Ralph_S

Now I see what you mean. I thought you mean the roof of the bus (which is yellow), but you mean the convertible's roof. Sorry, my mistake. Indeed, the city corner hasn't been inventoried yet on peeron, but bricklink does have it. I've trid a black on instead of the plate and tile contraption I have now and can't really decide what I like more. Cheers, Ralph

Wow. Thanks for all the comments. I appreciate it. My main inspiration for the pickup truck was the Ford F150, so you could see the dark blue plate as a Ford logo. I felt it was important to have some space between the cab and the bed, since on most pickup trucks they are separate. Thank you. The taxi indeed is supposed to look like the ones in Newy York, although many American cities have at least one yellow cab company. Thanks. The wheels that I am using may actually be a bit too small, but I simply can't stand the fact that in the LEGO sets cars, pickup trucks and commercial trucks all use the same size wheels, which makes the wheels on the trucks look a bit small (usually) and the wheels on the cars much too big. I've been trying very hard to make these cars look realistic despite being small enough to use them in a city layout with figures around them, so I'm really happy with your comment. It's been ages since I saw that picture, although oddly enough I remember them also using a red Dodge Ram pickup truck. That might be a fun build too. I think the new city bus would make a fairly good base for a European school bus. Here in the UK more and more of them are painted yellow and they typically aren't any different in shape or size to a normal bus. For me a classic American schoolbus has a different shape, though, and since I wanted it to recognisably be American, that's the shape I chose. I too am very picky when it comes to scale, so I checked the dimensions of a schoolbus before building mine. These are the dimensions I found for a large school bus Length: 40ft 33 studs Width: 8.5ft 7 studs Height: 11ft 9 studs My model possibly is one plate too high, but I think that is quite acceptable and otherwise it is spot on. Removing a plate would be very tricky because of the size of the windscreen and the SNOT work below it. I'm not sure which front you are referring to? Is it the sports car? The lights, the front bumper and the radiator are all mounted on a 2x2 and a 2x3 plate side by side. They're held onto the car using technic bricks and technic half pins. Very simple. I haven't tried using one of those curved parts. I have a fair few of those in black and in dark green (courtesy of an Emerald Knight set), but none in yellow. Actually, according to peeron they don't exist in yellow I'm no big fan of the wheels either, but they'll have to make do. On thing that LEGO tend to do with them that I don't like is allowing them to stick out of the sides of the cars -mainly on their smaller cars. It looks awful, which is part of the reason I use smaller ones on my sportcars and sedans. I can clearly see that over time building five-wides has become easier for you. Once you get the hang of it, it really isn't that hard. All it takes is lots of small plates as well as jumper plates Cheers, Ralph

I was there around Easter. I know they had some pretty basic stuff including red and black plate and bricks. There are a few things that I remember as standing out: plates and bricks in lime green (it's hard to get hold of that colour in large quantities) and minifig seats in various colours. Unfortunately it's all bloody expensive Cheers, Ralph

I normally wouldn't revive an older topic, but rather than starting a new one I've decided to add my latest vehicles here. I've continued building American vehicles. The latest four are an SUV, pickup truck, sportscar and school bus. (photos are links to flickr) Cheers, Ralph

Having a step from 6 to 7 wide indeed makes it look less like a single block of bricks. It would have been more of an issue for your truck than mine, because unlike you I could choose to make the aft body yellow rather than red. The odd-wide construction is very part-intensive. I am always running out of 1x3, 1x1 and jumper plates . Several other members of the Brickish Association have built copies of my five-wide cars recently and they were shocked at the number of jumper plates they require. I understand that the window would cause issues with the seating arrangement. On my truck I decided that the looks were more important than functionality, which means I can really only fit three figures in there. The reason why I built UK fire engines is because most of my buildings and vehicles were built to be part of collaborative builds with a British theme built together with members of the Brickish Association. Left to my own devices, I'd probably have gone for a Dutch truck. (Ik ben trouwens ook Nederlander ) Cheers, Ralph

Perhaps unsurprisingly I love fire engines. Brickshelf seems to be flooded with American models and although there's something to said for lots of chrome I do like the more utilitarian look of European fire fighting vehicles. Both of your models are very faithful reproductions of the full-scale vehicles and both of them wouldn't look out of place in a LEGO catalogue. I'm glad my fire engine helped inspire you to build these. I like that you've managed the half stud offset for the rear of the pumper truck. It's a lot of extra effort, but it makes a big difference in the overall look. I'm impressed that you managed to squeeze four fire fighters in the cab. You probably don't have the part and it may interfere with the seating arrangement, but I'd suggest using a 1x2x2 airplane window to add the window behind the driver. Nice SNOT work on the rear mudguard, by the way. The ladder truck is very nice too. I like the various little steps in particular. It's a shame there's no easy way to add the blue and white diagonal stripes that are so typical for Dutch fire fighting vehicles. I would love to build a Dutch truck. Cheers, Ralph

