zephyr1934

Nice!

Alright alright (grin), I'll try to get something out this summer, though I'll probably do away with the dual mode so that I can make it a stronger build.

I think a train theme is important (but that's just me). If it were expanded so that every three years there were two city sets and one adult (creator expert) set, then I'd be less worried about what goes in the city sets. We need some gateway for AFOL's to this hobby. I think it is time for an 0-6-0 in one of the city sets, perhaps reviving 7710/7715 or 7727/7730 in an updated design. (sigh, that is so nice that when you see a set number starting with 77 you know a train is near)

Nooooooooooo! You have such great builds, rather than destroy a thing of beauty build new. (even if you have to ebay the old to buy parts). Okay okay, they are Lego which is meant to be rebuilt and there is another angle if the art is transitive, only improving with iterations. But that won't keep me from sniffling a little bit. It would be cool to see a picture of the old build to see the improvements that came with the expansion. At any rate, looking good and great job with the tricky slant on the front(?) of the cab

That has some neat building techniques in it. If you feel like revealing your secrets, I'd be interested in seeing how you got the snotted door to be able to slide.

You folks are way too kind, thank you again for such nice words. That is an interesting idea. Probably the only unexpected expensive part on the build are the red hinge tops and those can be easily switched to black. It also has the magnets, roller bearing wheels (which could be done with technic axles when drag isn't an issue) and the truck sides. The biggest constraint is time, but I'll let this marble roll around my head and perhaps I'll have time this summer to do it.

Thank you all for the kind words! It was a lucky stroke of inspiration, all sparked by the off-hand comment of a motorized bobber caboose.

I don't think the Santa Fe was a disaster, when the engine came out there were no cars and it was a limited edition with 10k individually numbered sets. Probably a cross between today's Bricklink exclusive sets and Ideas. Anyway, that's what sucked me into the hobby. Obviously I am not a typical customer, but I do remember saying to myself, "wow, that is cool. Good thing they don't make any cars or that could get expensive." Then six months later they introduced cars and I did say to myself, this is expensive but what the heck (my sense of "expensive" has since grown). The 10k limited run of the locomotive then turned into a non-limited edition. It was then followed up with a freight locomotive (BNSF) and a freight car (TTX). All of these incremental steps were branches that indicate it was successful up to the given point. The disaster was probably the hobby train. But that was at least partially Lego's fault. I had nothing to do with the program but I know a lot of the people who contributed to it. Lego resisted a lot of their requests and only gave them a very constrained pallet. The biggest issue being that they wanted a rare color but Lego only offered them a palette of red, white and black. While it did have a lot of great train parts (windows, doors, wheels, etc.), it was one of two sets that launched the next phase of Lego Factory + online Pick A Brick. So every rare element in the set was now available individually online, which was the first time you could do that (well, there were service packs that offered specific elements). So with no rare colors and all rare parts available individually, why would a bricklinker want to buy the set? While it did come with instructions for the crocodile, the rest of the builds were only available online, which created yet another barrier in the age before tablet computers, smart phones, etc. It was probably Lego's first experiment with purely electronic instructions, something they still haven't adopted as an exclusive option. So sales weren't great. Then the magnet thing happened. So a mediocre set with a bunch of magnets was canceled and blown out at 50% off.

Great crops and animals, the old fence gates are also a good touch

That ad is brilliant. If they could do something like the Harry Potter Express - a $90 push train - for one of the sub-themes that would be amazing. Especially if they release it on one of the intervening years on the 3 year cycle. I suppose they have done that a few times with trams already.

Indeed, there are many before/after comparisons for the Ideas sets that went into production. Some changed very little between submission and production, others saw huge changes. A big part is finding the "thing" and weaving the story. No matter what it is, Lego will throw its designers at anything that is accepted to proceed, and even then, it is not guaranteed to go all the way to a set. Anyways, it is almost impossible to get to 10k with any submission, there are just too many ideas and not enough votes. Then if you do get to 10k with a train, well, don't worry, you won't be selected. But if a 10k train ever does succeed, I won't be surprised if having a tie in to pop culture helps it across the finish line.

