peterab

At the risk of taking an unpopular opinion, I'd partialy agree with this. Some sets are amazing, for me city corner and wind turbine transport are good examples. Others such as the current garage with the orange tow truck and the recent coast guard and construction series tend to have faults which make them unappealing to me. I think partially what irks me with them is that the colour scemes are all the same for a theme. I guess its for marketing reasons, to try and get people to collect the whole set. I think the individual sets have good designs to a greater or lesser extent depending on the set, but are overwhelmed by the single colour scheme. My nostalgia is set off by the 70's legoland sets, but given that was before minifigs, I can understand that most will not share that. I'm now fully committed to build modern style stuff, a bit of a mix of current city vehicles, modular style buildings, using techniques like the official sets and aspiring to copy examples like Hinkley's, and trains like some of the German train builders and the guys on Flickr.

In the articles for upgrading 12V and 4.5V motors I've read, the hard part is removing the gears from the original and putting them on the new motor without damaging the gears. Finding new motors isn't really that hard if you go to the motor suppliers, though ones with a shaft that extends through both ends are rarer. Finding them at retail is much harder.

Your list is correct for one train, to get two trains to move independantly at the same time, you need all of that again (since you seem to be comparing with buying multiple rechargable PF batteries). If you buy two 9V train sets you will almost certainly need to buy at least a few more straight tracks, which are getting rare and expensive, so one oval can go around the other.

Yeah, that does look ugly, but is in principal the cheap way of doing things. Others have hidden the large battery box inside a carriage such as this (it also has motors and an IR receiver in it but you get the idea).

I think the nicer 9V trains are more expensive, such as 4563 or 4564, which I feel is sort of equivalent to the current cargo train, and I hope the new trains. Added to that you will probably only get the 9V second hand for a reasonable price, whereas RC or PF will be new. I guess the less expensive ones are also the ones most people consider to be the less desireable ones. The Emerald Night complete kit is expensive, but if you use just the XL motor and the normal PF battery box (not the rechargable one) it can be made to run quite cheaply, add the remote control and IR receiver for extra control. Whichever system you choose you will be able to use the unpowered trains like 10133 if you want. 9V, PF and RC, and it looks like the new trains all have a bogie style motor you could fit. I'm not going to try to guess what the price of the new trains will be. If you want to make a real comparison you'll have to wait, though if you feel the 9V is the way to go, I'd buy now and don't wait, as its unlikely to get any cheaper by waiting.

The new trains will also only have two trains, probably for the next few years at least. 9V is expensive, and will probably only get worse, as there seems to be an active collectors market for them. The RC trains although they use different technology than the new trains, are very similar, in that they both use batteries and an IR remote. They also run on the same track. I have 4.5V, 12V, 9V, RC and PF trains, but I have very little 9V because they were supersceded when I got back into LEGO. I dont regret buying the RC train I have because its a nice train, and the fact that it has different electronics wont stop it from being used with the new trains. I also look forward to the new trains. If I remember correctly you want to buy the train for your son. I dont think there is a clear best solution, so the answer depends more on you than on what's available. I'm sure your son will enjoy whatever you choose, as all the available trains are OK. I'd probably wait for the new trains, but if your son wants one right now then the RC trains are also good, and wont be useless once the new system comes in, in fact having a mix of both RC and PF will allow more trains to be run at the same time. If you really like the 9V trains, they are also very popular but are a dead end so you should only buy them if you are happy with the extra expense and greater difficulty in expanding them.

You've clearly drawn inspiration in the past from official sets, but I think you've limited yourself because it's too easy if you have similar parts to just recreate or recolour an official set. Gambort has in other places said he dislikes the 9V train door because they don't look like real trains, I'm coming to understand why, because once you abandon the obvious choice, you find better if more difficult brick built solutions. My suggestion is to have a look at some of the 4.5V trains such as this one. The idea being I'm pretty sure you wont have a lot of the 4.5V era parts which may force you to novel solutions to recreate the basic look and shapes, and the models are simple so I'm sure you wont hesitate to improve them.

I don't think the dark green windows and awnings are available, other than this set, I'm also not sure about the Prince of Persia arches. It might be possible if you used other colours, and exchanged a few parts, but it's hardly worthwhile. The price per part for modular buildings has been pretty low, so actually buying the sets is about the cheapest way to get it.

My girlfriend suggested Hops, and those green awnings might make some nice copper brew kettles ...Hmmm Because the modular buildings are so popular, you see them on almost all Lego train club layouts. It's nice to add a little individuality even if it's a simple mod. Just like your mods of the repair truck, it's nice to see what you end up with, and what others have done. Besides not all of us are up to building something of this standard from scratch but we may be able to change the interior.

I made an order from US S@H which was shipped in three parts, PAB, Two modulars and some other stuff. When they first arrived I reaslised I had a problem as I was on the individual package deal, but it was held initially waiting for customs paperwork, so I was able to swap to a virtual mailbox to consolidate. They had a $10 per month virtual mailbox option, which you can change to/from a per package account easily a month at a time, which works for infrequent customers. Once you have a virtual mailbox, it costs 2$ per consolidation, a special request (ie open all the lego boxes, and put the bags into standard size boxes) would be more expensive, but also save a lot more in shipping. I might be wrong but I think the speacial requests were somewhere between $6 and $10, I didn't bother because before Xmas they were swamped, and suggested special requests might be delayed. Once you sign up and have a go, the process becomes much clearer, I had no trouble finding the options I wanted from the control panel you get when you log in. I also found that although they charge a fee on everything you ask them to do, they were reasonable, and tried to make it clear which was the most cost effective way/order of doing things. Their fees were a small percentage of the cost, most of which was shipping, and given they have access to lower bulk shipping rates than a lot of places since they do so much, I think they are a pretty good deal all up. (I've just realised this sounds like an ad, so I should add apart from using them once I have no affiliation)

