xenologer

Yep, One of my Major pet peeves with spaceships, is when the pilot is obviously sleeping on the job. :)

So I bought the A-Wing, its a really nice set, except for just a few things.... For once, it had an ugly stand instead of landing gear. And the pilot has to lie on his back to fit in the cockpit, it looks really uncomfortable... So I decided to move a few bricks around and fix it. These Mods require no extra bricks, so potentially any new A-Wing can be 'fixed' right out of the box. First, the landing gear I took the hinge from the 'trunk' beind the pilots seat and used them to have a retracable leg in the nose. The two cylinders were originally Inside the A-Wing body, and seemed to be supporting nothing, so I used them here instead. The Foot comes from the Mechanic's car thing. The cockpit This required major structural overhaul of the body, if you look closely you can see that even the laser cannons are slightly shifted from the original positions. Basically I pulled a plate out of the floor to get just enough ceiling room for the pilot to sit upright. This also meant he had more legroom so I could fit the extra unused joystick in there and give him decent controls. You'll notice that the seatback is what used to be the removable cargo box, it's being held up by what used to be the stand for the A-Wing.(not needed now that it has retracable landing gear) other details... the tail thing... is a little nicer, used a piece from the mechanics car, the black brick where the opening trunk hatch hinge used to be, is pulled from inside the A-Wing body. also note that the little car doesn't have a joint anymore, I used the floorplate from the A-Wing cockpit as a new base for it. The top tailfins on the A-Wing are changed too, I needed the bricks for use in other places..

The LEGO model has steerable front and rear pairs of wheels. Its turning circles are pretty wide. Looking at my Incredible Cross Sections book, it makes no mention of steering or mid-body pivot-points. BUT it does say that each wheel has three independently-geared sections. It seems logical and entirely plausible that it could use "tank" steering. IE to turn left, the left wheels will turn backwards and the right wheels forwards. The greater the speed on each flank of wheels, the smaller the turning circle. With three-sectioned wheels, control of turning would be amazing. Cool, I like my Lego vehicles to have steering as for the 'real' one, tank steering is what I meant when I said 'skid steer' the problem with it is that when you're long and narrow like that, trying to do tank/skid steering puts a lot of stress on the front and rearmost wheels, because as you rotate in place they are basically dragging sideways along the circle.

How does such a long tank make turns?.... skid steer seriously doesnt work when you're that long.... but I dont see a midbody hinge either...

I like how the bike is stuck in the tree, pretty clever.

Thanks for the inputs. Thats what I thought.... not popular cause its not pretty, and kinda fragile. I ask, because I recently used it in a MOC. I think I may have found one of the few cases where it is both Strong, and Aesthetic. other thread here

Bought the Dragon Pod 4337 yesterday, and one of my habits is to turn Xpods into fleets of mini ships. This is the Tortoise Class Light Tanker (might be a freighter... but the cockpit design makes me think a tanker, with no crew section aside from the head) I Really Love the 'ribs' on the sides of the cargo area. Two main engines, and two auxiliary ion drives (red) to help with the variable payload mass. The extremely limited pieces in the Xpod forced me to get really clever with the SNOT construction to get an interesting shape. I think I learned a new trick or two with this one... Lol, I was just going to name it Dragon, until someone pointed out that it looked like a turtle...

I think your heavy fighter would look a lot nicer if you used one of these: http://media.peeron.com/ldraw/images/39/30602.png for the cockpit window.

Its actually keetongu yellow. -l2k- ?keetongu yellow ? whats that I havent been a big bionicle fan lately... is it something between orange and yellow? well, in that case, unless its 15$ I definetly don't want it... I can get yellow from some nice Town Construction sets instead, they also have less Takeshi... Any word on the Price?

Hmmmh so he found it at a Lego Store but it is also apparently a TRU exlusive.... so It might be at my local TRU... tho yesterday I didn't see anything when I was checking on Batman... so I doubt it Well, looks like it comes with lots of yellow slopes, my favorite color... if it's 15$ like the other sets then sure I'll get it....

Its nice, but the large transparent 'window' pieces make it seem a lot smaller, almost makes me think of minifig scale. That fighter attached to the side at the rear looks good... have closer photos? Based on the description of all the smaller fighters it supports, are you sure this is a Frigate? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Ship_types enjoy!

A plate (flat 1/3 brick) can be mounted sideways, by fitting it between two studs. Is this a valid technique? or will it warp the bricks over time? I have never seen an official set do it, but it is rather common for new builders to do(airplane vertical tailfins for ex.). Rather uncommon for experienced builders though. I wonder why that is...

I notice on recent new sets, that official instructions are more often telling us to connect brick studs into technic axleholes. In all past official sets, this construction technique has been very rare; almost like it was an unwritten rule. In fact once I saw a website (a long time ago, lost it) that said that the technic axlehole is actually slightly smaller than a stud, so while you can make them fit, over time it causes plastic warping. I've actually had technic bricks where the holes did get wider over time and if you try putting a studded brick back into the same hole it is all loose since it warped, so for all my MOCs I try to avoid doing it now. But like I said... lots of new sets are doing it. Does anyone else know much about the issue?