I agree it isn't brilliant, but you should realise that Lego didn't yet have grey bricks when that set was developed. I think the whole Discovery range of sets was very good, with the Lunar lander probably being the best in terms of accuracy and playability. It was available outside of the US through shop@home. I don't remember exactly how much I paid for it, but I bought one for half price from shop@home a few years ago during a sale and I recently bought a 2nd hand one in excellent condition for £30. Cheers, Ralph

Thanks guys. I'm not celebrating much, I'm afraid, but I certainly appreciate the sentiment. Cheers, Ralph

I'm seriously afraid of accidentally using a piece of megabloks in one of my MOCs Cheers, Ralph

Perhaps I am too old, but one contender for me would have to be the white Ferrari Testarossa driven by 'Sonny Crockett' in the TV series 'Miami Vice'. Cheers, Ralph

Thanks guys. I didn't have Independence Day in mind and I actually completed it a few weeks ago. Most of the minifig scale vehicles I've built so far were European, but since I am working on a larger project that involves some typical American scenes, these vehicles had to be American as well. For the copcar and the taxi it's mainly the colour scheme that makes them look American, for the trucks it's also the shape. Cheers, Ralph

It's been a while since I last built some minifig scale vehicles and while most of my previous models were British, for a new project that I'm working on, I've started building a few American vehicles. The first two are a Fire Department Ambulance and a reefer truck (based on a model built for LEGOLand shown in The Ultimate LEGO Book) The other two vehicles I've built are a taxi and a copcar based on a common design for a generic US four door sedan (think Ford Crown Victoria meets Chevrolet Impala) I'm certain to build a few more in the next weeks including an airport shuttle bus, a school bus, a stretched limo and a pickup truck. Cheers, Ralph

Very impressive little helicopter, especially the lattice work for the tail. I can't figure out how you've done that. The only obvious improvement I think of would be to replace the trans neon green bubble canopy with a similar item in transparent clear (it can be found in agents set 8969). Cheers, Ralph

Two occasions stand out: I had a person from Russia telling me that he felt I made a bigger effort when I build American jets and helicopters than when I build Russian ones. That seemed a bit odd to me, because I certainly am not conscious of doing so and I really like certain Russian aircraft and I think my Su-27 Flanker is one of my most attractive models. The other occasion was somebody from former Yugoslavia objecting to me writing that 'unfortunately an F-117 was shot down during Allied Force'. Anyway, the comments aren't all that important, but they do show that any sort of military stuff can be controversial. Thanks for your compliments. Cheers, Ralph

Nice truck. I would have looked at more pictures, but your link appears to not be working. Anyway, from what I see it does have the look of a 'sixties American pumper. I like the SNOT work on the front and the various bits of kit visible in the back. I wouldn't call the truck that comes with the set a 'joke'. Perhaps it suffers a bit from the constraint of having to fit inside the fire station, but I quite like it and it looks convincingly like a 'thirties pumper to me. I like the scale too. Cheers, Ralph

Thank you. I should obviously post more of them here! I have been building planes and helicopters for quite a while and by now have a collection of more than thirty. I think that this is one part of the market that for the time being will be dominated by the various clone brands. Megabloks in particular seem to have many military sets, albeit usually crappy. I can sort of understand why LEGO steer clear of contemporary military. They're a global company with a high profile marketing products for children and they don't want any sort of controversy. I'm just an individual builder and I've already had comments from various places in the world complaining about me building mainly American aircraft. Of course, with LEGO not producing them, I have found my own little niche. Cheers, Ralph

Thanks. Out of these two it's definitely my favourite. It has an oddball shape, but that was great fun to build. No worries. I'm not at all offended by you thinking that Mike's F-22 is mine. I wouldn't mind it being mine at all I have yet to see an F-22 fly, but it's been years since I last went to an airshow and they'll probably not be frequent visitors to Europe any time soon. From what I've read, the YF-23 was faster and more stealthy, but Lockheed the YF-22 was seen as further developed and closer to the production version and because of that as being less risky. The B-1 does have a pretty fat rear end, but overall it looks pretty sleek to me. Thanks. I wouldn't mind LEGO do more aircraft in the same vein as the Fokker tri-plane or the Sopwith Camel from a few years ago, but I suspect that any sort of jet is too contemporary.