Yep, since the Fire Brigade it has been cheaper to buy in the US and have it shipped here. Either get a remailer address, or make a freind in the US :-)

The problem is, the size of the set boxes for the Modular buildings is too big for the air freight standards, so it won't really matter where you order it as far as shipito shipping costs go. Shipito will fairly cheaply repack, so as long as you dont collect the set boxes you can significantly reduce the shipping to Australia. Well, in one way you're correct, however by having boxes larger than needed to hold the content, you could argue the marketing of the product is misleading, and that to gain that marketing advantage they are willing to increase the cost to all consumers in shipping, not to mention the environmental cost. I'm not sure about your box strength argument, but my physics training would lead me to believe that, all other things being equal, a smaller box of similar materials will be stronger. About the only argument I can see for a larger box, is there are a range of sizes, which are spcially chosen to stack well together, thus making shipping cheaper, and sets are packed in the smallest that will hold the content, from the available sizes. Given that almost all lego sets have a lot of space in them, I'm not sure thast this argument holds, unless the ammount of free space is deliberate for some reason I can't understand. I'd be happy if the larger boxes were at least more square, or less long, that tends to be what makes shipping them cost more rather than the volume itself. For example the modulars coul be half as long and twice the width.

When you see them sitting side by side it's hard not to feel Svelte has some spooky weird psychic powers, but I thought that ever since reading along with the Train Murder Mystery. I felt for sure the pony would be eaten after Schmelt predicted it.

Motorised or just moving? I'm not sure I like the idea of motorised parts upsetting the currently awesome price per part.

I already like this set enough to know I'll buy it, probably two if the price per piece makes it attractive. I'm surprised that some people find the facade a little bland, to me it seems to have typical classical restraint, which goes well with its slightly Victorian feel. I guess people were expecting Jugenstil (hope I got the spelling somewhere correct), or Art Deco. I'm also pleased by the number of minifigs, especially since some appear to be the newer print city ones. I too like the window washer, and will probably mod the SHOP sign and the billboard. Even if this set doesn't have the wow factor of the sand green GG, I think the colour selection makes it a much better colection of pieces, after all the reason the tan and light grey Creator house was so popular is because these colours have a lot of realistic applications.

Follow theLink to the Brickventures site, select the News tab, then the Registration link. Or just turn up on the Sunday, and pay at the door to just view the display.

As long as you dont want the original green grocer boxes, you should be ok, the lego boxes are much bigger than the need to be. If you want to keep the boxes, you will probably be out of luck.

I voted for the old track, simply because it is more useful in Mocs such as turntables. Both have their advantages though so I'm not really fussed either way and use both.

There is so much good sense here, thank you for posting it. Further to your idea's, Jamie Berard said in his interview with Cpt Zuloo, that one of the choices they made when designing the Emerald Night was how many carriages to include. He asked if AFOL's would be more likely to buy the set if it were more expensive but had more carriages. I think each of us answering that question could influence any future AFOL trains. Currently I own two Emerald Nights, and have purchased an additional twenty tan windows. So I can safely say, had EN come with three extra carriages at double the cost, I would be no worse off financially, and it would have been easier to purchase. I'm sure I would have bought it.

These wheels look great and are a welcome addition. Oh my, I also seem to have bought some BBB wheels which may now have to be repurposed for another engine. Once I've finished my BR50 (it is still progressing, just not very fast) I plan to build a BR01 or BR03 since they are so similar (at least the boiler size, cab and tender). These extra large drivers will be perfect.

Toy story, 2010 Star Wars, and some of the brick boxes are turning up in Melbourne stores. All the above have been seen at Northland Target & TRU.

Yes, trains are not a huge priority for Lego as they are not hugely profitable. In many markets they are only regularly available through S@H, since retailers seem only stock them immediately after release if at all. Since the trains have a three to four year life span, about three quaters of the time in Australia, we simply cannot get trains at retail. Edited to add: It may vary from market to market a little, however TLG only really recognises two markets; the US and everywhere else. Since Europe and Australia have an August release the only likely exception may be the US.

I've never had the sort of trouble that would require sending a set back, but I once had a missing piece in a MISB set I bought from bricklink. TLG doesn't care where you bought it, they just ask what was missing and send it out to you.

I've used shipito once for a couple of modular firesrtations, and as others have pointed out TLG's larger set box sizes are a problem. I would highly recommend you get shipito to remove the Lego box, which they will do for a small fee. The shipping to Australia for two firestations in their original boxes was US$178 because the box size meant it could only be shipped via Fedex. I found shipito easy to use and it worked well. More frequent users on an other forum (whirlpool an Aussie telecoms forum), have compared their shipping prices and they come out pretty favourably. Be aware that TLG will charge state taxes on your order because Shipito is in a state (California) where TLG have a retail store. Also the poster above who claims shipito is expensive, may also be lying so make sure before using them. There seems to be a lot of astroturfing going on in this industry, by which I mean people trying to appear to be grass roots users of a product actually being fakes, ie paid employees of the company they are promoting.

No I've seen that thought expressed a few times, but it all hinges on the price, which at this stage, we only have reliable info on for the New Zealand market. If Australia's prices are similar (they usually are just slightly cheaper but not always) then it's not a huge bargain. The Euro prices quoted seem to be very cheap, which leads me to be more sceptical. We'll have to wait and see. If the price turns out to be attractive I'll be doing exactly what you suggest. I'll certainly buy a freight train if I can afford it, but depending on price I may buy a couple of the passenger train too.