Interesting the guy said he found them at the Lego Store when ExoForce got released I know that ToysRUs got the sets Before my nearby Lego Store, apparently TRU lego's cost an extra $ becauser they get them all early. I wonder if the Batman sets might already by at some TRUs by now then...

'Product Preview' is different from 'Product Release Date' Is there any word on when they are actually going to be in stores? thanks

I know exactly what you mean. Lately all of my MOCs have been 'alternate models' too. Where I build something using only pieces from just one set, and try to use up all of them if I can. I even keep the original boxes to store the unused pieces in. I guess part of the appeal is that if I make something really good it's a simple matter of buying another of that set to make duplicates... plus its easy for anyone else to get one too if I post instructions online... and color coordination becomes an easier issue I do make exceptions though... designer sets are nothing but parts collections, and Racers tend to be pretty useless by themselves so they go into the parts bin too Your Bin Truck: in the US we call them Garbage Trucks Its pretty good, the only thing I think you might change, is to have more open sides on the cabin, since they make frequent stops and the worker is always going in and out to load the back.

I'm Almost considering getting the Fuel Stop, if I hadn't already spent a lot on town sets. Has the computer screen and keyboard... usually don't see those except in the really big sets (Hospital or Police Station) While I really dislike Lego's new sticker habit, this is one place where it actually benefits... Just leave the stickers off the minifigs, and instead of a ferrari pit crew you get Red Space Ninjas! Tho I'll have to dig thru my parts bin to find visors for their helmets...

My guess: It costs too much to have someone pick out the bricks you want, count them, and package them. We can see this pattern with the Designer software, the original let you buy any combination of bricks you wanted. The new version limits you to specified brick palletes; essentially your brick selection is identical to the actual Designer Sets that you could just buy off the shelves in stores. You don't even get a printed copy of your instructions, all you're really buying is a custom box. Packing it is a lot easier tho, they just have to decide what bag of bricks to toss in there. So.... as nice as it would be, based on Lego's current development of Designer software, I don't think they would be interested in pursuing that idea.

I made a bunch of alternate models, each one using only pieces from a single of the official sets. Ok here we go: Sentry Speeder, a hoverbike vehicle based on the official Uplink Alt model, but built using Sentry instead http://mocpages.com/moc.php/13718 Thunder Hawk, a hovercar/hovertank based on the official FireVulture Alt model, but built using Thunder Fure instead http://mocpages.com/moc.php/13719 Vespids, hover gunships, based on the official Stealth Wasp vehicle, red one is made from Grand Titan pieces, white one from Stealth Hunter http://mocpages.com/moc.php/14226 and there was also Nova Wasp, my re-interpretation of Stealth Wasp, with a focus on stronger construction brickshelf is down right now so I cant look up the link at the moment...' Yep, I pretty much take mecha, and turn them into flying/hovering vehicles. Probably not what you were looking for.... you said mecha based.. I'd assume you were hoping they stay mecha afterwards...

The set numbers are supposed to follow a categorization scheme arent they? Does anyone here know the system?

the Jet wins although, it needs bigger engines ... or is the open tail area a big engine? the gun on top lights up right? humh... bulky cannon, maybe it can be remounted on the bottom?

found on the internet http://www.flickr.com/photos/eitheror/sets/1687654/show/

This is why I am OK with all the licences, with the exception of SW. The others are fun to have on the side of lego's themes, but StarWars goes and Replaces classic space; and cuts down on the diversity of themes.. This problem is especially aggravated by the fact that StarWars isn't really science fiction, if you look at the storyline its actually a fantasy/adventure just painted over with a space-like motif. *points at the Jedi fighting with glowing samurai swords* I also get tired of the 'grungy' technology and ship designs, and the backstory that takes itself too seriously. This is not to say that SW is bad, the first movie was actually very good (not so sure about JarJar), I just think the theme with its backstory and technology/design is a little too limiting to be completely Replacing classic space, theres no more sense of 'freestyle' play for me. Lets put it this way, don't you miss the happy smiling yellow spacemen with their shining rocketships?

The Hero Tank / Mobile Def Tank.... I dunno about that design what bugs me most is the 'hubcaps' on the caterpillar tracks, as far as I can tell from the photos, they're held on by a single technic pin through the middle of the track. Looks weak, like it'd easily fall of or rotate out of position during battles... Some kind of steering feature might be nice with those 'legged' tracks, they seem to be just click hinges tho. The rocket packs also bug me, does anyone know what they used for the curves on those? are they big and 'juniourized' single pieces? or do they separate for reusability (I hope) The cockpit design is nice at least. I guess it depends on the price they want, I might get it for the rare orange pieces if its cheap...

Well, I think we've seen photos of those sets already but these ones in particular are a lot bigger than the one's I previously saw Can really see some of the details this time. So it WINS for me. Is it just me, or does Striking Venom have knees that don't bend? and Hips that only swing up and down, but not forward and back? Nice to see that the blue mech in Sentai Headquarters is Not Stealth Hunter, or if it is, its on steriods; new canopy, missle racks, a hand....