tedbeard

As a parent I totally understand. I would be wary of an unaccompanied adult in a children-oriented facility. Heck, at my local playground I make sure that I check in with kids regulalry so nobody reports me for sitting on a bench in a public park. Totally paranoid I know but when it comes to kids safety and security I am happy to see a little over-vigilance. Of course, as an AFOL I also think special "adult's-only" nights at a Discovery Center are a great idea.

"Custom LEGO Instructions". Does that mean these instructions will be for sale?

Or how about we start a new thread so we don't confuse the two different topics? 2012 is done as far as "new" sets goes so this topic, IMHO, should be locked as reference material if someone is looking for 2012 information/speculation. Continuing a single thread for speculation for all time is absurd. Imagine someone joins EB in 2014 and wants to find info on new Pirate sets. They would have to wade through page after page of 2012, 2013 and 2014 info before finding something useful. I think EB is going to be around for a long time so let's keep each year a separate topic thanks.

Wow, finally got a chance to pull apart the gun. Click on the pic for more details:

FYI "ween" is simply a contraction/bastardization of "Eve" or "Evening" (meaning the evening before a holy day aka "holiday") so Christween is simply another way of saying "Christmas Eve" as "Halloween" simply means "All Hallows Eve" or "the night before All Saint's Day". :)

Never seen the truck version before. The VW trucks I have seen are flat-tops with sides that fold down and storage areas underneath the bed. Do you have pictures of this type of truck IRL?

I knew that looked familar: JRC III - Porto de Sao Filipe

I have never had a problem with theft from displays. Not even when we were doing a public show for hundreds of kids without any sort of barrier to the tables - just some small "DO NOT TOUCH" signs and a couple of LUG members keeping an eye on things. I did however have a bag of minifigs and accessories (including uncommon BrickArms) stolen from me at BrickCon 2011 during the tear-down when, theoretically, it was only AFOLs in the hall. That was the sixth BrickCon I attended and I was rather upset for quite a while thinking that I had been robbed by an AFOL. Looking back there may still have been some non-AFOLs lingering in the hall (it is pretty chaotic when the public hours end on Sunday) so it may not have been conventions attendees but it still ticks me off.

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As soon as I saw the MAAWS it's all I could think of. The other bits are nice and hopefully I can use them elsewhere - otherwise those three parts cost me $6 each. I'll take one of the guns apart and post the pics when I get a chance.

Ignore the jerk. Your MOC speaks for you and it says "awesome skill."

I finally got my hands on some BrickArms Venturi exhausts and so I was able to start putting together my horse artillery battery: I didn't think to take pics of the parts or building of the guns but I did take some snaps of the caissons. Maybe I'll pull a gun apart and take a pic or two in case anyone wants to see what I did. Thanks to all the inspirations in the Cannon index. I did not look at it while working on these but I am sure some things I saw there gave me some ideas.

I think you might want to look at the pictures again. It looks to me like the rails will be attached with clips. The "plate" that goes in the middle has small half-clips on the end which lock the rail in place in conjunction with the half-clip on the outside of the tie piece.

Isn't that basically what Ben is doing with his new product?

If they had actually sold 'track packs' in stores alongside train sets then maybe they would have sold better. Over the last ten years train sets have been virtually invisible to the general consumer and the few times sets were available in stores there were few if any accessories or supplemental sets available in stores. It was all well and good to sell a fantastic Christmas Train a few years ago but I would guess that 90% of the consumers who purchased one saw no track available, let alone switches or motors available for purchase at the same store.

I was thinking the Cad Bane hat would make a good hat for Rick/Carl. Nice figs. Are you gonna build Dale's RV or maybe the prison in honour of Season 3 this weekend?

There is a special room (Shaw room this year) set aside for casual meetups, trading etc or are you looking for food/drink? The Castle crew meets up every year @ 5:00 on Friday at the castle display and heads out to dinner somewhere. I would suggest you do something similar ie:meet up in the Shaw room @ noon on Saturday or Sunday and go for lunch. Dicks is a local hamburger chain that serves classic burgers and shakes for cheap and is one of two places I make sure to go to every year. Smaller, but still great food is Pagliacci's Pizza. Both are located a couple of blocks west of the site (directions should be available). I have been bringing my son (now 14) every year since 2007 so I cannot suggest a good pub as I haven't really tried them but if you ask I am sure one can be recommended.

Welcome youngster from an old fogie1 on the Left Coast2. Hope you enjoy EB. (1) I have LEGO older than you. (2) Victoria, BC

I look forward to seeing it. Good luck, it is a massive project. I really enjoyed Scott Fowler's version displayed at BrickCon a couple of times. It was magnificent.

Hey, they dropped the age limit down to 7 years old. Don't tell my kids!

Hmmm, I would say that was actually a good thing. If you are selling trains to (parents of) kids, attaching it to a theme seems like a much better idea than stand-alone sets. A cargo train that can connect to the city harbour, city trucks and city buildings via a train station seems a lot more attractive to me as a parent. That is why the subway/lrt train suggestion above makes a lot of sense to me. Kids can add it to their existing towns and build around the sets. Making a beautifully detailed train set like Emerald Night was a great start but it needed an appropriate train station (should have used the modular style there I think) and rolling stock and a freight yard. Parents do not generally buy beautiful display models. They buy models that the kids can play with. The new Lone Ranger theme could really use a train and while it could be part of the license, it could also be done as a complementary off-theme set (in a similar way that the Cuusoo Western Town set could be seen as not cannibalizing but rather adding to the sales). It is a mistake to think of trains as anything other than a component of other themes. I know this is probably heresy around here but even die hard trainheads have to admit that there is something to be said for running trains through a layout that includes buildings and landscapes and people. Without a layout of some kind it is just a bunch of static models which, while cool, is not a large enough market by itself to sustain a business case for production.

I'll bet that is fun. Too bad I cannot view the website as the dodgy Aussie newspaper insists on invading my privacy just to look at their website. Must be one of Murdoch's gang.

Me too! I think though it would make sense to keep both as they compliment each other. After all, they could up production numbers of cowboy hats and guns and horses and be able to service both and I think if you like either you a likely to buy both. I mean, what kid getting a couple of Lone Ranger sets would not want a cool saloon/hotel/sherriff's office to go along with it?

That's the problem. It would just be too expensive. Of course it is technically possible but the whole reason they abandoned monorail in the first place is that did not sell, in part because it was too expensive for consumers to buy. If you are willing to pay insane amounts of money then you can make anything. However LEGO is not in this to lose money which is what would happen if they tried to sell a limited run of sets based on 3D printing.

You are right, they can indeed print with steel. I had to look it up after speaking to a friend and wow, just wow. That is cool. As I did say however I see no reason to believe the result would be suitable for injection molding or in any way cheaper and faster than traditional methods of mold production. I did read you entire post and just re-read it again. 3D printing technology has a long way to go before it can compete with injection molding for the production of bulk commercial parts. The reason for the failure of the original monorail system cannot in any way be solved using 3D printing technology.