Welcome to Eurobricks. I've just taken a look at your brickshelf folder. I really like your RV and your VW Beatle work-in-progress. I have a soft spot for Beetles. Cheers, Ralph

Thank you. I've always liked the Harrier, but until recently there were too many problems that I didn't know how to solve for me to attempt to build it. What made me do it now was discovering that the Sea Harrier has wings that are swept back at a much more convenient angle than the AV-8Bs that I'd always been looking at. I suspect you have me mistaken for someone else, in that I actually haven't built an F-22. There are a few Lego F-22 models that I quite like, but that don't have a number of features that I would like my model to have: such as the side weapons bays or a realistically retracting undercarriage. I've been planning to build one for ages, but haven't found solutions for some of these issues yet. I also haven't figured out what colours to use. Apart from the first EMD aircraft, Raptors all seem to be painted in three different shades of grey, with light grey on the leading edges, a slightly darker grey on most of the rest of the airframe and an even darker grey in a disruptive pattern on the upper surfaces. Making it light blueish grey overall would be to light, making it dark blueish grey would be too dark, and the contrast between the two is larger than the contrast between the various shades on the real jet. What has also kept me from building one is that I actually don't really like its looks. I know it's very capable and that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but to me it looks like an F-15 that has partially melted. IMO, the YF-23 looked much nicer and I'd love to build one. I did build a B-1 -my largest and in some ways most complicated MOC to date. I can understand that people who actually maintain the jets probably have a rather different view of the plane than enthusiasts such as myself. I just love the looks of it. It's a pretty big jet, but looks very much like a fighter. I hope to build another large bomber in the non-too-distant future. I've been collecting parts for it for ages and may finally have the time to start building it during my summer break. Thanks. they are distinctive-looking jets, but it's nice to know you think they are recognisable. I've always looked at using non-Lego parts as a compromise. If I feel I can make the canopy look at least as good using LEGO as I can when using my non-Lego solution, I'll obviously choose the purist solution. Cheers, Ralph

Yes. I use a lot of pictures and I normally also use a three-view drawing in order to get the proportions right. I couldn't build things like this without proper reference material and looking for it is part of the fun. Cheers, Ralph

Of course, for the moulds it shouldn't matter whether the part is old grey or new grey. In any case, the old ones are gone. The monorails were quite expensive. I know that 6690 -the "grand daddy" of them all- used to cost 345 Guilders way back in 87, making it the most expensive LEGO set to that date with a healthy margin. To put this in perspective, I was 12 years old at the time and I got 10 guilders in pocket money every week. Perhaps the high price was part of the problem. They could never produce them cheaply enough to make the price low enough for the set to be bought in decent numbers. I didn't buy mine for 345, but waited a while. My local toy shop ultimately sold me one for 200 Guilders, because they couldn't get rid of it otherwise. Cheers, Ralph

Excellent. The truck in front of it also looks pretty good by the way. I knew Pete (legoloverman) managed to go to a meeting in Moscow, but hadn't seen any pictures yet. Are all the buildings in this line-up yours? Cheers, Ralph

Thanks guys. I often use non-LEGO for the cockpit canopies. The one on the Harrier however, opens by sliding the aft part back. that means I had no frame to attach anything to and needed a more rigid solution. This is one case where a LEGO A-wing canopy actually does work -albeit not without a few stickers. I'm not sure whether these are any more detailed than any of my older models and they were built to a deadline (I still have one more plane to build). Nonetheless, I didn't want to compromise too much on their looks since they are for a public exhibit. Cheers, Ralph

I've always been told (not sure where the story originates, but it might be Jan Beyer from LEGO) that LEGO lost money on every single monorail set they sold. It was a very expensive system to produce and after set 6691 the molds for it were destroyed, so that nobody would ever get it into their heads to ever release another monorail set. Even if parts of this story are exaggerated, I'd be very surprised if there was going to be another one. Cheers, Ralph

On Saturday the 27th of June a few members of the Brickish association will be displaying LEGO models at the Museum of Science and Industry in Manchester. The museum is currently celebrating the centenary of the first all-British flight, and because of this my good friend Ed Diment (Lego Monster on flickr) suggested that the two of us build an aircraft for each decade. I had many other things to build, but have so far managed to complete two aircraft. A Sea Harrier representing the 'eighties A Eurofighter Typhoon, representing the first decade of the 21st century This shot shows the two of them together Pictures are links. I may have a reputation for building models of jets, but lately I have mainly been building helicopters and WW-II aircraft. The last time I actually built a jet before I started building these two is about 6 months ago and the last before that was in April 2008. I suspect I was actually getting a bit tired of building jets all the time, but this seemed like an excellent opportunity to have another go at it. Both of these jets have a quite distinctive look, which made them interesting to build. I'm quite happy with how they turned out and hope you'll like them to. If you're in the UK close to Manchester, you may want to drop in. Entrance to the museum is free! Cheers, Ralph