DLuders

The 9641 Pneumatics Add-On Set is now in stock and available from the Lego Education Store website http://www.legoeducation.us/store/detail.aspx?KeyWords=9641&searchtype=0&sport=3&by=20&c=0&t=0&l=0&ID=1572 for USD 55. "The Pneumatics Add-On Set is part of a complete package. Combining the set with the Simple and Motorized Mechanisms Set enables you to carry out engaging cross-curricular activities. Your students will explore power systems and components, sequence and control, pressure, prototyping, kinetic and potential energy, and much more. The set and corresponding Pneumatics Activity Pack feature 14 principle model activities that introduce students to the basics of pneumatics. In addition, four main models and activities and two additional open-ended problem-solving activities thoroughly educate students about pneumatics. The set features 31 specialty elements, including pumps, cylinders, valves, an air tank, tubes, and a manometer."

On that TechnicBRICKS post, Conchas wrote "In order to achieve the full LA extent, the driving axle-hole needs to turn 26 full revolutions. To be more precise it is in fact around 26,5 full revolutions." So, maybe if one counts 26.0 revolutions (from zero to full extension) on both Linear Actuators, they would be set up equally in an ideal, non-binding way. Conchas continues his Linear Actuator review in Part II: http://technicbricks.blogspot.com/2008/08/tbs-techreview-05-technic-pf-linear.html . Of note is his "Parallel Synchronous Setup" picture 3/4 of the way down that webpage. Note that the Gray Idler Gears are on the SAME side (which may help in the 8043 Motorized Excavator set):

@ JunkStyleGio: Are you willing to experiment with your own 8043 Motorized Excavator, to see if reversing that "gray idler gear" makes any difference? From your own Brickshelf folder http://www.brickshelf.com/gallery/JunkstyleGio/8043Excavator/Buildinginstruction/dsc03847.jpg , is this the key step to making the arm perform better?

Think of all the fun mutants we could make in LDD if we had more pieces:

That's pretty good time, since the Lego World Record (for a 3-person team building the 10189 Lego Taj Mahal set) is 1 hr 47 minutes 9 seconds (from http://www.recordholders.org/en/list/lego.html ) : "Fastest Time to Built the Taj Mahal (Set 10189) (The team is limited to 3 builders. No presorting of pieces is allowed.) "1:47:09 hours -- Marcus Klein, Christian Krützfeldt, Bruno Kurth (all Germany), Thomas Muskovich (Austria), Tobias Reichling und Thomas Wesselski (both Germany) at LEGO fan weekend in Skærbæk, Denmark, 27 September 2008." There are other Lego World Records listed on that website too -- it makes for interesting reading.

Below is a closeup of the 10197 Fire Brigade set's fire truck (from http://brickset.com/detail/?Set=10197-1 ). You can download the PDF Building Instructions on http://us.service.lego.com/en-US/BuildingInstructions/default.aspx by typing in the "10197" set number, and then viewing the pages with the "launcher".

Mahjqa (a.k.a. Mahj) posted a Flickr photostream of his impressive Batman "Tumbler" made from Lego Technic elements. The car was featured on the "Batman Begins" movie. There are 7 additional photos of the MOC on his Brickshelf gallery. The Tumbler's front steering yoke is certainly distinctive, and it is very quick and nimble. Mahjqa wrote, "To those unaware; this is something I built myself. It's not available in stores, and there's no instructions available. Due to technical difficulties I'm going to have to rebuild this thing." If you view the end of the YouTube video, you'll know why: "The Tumbler, with functional steering, driven with Power Functions. It's not entirely done yet, as I'm not really absolutely happy with some of the details. The panels in front of the windscreen are just weird, but they're weird in the original too. If you've got a better idea, let me know." "Plenty of mechanics. From left to right: differential, two-speed gearbox, HUGE BATTERYBOX, steering system....I believe these tires match the look of the original quite well (they're from the 5571 Black Cat)": "What I'm proudest of is the steering system; there's very few Lego tumblers with steering....It's not 100% movie accurate; detail had to be sacrificed to make the electronics fit inside":

Use Olive Oil: http://www.eurobricks.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=26091 . Seriously, it works well in lubricating Lego Technic parts without degrading the plastic.

