Sastrei

Cheers Lunabrick! Thanks for spreading the word. :) Gnac - I certainly don't want to offend the Eurobricks admins. Discord is just a chat channel similar to IRC, Trillian, Yahoo Messenger, etc. It does have voice functionality, but think of it more as a coffee bar that people stop by on their way to the theatre, with Eurobricks being the theatre in the analogy. It's browser based as well, so you don't need to download anything. Indeed, I can access Discord from work (for now) despite Eurobricks (and even LEGO.com :( ) being blocked, so it can be a fun place to burn time on a lunch break.

You'll need to recalculate the normals so that they are facing in the proper direction. Also make sure you don't have any coplanar faces or similar trash geometry as a result of the import process. How did you pull the LXF into 3DSMax in the first place? I wasn't aware a converter existed.

I take it you modeled the quadrant gear yourself? Neato! Did you use solidworks, dat editors, or something else? Also, will you be making that piece available for download?

Hi everyone! I was reminiscing about the old IRC days and created a LEGO chat channel on Discord. Voice chat is available, but it's primarily text. You can access chat straight from your browser via the link on the image, or download a standalone Discord app if so inclined. All themes welcome!

Yes, they've been hollowed out at least as much as the official pieces. Tested it out for a show. Held up to two days of constant running with no apparent issues!

Thanks solscud007 :) To 9v system, yes I wish they were only $10 too. :D I've added two new pieces of inventory to the shop, narrow gauge straight track. http://www.shapeways...Train Track&s=0 One is a regular narrow gauge straight (oddly, LEGO has never made one, just the curves and ramps), and the other is an adapter, so you can transition to regular 12V single rails, since they are cheaper. Given that they don't come in black though, I'll try to add those as another item in the future. I did test and confirm that the pieces mate together with official LEGO narrow gauge track. They lock together quite securely. -Stefan-

Polishing is probably what did it. It's mechanical polishing, so it abrades away the surface of the object, which screws up all the dimensions and tolerances. Only un-polished black and white are able to be selected for the parts I've got on Shapeways. :) Clutch power on the ends using deep studs (like those found on the monorail stanchions) is excellent, but clutch power against regular studs is good but not great. The tile recesses to lock the pieces together work very well though. I'm not sure why gray isn't one of Shapeways default material choices, but my only way to color match it currently uses a process for which the regular monorail straight is too large. I'll keep investigating! And yes, prices are higher than what I'd hoped, for exactly the reasons that coaster points out. :)

Thanks! They are on Shapeways, available in black or white. Sadly Shapeways doesn't offer gray as a default color choice for some reason, and the parts are too big for their color-matching service. http://www.shapeways.com/shops/pitr

Howdy all, Finally got some 3D-printed monorail working. Created a custom half-straight as well to fill the gap between the 10" and quarter-straight sections. -Stefan-

virtualrepublic - Does Modo have "baking" capabilities? And if so, is the fake bevel material you're using something that would show up in a bake to a lo-poly object? -Stefan-

Re: Space Police 5985 - The irony of the black cowcatcher first appearing in a space set still makes me giggle every time.

http://www.majhost.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=195599 Here's some replacement images for the 4.5v and 12v rails. -Stefan-

EsperNet is just another irc server. If you're unfamiliar with IRC, I'd recommend looking up the Wiki entry on it, as it could explain it better than I. It should also contain information on downloading a client such as Trillian (I recommend v0.75) and connecting to the server. -Stefan-

As Esper seems to be the defacto home for Lego IRC, already hosting a mecha and space channel, I thought it only fitting to create a trains channel as well. Connection info is: esper.net port 6667 #trains The channel is intended for casual discussion of lego trains and the real ones they're based off of, a place for ltc members to chat and "hang out" and for those without an ltc nearby to be able to talk to other trainheads. Discussion of town is also welcome, since the two themes go very much hand in hand. Hope to see you there soo! -Stefan-

Oops, I didn't see that Space was in a subforum of the subforum. :p If an admin could move this, I'd be appreciative. -Stefan-

A game modification for Homeworld 2, BrickSpace lets you fight as the Classic Space, Blacktron, or Ice Planet fleet. The Preview Release lets you select any of the three fleets and gives you a selection of ships to control. Enemy AI is currently not implemented, though they put up quite a fight when attacked! Make sure to check out Adrian Drake's Tribunal, a glimpse of what's to come in BrickSpace's future! http://www.brickspace.net/files/brickspace_two.zip -Stefan-

Being a fanatical space fan who's never owned a full C-S set, wasn't alive at the time, and a media whore, I thought I would chime in. This is one reason why CS is so beloved: http://flickr.com/photos/sastrei/119662252/ I only saw a few guns, which are ostensibly sensors, and where I saw thrusters, others saw guns. The ships were so wonderfully detailed and vague at the same time that you could use your imagination to fill in the rest. An A-wing has two guns and two engines, period (okay and a torpedo launcher or something). Nothing you do can change that, because then it's not an A-wing. But they never told you what C-S did or was in the first place. Another reason is that this was when space was big in people's mind. The Cold War, the Soviets, the Space Program, all of that is gone now, largely. There's nothing pushing people out into that great black void. And for me, it's the set design, pure and simple. Modular, colorful, (almost entirely) enclosed canopies, and a massive range of ship styles and designs. This even went on at least til Ice Planet 2002, though the number of C-S ships is easily two and three times the numbers of each other theme. Finally, I doubt and indeed know that no other theme would've inspired me to create my mod for Homeworld2. http://www.maj.com/gallery/sastrei/BrickSp...0_bs2_promo.jpg -Stefan-

Hi everyone, Just wanted to whor--I mean, share, my latest progress on BrickSpace, a mod for Homeworld 1 and 2. A whole long list of screens can be found here: http://sastrei.livejournal.com/ And the site is here: http://www.brickspace.net/ Comments, critiques, discussion encouraged! I'm always eager to hear what community members think! -Stefan-

I should've thought it'd be rather flagrantly obvious since the first pics that those were NOT the curved bricks. :p Though I did think they were the plane pieces at first. Yes, they are the escape pod pieces like they say, and there are walls on the ends, and they're hollow in the middle, for headroom. So the minifigs need to watch out for those "support beams." :D -Stefan-

Ooooooo...interesting. Thanks muchly! -Stefan-

Yes Yoda, I just want to know what the trans pieces are, the rest seems like basic or preexisting bricks, for the most part? Thanks! -Stefan-

Thanks for the help, but I was asking about the c-o-r-r-i-d-o-r. The large, transparent light blue chunks in this image. -Stefan-

What are the pieces making up the windows in the corridor to the airplane? -Stefan-

Just use rechargable batteries! Crybabies. :P I could be mistaken in my understanding of course. This sounds to me almost like a primitive DCC system. Shunting engines anyone? -Stefan-

You guys should read the article in Wired. http://wired.com/news/technology/0,69946-0...tory_page_prev2 Yes, it's incompatible with the old one, but this is because it's better! This is a completely new setup. Designed with the input of several AFOL's, including Hassenplug, who made the Connect-Four robot! and if you only have 3 ports, why would you need any more motors? You can accomplish all the rest with gearing. Yes, I'll admit, the styling is a bit funky, but it's starting to grow on me. I'm looking forward to grabbing one of these. -Stefan-