xenologer

You thinking the instructions might already be on legos website cache someplace?

Well went to TRU today to find they do not have this set on shelf. And when I asked when it would come in, they indicated never. So either this is an online-only exclusive for TRU or not yet scheduled for instore for a long time or the person I asked doesnt know anything

Interplanetary Rover? Wouldnt the 'interplanetary' part of the name seem to indicate it somehow is able to drive from one planet to another? Strange... I wonder how they pull that off.

Well, I'm a younger afol, so my 200-Jet is actually the Blacktron2 Aeriel Intruder. Are they designed by the same guy btw? or is it just a tribute to the old one?

Cool I guess its just you donating your time? not an employee or contractor or paid in any way. Or even 'on the books' offiically, just an agreement with the specific store manager? Nice model, btw where did you find that Clear! Treasure Chest piece? I guess it must be a Space Pirate's Treasure...

Looking at that Inventory sheet. Does anyone know the peeron.com part number for what they label as 4494486? the grey technic slider cylinder (fake pneumatic) thing? I'd like to get some of those, but debating if the Hovercraft is really the best parts pack that has them... might be others with less giant-useless-hovercraft-base pieces included.

Ugh, I never did like the new style of Big Boxes Full of Mostly Air. Looks like they're proving to be trouble.

Some very impressive works this guy has. In one of his other folders, I thought this future/traditional japanese building was nice. http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?i=1230708 Mainly because it uses 90% simple bricks that can be found at Pick-a-Brick. Just cleverly combined to make interesting architecture. Inspiring really, makes me want to start thinking about heading off to PaB and seeing about building something large scale by virtue of just a few simple parts in bulk...

They're Cubes? X-O Doesnt that mess up a lot of SNOT dimensions? no more 2studs=5plates no more 1 stud brick sideways + the stud of the brick below it being as tall as another brick? I wonder how they build Anything with those bricks. lols :-D

Thanks for the info. *looks at inventory pics* I guess it'd be ok to buy it if you plan on always having at least one hovercraft (possibly mod a military one) on your shelf at all times... since I dont see what else that piece is ever going to be used for. Some interesting parts in there, Ive got my eye on the: 6 oldschool airplane landing gear (enough for 2 planes!) 2 large 3blade propellors (time to make an osprey-like aircraft?) the 2 technic slider pistons (whew, now i dont have to buy bionicles to get these) and the large train cockpit (Space Freighter!) but... I really should pass in favor of the nice stuff coming out in Summer. Already have bought all the good stuff released so far this year; so this hovercraft is only a purchase of last resort if I get really bored between now and then.

Neat. I havent bought any of the new bionicle sets, so I'm not familiar with their part inventories, but can these be made using only the pieces in the official models? The official sets havent been looking appealing to me... but if they can convert into something cute like this, while giving me a few spare technic parts to add to my bins... then it might be worthwhile.

Awesome. I just love the way you did the cockpit, great way to use that windshield piece. The sideways use of all those angled pieces to make the nose smoothly slope is nice. In fact, I'm going to have to try a similar method for my next Spaceship cockpit. It's almost a perfect match for this Privateer2 Ship that I always wanted to build but could never figure a good way to do the nose. About the only things that might make your design better are, that the grey technic pins holding the two halves of the body together dont totally fit, theres a gap. and a spinning tail rotor.

The Giant Wheels from here: Much better than those green 'motorcycle' wheels the prototype has. Would make it look more solid and armoured, like a tank instead of a ...whatever it is now...

A lot better than your last one; it is less obvious what the parts originally were. -no distracting shovel sticking out, ya know? One good drop and it looks like it'll shatter into a million minifig accessories though... Maybe if you had a solid technic based chassis under the greebs for strength, and had it extend to the landing gear and 'swoosh-bearing' structures? (on that note, How? do you pick it up for swoosing??)

The Robot Tank/Base thing... Would really look a lot better if they replaced the ugly bicycle wheels with the giant spacewheels from MegaCoreMagnetizer (remember those?) would make it look a lot more solid....

Actually, metal cutting against metal (sword vs mecha armor) probably is not very effective. If you ever cut metal with a hand saw... its very hard and deflects sharp force pretty well, this is why metal saws are designed with tiny teeth for slow grinding away of metal not actual slicing like a sword.... If you really want a close-range mecha weapon, I'd say mount a mini shaped explosive charge on your mecha's hands; grab hold and burn through opponent's armor. (some early anti-tank explosives worked this way, specially focused explosion flat against thick armor so it burns a hole all the way through)

Or at least send them comments/compliments/impressions. That would be cool now.. if the designers were well known enough in the community that they could hear what people want directly...