You might have to "upscale" your MOC to be able to fit everything that you mentioned. I don't believe that there is enough room in your present MOC to fit a Lego Power Functions M-Motor, Receiver, and Battery Box. The smallest RC Lego Power Functions truck I've seen is Nico71's yellow "Mini Trial Truck", which is considerably larger: http://www.eurobricks.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=42001&view=findpost&p=740610 .

@roamingstudio: None of your LDD .lxf files will download. Could you check your web server to see if the links are still valid?

With expensive taste like that, I want to be invited to any birthday party that has it!

"I await you, Han Solo!"

Still no change in the LDD version in the northwestern USA -- Version 3.1.3 & Brick Version 114.3.

As cataloged on Bricklink, there are several different types of Brick Separators: http://www.bricklink.com/catalogList.asp?q=separator . The most common one is the 821-1 Brick Separator, Gray , pictured below. Here's one for sale from a Singapore Bricklink dealer: http://www.bricklink.com/store.asp?p=jaxsenchew&itemID=13523882 .

Considering that the picture below appeared on the contest's webpage http://technic.lego.com/en-us/competition/default.aspx , I believe that your MOCs could be eligible. It says that "This month (August) the competition is all about Cranes –Whether its stationary or on wheels is up to you, what matters is that it has lifting functions and that it is actually able to lift an object. Weight/Size of the object doesn’t matter – but the crane must be lifting an object on the picture, holding it clear off of the ground."

On his "Engineering with ABS" website http://www.engineeringwithabs.ch/ , Swiss AFOL Beat Felber has a clever design for "A version of a large turntable that works without a standard Technic turntable. Track links are used instead to build a gear ring." Go to his "Building Hints" page to see it. Here is the description and pictures in their entirety: "This second version of a heavy duty turntable I developed with the goal of not using a standard Technic turntable. The functionality should be the same than in the first version but there had to be a big hole in its center to let wires and other things pass through it. The whole thing consists of four main parts - the gear ring, the king pin, the upper part and a roller ring. The gear ring is made of 72 old chain links, connected to a circle. To achieve a strong shape, there is a 1 x 2 Technic brick with two 1 x 1 plates attached to every second link. This structure is connected to the lower structure of whatever you are building - in the case of this prototype a simple base plate holds all the parts. "The king pin is made of eight arched bricks resulting in a perfect circle. This circle is in the center of the turntable and is needed to guide the upper part. The upper part features four pins, forming a rectangle, which perfectly fits in the circular shape of the king pin. This way the upper structure is hold in place and allows just a rotational movement. To propel this movement, old 9 teeth gears can be attached to the upper part. These gears grab into the gear ring, which is made of old chain links. Therefore the whole thing works perfectly together. In my prototype I used just two gears but it is possible to attach as many as needed. The gear ratio is 9 theeth to 72 chain links which equals 1 to 8. "The roller ring is not shown on this model. But it can easily be built following the instructions given on the page of the first version of a heavy duty turntable. This time it has to have bigger diameters - at least 32 studs for the inner one. When using a roller ring, be sure that the weight of the upper structure is supported by this ring and not by the king pin or the gear ring. Otherwise the whole thing whould have too much friction and would not work well. "Possible applications of this turntable could be dragline models where a large turntable is needed, models of stripping shovels where an elevator passes the king pin or bucket wheel excavators where the coal passes the turntable before it is forwarded to the spreader. Another possibility is to use this construction for large crane models like offshore or twin ring cranes." The red gear he used is the g9 Technic, Gear Expert Builder 9 Tooth. There are downloadable Building Instructions ( http://www.engineeringwithabs.ch/download/turntabl.zip ) and LDRAW file ( http://www.engineeringwithabs.ch/download/turntabl.mpd ). Note that the diameter of the turntable can be changed by using his Circle Template -- "Use [the link to] this drawing to build circles out of LEGO bricks with a diameter from 4 up to 40 studs."

If folks need some inspiration about cranes, Technic Brick Constructions is an excellent website showing various motorized cranes:

It looks sharp! I like the HOG ("Hand Of God") steering and the proportions of the truck. Welcome to this Eurobricks forum. I activated three of your pictures so that they would appear on your original post. There's a Picture Icon in the menu bar for pasting your hyperlinks. You can read about the procedure for posting your pictures here: http://www.eurobricks.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=18583 .

