirates website? Not me. I suppose the crew of this vessel could serve as the hapless victims to a bunch of pirates. Cheers, Ralph

Thanks guys. The shape of the hull came together very quickly. I actually spent an hour or two in a marina a few weeks ago to get a closer look at yachts and I already had a rough idea of what I wanted in mind before I started building. The things that took most time were incorporating the railing and tying all the strings. That was no fun at all. The only sail parts I have are green from the creator dragon set from a few years ago. I didn't fancy that look. I intend to buy a Grand Carousel pretty soon (hopefully at STEAM next weekend) and the white cloth parts in that may be useful as sails. I'll see what I do. Many of my models do have interiors, but this one doesn't, since it would be practically impossible to see. It does have a door through which you could see a small part of it, I suppose, but seeing the rest would require removing all the rigging. Cheers, Ralph

Believe it or not, opening the curtains made the boat look even darker :-(

In the last two months I've built several models with a nautical theme, such as a flying boat, a Coast guard helicopter and a Coast Guard rescue boat. Time for one more. I decided to build a sailing yacht. I don't remember ever building one before, but apart from adding all the rigging it was a fun little build. I hope you'll agree. Cheers, Ralph

Welcome to Eurobricks, Duq. It's a really nice rendition of an Amsterdam tram, but the highlight for me has to be that pantograph. That's just awesome. Cheers, Ralph

You paint a very bleak picture. The moodiness of it all is wonderfully captured and the idea to base a MOC no a song in inspired. Cheers, Ralph

I have the nagging suspicion that my airport shuttle van may have served as inspiration for that idea - not that I mind. Cheers, Ralph

This is just the sort of model I like. The combination of a five-wide front (excluding the mudguards, of course) and a six-wide camper body looks really good. It is as though the camper is based on an existing van chassis and cab, as is the case with many real campers. Although I've used similar door mechanisms myself (on my minifig scale coach) it is not an ideal solution. It probably does work a lot better than your first one, though. It's only a shame that LEGO don't make windows that are five studs wide. Do you intend to make a real-life version of it? Cheers, Ralph

Thank you. I've really enjoyed minifig scale stuff, which for me end up being 5-7 studs wide, but this larger scale still has my preference. Certainly the smaller cars like the BMW wouldn't really be doable on a scale much smaller than this. I will keep posting! Cheers, Ralph

Perhaps there would be a market for a set like that, but I have my doubts. I and most other AFOLs about which I know how they go about building city buildings tend to buy sets such as creator houses for the relatively cheap bricks and get minifigs, minifig accessories and other special parts from city sets, modular building sets and bricklink. I liked the buildings in town plan, for instance, but they wouldn't fit in any sort of city that I'd ever build. It's full of fantastic stuff for making buildings that are more to my taste, however. If people moan about 'yet another fire station' it's probably because they like LEGO's designs so much that they'd love to see LEGO do something else for a change. Of course, until the release of yet another fire station (set 10197, which I rather happen to like) that's exactly what LEGO was doing with the modular building sets. Cheers, Ralph

Thanks. I'm way ahead of you: http://www.eurobricks.com/forum/index.php?...l=fdny&st=0 Cheers, Ralph

Thank you. I think you can count on me to keep building. I love the things you do too, by the way. You're welcome. The windows are definitely an acquired taste. I'd rather have these than no windows or non-LEGO windows. There are some cars where I could easily leave them out. However, cars from the 'fifties tend to have panoramic windows and look odd without them. Take a look at these two for instance. Having one car with brick or plate-built windows and another one without them sitting side-by-side doesn't look right. I did consider making the windscreen on the BWM using trans clear panels instead. Many of my vehicles end up needing windscreens that are an odd number of studs wide, but the BMW is an exception. However, the thicker edges of the panels interfered with the opening hood. Compromises, compromises! The fire engine probably isn't quite as big as you imagine it to be. It's about 90 studs long. It's a lot easier to fit on a shelve than some of my airplanes! I'm not sure whether I could actually squeeze technic figures inside (probably not -not enough legroom), but they do seem to be more-or-less the right height. The truck does have a number of working features, including opening doors. The ladder can be extended. I didn't take any new pictures of that, but I do have an older one (from before the latest update) (I hope the picture isn't too big) Cheers, Ralph

As some of you may know I have lived in England for a few years. When I moved, I left most of my LEGO collection behind in The Netherlands (a good excuse to buy new stuff!). I've recently moved back to The Netherlands and have been reunited with all of my old stuff, including a lot of my older models. I still like many of them, but compared to my newer models some of them look a bit dated. Over the years I've picked up new tricks and new parts and I've been itching to have a go at upgrading some of my favourites. Since none of the original models have ever been shown on Eurobricks, I decided to showcase the upgraded ones here now. For a long time I've had a soft spot for fire engines, American ones in particular, and about four years ago I built a large tiller truck as used by the Los Angeles Fire Department (also inspired by the FDNY tiller truck in 'The Ultimate LEGO book'). I was very happy with how it turned out. However, as I did with many vehicles at the time, I used non-LEGO plastic to add windows. Lately I've been using more and more trans clear LEGO to do the same on my newer models, so replacing the windows was a priority. I was lucky to get my hands on a few unblemished trans clear macaroni bricks and they were exactly the part I needed. Older pictures are on brickshelf The windows are the most obvious change, I suppose, but there are all kinds of little things I fiddled around with. I filled in a lot of little gaps in the construction of the ladder, replaced the windows in the cab for the tiller driver and changed a lot of other details. Replacing the windows was also a priority on two more older models I updated: a Ford F150 pick-up truck and a BMW M-Roadster (the sportier version of the BMW Z3). I built the Ford back in the UK a few years ago. The BMW was built when I was back in The Netherlands for Christmas. Older pictures of these are on brickshelf as well: BMW, Ford In addition to the windows, I fiddled around with small details and replaced the home-made stickers I used for the license plates with LEGO parts. I also replaced the wheels on both. All in all, much nicer IMO. I hope you agree. Cheers, Ralph

There are some really nice ones. I found these two, both by the same builder, on brickshelf. (since these aren't mine, I can't rescale the pictures I'm afraid) Of course, they're still aircraft, but they look really good. They make me want to have a go at building something similar I quite liked the big airliner apart from the truly terrible landing gear. I bought one at a discount last year and was pleasantly surprised. Even though it does use a lot of very large pieces that I can only see as being useful for building another quite similar plane, it was far better than I thought it would be. As my two examples show, it is possible to use them as the basis for some pretty exciting MOCs. Cheers, Ralph