I *almost* considered the big green one as well, but not for the lime (too much of the lime is technic fairings) but because of the Giant Techinc Tyres on it. at 20$USD it is probably The cheapest way to get ahold of a set of those (aside from secondary market). I really doubt that the flames are a decal, because the ones on the technic fairings definetly are stickers(cant print on technic parts) thus as long as theres a sticker sheet, all other details are destined to be stickers too. But anyway, before buying it I always come to my senses and realize - why do I want to waste money on a pull-back-motor that I Wont use? I'd rather spend the 20$ and buy... two Creator set Cool Cars... or Mythical Creatures (for 10$ more you get Much much more green)

In approximate order of importance... Steering mechanisms on Rovers! Good old M-Tron and earlier era had awesome steering (without needing technic!) built into their vehicles. I want to see some clever mechanisms like that again. -on a side note, Im Definetly buying two of the Tricycle rover to re-make a classic SpacePolice Spy-Trak in white/orange civillian colors Replace gummi-bear candy aliens with ExoForce Drones colored green - good re-use of a nice mould. Remove the air pump stuff - im not using them anyway so all they do is drive the price up like crazy for no good reason. I'm gonna have to miss out on the base because it's too expensive per part once you throw away the airtubes(no, theres no chance of selling them on bricklink, they suck that much). :-( Actually, I'd keep the orange wheels, since thats a cool new color for them; and if you want grey ones, just buy an extra SW Clone Turbo Tank off ebay, all the ugly grey wheels you'd ever need! Replace the Bionicle drill pieces on the vehicles, with technic drills consisting of clever stacks of gears - see some of the Old AquaRaider's submarines for examples of this. Let them actually spin rather than just decorate. Get a New airtank for the astronauts, scuba tanks are kinda 'outdated' compared to current Real NASA designs.

Huh so they decided to do Alternate Models after all. How'd you find these? If I go through the building instructions section on the normal EF site these dont seem to show up. Well, theyre kinda ... bleh, so I'm not building them but the Robot's combiner brings up an interesting point, WHY didnt they just use a Claw Crusher style cage for Iron Condor's missing cockpit? it fits in there perfectly (like the combo model illustrates) P.S. the human combiner looks like a mechanized butterlfy, theres just too many colors...

I was just thinking, that with for example, Hotwheels diecast cars, more serious collectors know the designer's by name and can even recognize their products by the styles used. We don't really have that kind of thing here with Lego sets do we? Ever see two sets and say, 'those have to have been designed by the same guy'? It might be kinda cool to know who designs sets and their various styles and techniques (if any)..

Whoa! the MiniRobot main model has a waist that can twist? I did not see this at all from the box pictures. Very clever how they did it *looks at the instruction manual from newly purchaed robot pod* Ok, I thought this would be a lame robot statue but that is actually pretty cool how they designed it. Not just another copy of the same mini-robot frame from last year and the one before that... Thanks for the heads-up. ummh, well it would be nice if they could have given us some of those flat sideways hinges like last years white Robo Xpod then this guy could have some bendable elbows... missing elbows and knee joints, thats the big flaw I see here...

2006 had better 'big' mechas especially on the Robot side, they really feel massive with their big armour plates and enclosed cockpits compared to the new ones (open cockpit IronCondor) 2007 has better small mechas nice construction methods, they have more substance to them. 2007 has 'rarer' parts, for example oldschool jet engines on SkyGuardian (must have for the jets alone!) plus the oldschool half octagon windshield piece (Now I can build a blacktron SuperNova2 in civillian colors!) 2006 ... seems to have 'more' parts, now I might be wrong since I didnt check the part counts, but the big mecha's just feel more AlternateModel-able on a related note, one thing that Really Dissapoints me with 2007 is that they got rid of the Alternate Models. the 2006 alternates were awesome designs, and really added 'depth' to EF by expanding into secondary support vehicles; really gave you a motivation to buy more than one of each set! well, thats my observations, weigh them depending on what you're looking for...

On the Topic of Displays: How do the Displays at Lego Shops go? I know there are some definetly 'official' ones(official sets propped up to look nice), and they seem to get broken into Brick Grab-Bags when they're done. But every once in a while at the Lego Shop I'll see some that are apparently fan-made displays, for example Once I saw a cool mini-classic space diorama credited to 'Brick Stackers club' or something like that... Anyone know how those get in there? and who owns them? I mean... is it some activity where you can approach TLC, and they'll give you all the parts you need to produce a display for them?(sounds like it'd be a fun gig to get into... especially if they let you keep anything...) :-D

I quit going to that TLC Club Messageboard after about 2 weeks.... Try to post anything Intelligent or that doesn't say "OMG LEGO IS COOL!" and the mods Will delete it(actually it just wont show up, because All posts are filtered manually before anything is added). This post/approval lag also effectively prevents any conversations in threads, since the order they show up will be randomly interspaced with others that have been approved that day. It like they're Purposely keeping the boards dumb. My guess, because its simpler to keep things dumb and keep people from directly communicating than it is to be a responsible mod or deal with the parents of kids who might get upset by something someone says. *n* at any rate, the posts on that board are *probably* not a good representation of how the market feels about female minifigs.. And Yet! TLC uses it as their market reasearch