WooHoo!! "Winner: Bobber Caboose" I promise to devote all of the proceeds from my winnings to the Lego company

Thank you BMR for hosting this inspirational contest that brought out so many amazing ideas. It definitely pushed me in my building techniques. I do not envy the judges, how could anyone pick a single "best" model in any of those categories. I am grateful that my build was selected among all of the great builds. Congratulations to all who entered!

If such train sets were in addition to the city trains that could be neat (e.g., as part of the police theme rather than the train theme). If they incorporated a police/fire/hospital train car with good play value in a city train set that could be cool (much better than a helicopter car if you ask me). But I would cringe if one or both slots in the apparent 3 year cycle for city trains was an entire train (locomotive and all) being done up as a police, fire or hospital train. I can totally see how they would work well for an AFOL who is lego first trains second, but they would not work for someone who was trains first lego second, which is where I was when I got into the hobby. I was an adult when 4559 and 4560 were on the market and while I thought the train components were cool, as an adult the sets just did not look like something I would ever relate to. When 10020 came out I literally said, "now that looks like a real train" and bought one, then quickly bought a copy of 4560 to use as a parts pack. For AFOL's and "potential AFOL's" who are trains first lego second, I think that the more realistic the trains are the better and the city trains for the last 20 years have done a good job striking a balance between play value and "realism". There has been a fuel car, a cattle car, and some construction cars in the PF city trains. In 9v there have been auto transporters (including 4560) and mail cars. I bet we will see all of these come back again in the city theme.

That's a great layout that shows off all of the greatness that 12v is. Very impressive.

Is the build yours? If so, do you have more photos, e.g., on Flickr? That looks like a PennLug layout.

Just about any set lego makes will make money for lego. Lego is just optimizing to only make the combination of sets that will make the most money. Lego builders will buy any good set, but a subject with a large pre-existing fan base allows lego to grab a lot of new adults that would not otherwise buy lego for themselves (tv shows, architecture sets, stadiums, etc). Trains do have that possibility but I think Lego just wants to have one superstar train set at a time, and it is hard to find the single train that everyone will embrace. Trains are also tricky because the are best with a system (choose between cars, locomotives, a station, track geometry, etc.) and they have no desire to do that. The profit is in designing once and producing a million of one set. Every time they change the production line to a different set it is a huge cost, so it doesn't make sense to produce sets that would only sell well in the tens of thousands.

Children ALWAYS put things in their mouths, heck, I know adults who still chew on pens. As you've discovered, magnets do not taste great, so they are less likely to be deliberately swallowed, but one hiccup and down it goes. Swallowing a single magnet is probably safe, it is swallowing multiple magnets as noted above (and even then, if they stay together through the system you can get lucky). The very real hazard is when two loose magnets find each other between different twists of the intestine. High power magnets are a bigger risk, but it can happen with lower power magnets too. Here's a link discussing the event that triggered Lego to abandon magnets.

Really amazing build!

that's a great price, if you only wanted straights it would be 8 for $20 with the current track pack, and still comes to 16 for $20 if you valued curves and flex track equal to straight.

I can't find the information quickly, but at least at the time Lego seemed to be motivated by safety regardless of regulation- even without government regulations they did not want a headline that their product proved fatal. These days there are third party suppliers for the adult market though

How much did it come to per straight segment?

Good you found it, I futzed with the IR link years ago. There was no "pure" way to set and retain the speed level directly with IR and I THINK I was looking for a solution to reliably control two IR receivers in tandem. For me at least, the functional range was really short, like less than 1m so my ideas never got off the ground, but then SBrick solved the power problems I was having, and now the rollerbearing wheels have really solved the problem. At any rate, I had emailed the HiTechnic folks at the time and they said that the range was limited because the available power to the sensor ports is very small

I like that one better, but I don't see Lego doing that because that could still be swallowed

That is a massive and impressive layout. Definitely build in mini-goals to hit along the way (like completing an era, or even just completing a loop, or section, or tunnel)