DrJB

Neat project ... but to me, it seems you're investing a LOT of money into an old computer. Some of the pictures suggest a very old motherboard, with Serial, LPT, and PS2 (mouse/keyboard) ports, and PCI bus, and I have not seen those in a very long time. One pic however shows USB 3.0 ports ... and that somehow doesn't seem to match the rest of the hardware.

I've tried many approaches and the most effective is to soak everything in hot water (not too hot) and ix with dissolved dishwasher liquid (or capsules). Make sure you stir the bucket every now and then to expose all sides of the parts. The detergent is very effective at literally eating up all the grime ... no wonder it's so effective against dishes. Warning - Do not use on parts with stickers, and/or painted parts.

Sounds like a spin 1/2 particle ... neat!, there are such lego parts ??? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spin-½

Few technical questions: 1. What's the compression ratio? 2. Does it have auto-clean function as well? 3. Does it work with other dog-breads?

Yes, good point. I was referring to most common applications. That video of the tractor going at 80 km/h seems to indicate the tractor has some fancy/active suspension. I drove some large Case IH tractors, and those tend to be 'bouncy' (large tires), add to that the ribs in the tires, and you get a lot of vertical vibration... especially on hard asphalt.

Thank you. Makes sense now. The last place I was expecting the power to come from is through the hood ... Live and Learn as they say.

I just saw a picture of this on a different thread and something seems odd about such vehicle. TLG used large/ribbed tires. Those I've never seen on trucks, they are typically used on off-highway machinery that moves relatively slowly, such as agricultural machines. Edit: It seems my post was 'copied' to a different thread. Neat, did not know you could do that..

Not to digress but ... I've never seen a large truck like that with large/ribbed tires. Those are typically reserved for off-highway, and used mostly on agricultural machines.

What do the black gears on the LA's actually do? Manual adjustment of the blade? Also, the 2x2 round bricks on top of the LA's look out-of-place The real machine has two exhaust tubes, the lego model only a fat/wider tube. Can you share such photo?

For sure it's an eyesore ... Not sure I like the yellow track elements. They could have done the whole thing in orange, which is more realistic of construction machinery.

That's NOT the real thing ... that's a die-cast model. Typically those are not as 'rigorous' as the original/real thing. Does anyone have a pic of the Lego rendition ?

This might be old ... I found this on youtube. For those interested in seeing what it looks like.

Not sure I understand your solution. In you very first post you wrote that you wanted some gears to NOT rotate ... Yet, in your solution, all gears are always meshing, and always rotate ???

I think the real issue/challenge is NOT the clutch ... but the gear itself. If gears are meshing, they'll all be spinning together no matter what. And, you cannot stop any gear with just a clutch. You need to replicate what they do in older machine-tools where a gear can slide on an axle (red 8-teeth) and acts as an idler to engage/disengage gears. In modern manual transmissions, gears are always engaged and gear selection is always accomplished by synchronisers/clutches ... In older transmissions however, it was a set of gears that slides on an axle, an enabled different gears to mesh. In fact older transmissions (still used on machine tools) are very fuel efficient because only the needed gears were engaged, not all of them.

Anyone has pictures yet ... or is it all wishes and speculations ?

Well, you're going to get many opinions about this one. Here are some other thoughts 1. Most construction machinery is yellow/orange. This is done to increase contrast and safety on job sites. 2. Most planes start white/metallic ... if you ignore the SR71 and other military aircrafts 3. TLG often introduces parts in new colors to boost sales - Call it a conspiracy theory, or better yet a 'tactic' to increase sales. 4. Over the years, TLG must introduce new colors, or else, what is the novelty (i.i. sales) between supercars from year to year? As to available colors palette. In the past this might have been more true as the colors had to be pre-mixed first. Nowadays, with modern injection machines, where one can program/request any color they want, I see such palette as no longer too relevant. Unless of course one considers the storage space and all the 'paperwork' required for introducing a part in a new color. My 0.02

Youtube is full of fantastic machinery for agriculture, construction, production plants ... Granted, most kids (and any adults) would not relate. How about some machine-tools ... lathe or milling machine? TLG is likely after machinery that most people can relate to, that is why cars are very popular. There are others though that are plain fascinating: Loom, Spirograph, and the like. Also, when it comes to off-road vehicles, it is often a delicate balance between functions and looks, and TLG has been leaning more towards looks. Another example: typical components/machinery inside a combine harvester: Header, feeder, rotor, sieve, auger. All of these are truly genius-grade mechanisms. Last one: there were books that show collections of mechanisms: non-circular gears, Geneva mechanisms, and the like. Again, not sure how much appeal those offer to the non mechanical engineer.

The two parts are in general equivalent, unless used to switch gears. If used as an in-line connectors for axles, then they both fulfill the same function. Also, my understanding is that the earlier versions of the truck came with chrome wheels, and later production batches came with gray. In fact, sometime back, the version with the chrome wheels/parts was more expensive than the gray version. If somehow the buyer replaced some parts, you also need to watch out for old gray vs. bluish gray.

Simply fascinating build. Thank you for sharing. I've been collecting Trans parts for a while, and now realize there are many more shapes I was not aware of.

One here has to be careful and make sure this 'perfectionist habit' does not 'translate' to their work/livelihood. I'm an engineer as well, and often (at least in the past) get bogged down by 'needing' to constantly improve my design/solutions ... but one needs to know when to stop. I'll tell you this, when we hire people, we look typically for 3 attributes: 1. That the engineer/candidate knows their stuff - If I'm hiring a DSP engineer, he better knows everything about the math behind Windows & FFT 2. That he gets along with people - Many engineers are introverts and love to sit at their desk and talk to their computer 3. That he delivers on his promises - Many new hires meet requirements 1 and 2, but fail miserably at 3 ... because precisely of the need for non-stop improvement. Yes, Lego is a hobby, but in the end, one must know when to stop and say the design is 'good enough' ... The software industry has understood this extremely well: Release the software as is, there will always be time for future versions and bug releases. Also, releasing software enables the company to sell it, and make money to pay for the engineers, so they can work on the fixes. A bit of a digression, just to say don't let this Lego 'obsession' leak into your real-life job.

That's truly what a hobby is (by definition) ... I've had many hobbies over the years, and they all have that in common. There is ALWAYS something to tweak, whether it's a lego suspension, a reef tank, or even a vegetable garden ... and now, it's Home Automation (HA). Of all the hobbies I've had, HA is the worst of all, so much learning/reading, so little doing, and always tweaking.

Which sandwich panel ... the one below?

Very nice pieces indeed. While these would definitely increase the building options, I'm not sure TLG can make such parts 'easily'. When building a cavity mold for such pieces, while the shape is 'easy' (relatively) to make ... de-molding seems like an unsurmountable challenge.

Bravo, you obviously did not waste any time. How about a submission to Lego Ideas ?

Don't forget the ZNAP system. Did not offer many options, but great for building large structures (a bit like Knex). I have several such sets, and they're a good 'distraction' from the conventional system/technic parts. In fact, some of the Znap parts can be used as lift-arms.