NXT_Liftboy and Technomoves created this "LEGO Mining Truck after the enormous Liebherr T 282 B, build APART from the bucket, from sets 4958 "dinosaur" and 8297 "off-roader", and with remote-controlled driving!" On MOCPages, NXT_Liftboy posted many pictures and detailed description of the MOC. The YouTube video is well done, with a Minifig climbing up to the driver's cab! "The Liebherr T 282 B is the biggest commercial mining truck we know of. We downloaded the specification from Liebherr and studied it. Then we printed the side- front- and rear-views enlarged such that the printout was 1:1 for the model, the scale being determined by the offroader wheels, and about 1:50." "Taking the scale into account our MOC performs more or less like the real thing: the MOC weighs very close to two kilograms, and can bear another two kilograms [4.4 pounds] load relatively easy, and lift and dump it too! It can still drive around with three kilograms [6.6 pounds] load, but dumping that fails, depending on the distribution of the load. This matches with the say 250 tons weight of the real one and a payload 350 to 400 ton. Moreover, the scale we build it is 1:50 for length, so 1:2500 for surface, so 1:125000 for cubical measures, like weights should be. Hence the model weighing 2 kilograms corresponds precisely to 250 tons in reality!"

[As posted by CopMike on the Eurobricks Frontpage] Hi all! You now have the ultimate power in your hands ! It´s time to vote on the Color Change by Fans that you proposed through this thread. Go here to vote for your top 5 BASIC elements Go here to vote for your top 5 various elements ! NOTE -- There are MANY Technic pieces to choose from in the "Various Elements" category!

The first Bricklink choice listed (from the link I provided to you above) can sell you a NEW Lego NXT 2.0 set for USD $250 (see http://www.bricklink.com/store.asp?sID=51203&itemID=18409410 ). Since the new set has a damaged box (and you're worried about the shipping cost), you could buy the set from Maryland USA and have it shipped WITHOUT the box to you in Bolivia. The seller won't care one way or another. If you look on the "Store Terms" page, that vendor accepts "Cash (no COD), Money Order, PayPal.com, [and] Western Union Transfer." It's a pretty good deal. I bet you that, for a total cost of ~US$280, you could get the set. Over the past 10 years, I've had great luck placing HUNDREDS of Bricklink orders (for new and used Lego parts and sets). I've gotten orders from Europe and Australia sent to the USA within a week sometimes. Try Bricklink -- you'll like it.

If you live in Bolivia, I'd try to get a new Lego Mindstorms NXT 2.0 (Set 8547) from Bricklink: http://www.bricklink.com/catalogPG.asp?S=8547-1 . One of the vendors will be able to ship to Bolivia at a total price lower than USD 442.

Maybe some Olive Oil lubricant would help reduce the friction. "furious" used it for Lego Pneumatics, but he said this: "The olive oil is non reactive with plastics and rubber. A mineral oil will destroy rubber parts. "I know that people use graphite powder for turntables. That would get messy. "How I applied the olive oil is spray some on a paper towel then rub it onto the piston. So there is no messy excess. I would do the same on a stuck turntable." See this Eurobricks post for the full discussion.

On the website http://www.tau.ac.il/~stoledo/lego/Spitter/#Midtskog , Sivan Toledo built a "food-spitting" Lego Mindstorms NXT robot. He wrote, "This hungry little fellow is a picky eater. He is very hungry. If you don't feed him often, he asks for food. Clearly, the most appropriate food for him is paper pellets. But whenever I feed him, he objects and spits it out. "If you are looking for a bot with a strong personality, you have found your match....It detects the white [paper food] pellets using the light sensor....Once it sees a pellet in its mouth, it starts spinning the wheels, waits for them to spin fast, and then opens his throat. The pellet falls into the spinning wheels and gets thrown out." He has a made an excellent PDF Building Instructionsfor the "Spitter" available for download (21 MB, 231 pages) PLUS the NXC Program that the Spitter runs.

LegoMINDSTORMS.com has produced several funny videos to show the versatility of the NXT brick. Look at the expressions on these people's faces! "Suprise Lego Robot Attack" -- A Lego Mindstorms scorpion guards the candy: "Lego Window Crashes" -- Mindstorms sound sensor goes amok: "Lego Mindstorms Throwbot" -- A clever way of disposing of unwanted food: