henrysunset

Thanks for explaining! I can totally respect that it doesn't sound like a particularly easy process to automate, and it will take some time to migrate 1000 parts! Out of curiosity, how long does that process take? I would expect that it's at least 15 minutes per part (average), and that probably doesn't include the process of moving parts through the review process. ---tom P.S. Is there a human-readable summary of the process to create new parts in LDraw? If not, It's the kind of nerdy article I'd love to tackle at Brick Architect if someone wants to help me do it!

Is it possible to script a bulk conversion into LDraw format? It wouldn't bother me if it took a long time to clean up and move to "official" - At least folks who are familiar with the "unofficial" parts could begin to use them! As mentioned in another thread, I'm in the process of writing an article about the Most Common DUPLO Parts, and many of the parts are missing pictures. I also plan to add the most common DUPLO parts to my LEGO Brick Labels collection (for only the most discerning toddlers, of course...) ---tom

I love this, and have pinned it to my collection of great LEGO Gothic Architecture on Pinterest. Thanks for sharing! —Tom

The iconic alternating light and dark bands on the arches took me right back to southern Spain, walking into the Mezquita-Catedral de Córdoba. You have achieved the detail well at a small scale! I've added this to my small but growing collection of Islamic and Byzantine LEGO Architecture on my Pinterest board. Thanks for sharing! —Tom

Love the neo-gothic details in a very small model. I added to my popular Pinterest collection :-)

For a much longer (and fairly up-to-date) list of unofficial architectural sets including those by LEGO Certified Professionals, you should reference this Unofficial LEGO Architecture Set Guide - BRICK ARCHITECT. It includes information on many sets, including details which I have verified by talking to the original resellers or the LCP in certain cases. Sincerely, —Tom

I had the good fortune of receiving an advance preview copy of the new set. I wanted to share a few highlights from my review of this massive new set! The first surprise for me was that the box is actually 25% smaller than that of the UCS Millennium Falcon, even though it has 20% more parts. I was similarly surprised by the huge price difference, with the Colosseum coming in at about 30% cheaper than the Falcon. #10276 Colosseum includes 20% more parts, a 25% smaller box, and a 30% lower cost (versus #75192 Millennium Falcon). The second surprise was how satisfying it actually was to build. To be honest, I found the prospect of a 9000+ piece set a bit daunting, especially given how repetitive the model looked like it would be. Now, I don't want to say that it isn't repetitive (it definitely is), but It is extremely satisfying to build a huge module of seating, and snap it into place on the base. In fact, the building techniques used in the model are quite clever and satisfying. The set includes a number of existing parts in new colors, most notably 16x16x 1⅓ Brick w/ Technic Pins (part 65803) introduced in the LEGO Art series in Olive Green. I was also pleased to see a few popular new parts available in new colors for the first time. This includes the Olive Green part in the photo above, plus three parts in the very useful Dark Tan color. I've included a step-by-step look at the entire review process in my review at brickarchitect.com - check it out! ---Tom

As someone *significantly* more familiar with both of the systems, can you expand on the ways that you see the new Powered-up Generation Mindstorms (51515) as dumbed down when compared to EV3? The main things that I am aware of which are either different are worse: (worse) the removal of most of the buttons on the hub, (different, probably worse) the replacement of a crappy-looking but useful grayscale LCD with a 5×5 grid of LED's. (different) The new device has a slower 100mhz CPU, but based on a much newer ARM architecture, so I don't know if it is faster or slower overall... (but suspect that the battery life will be improved) (different, probably better) a single connector for both sensors and motors. (different, better) Smaller overall size makes it easier to integrate into models. (different, probably better) Includes a decent-capacity Li-ion pack.

Thx for clarifying. I will update the labels accordingly.

Yup, that's the one I use most. (I also have a Cube Plus, but it isn't meaningfully better).

I thought "Angular" referred to motors that can precisely describe current angle and programmatically rotate to a specific angle. (If I'm mistaken, End/Side seems a lot less confusing than linear/angular) The labels are black-and-white, but yes, you can change the text or images in the Brother p-touch application. (Info on the various compatible printers here: https://brickarchitect.com/labels ) —Tom

Thanks to everyone for patiently explaining how all of these motors differ. To celebrate today's #51515 LEGO Mindstorms Robot Inventor announcement, I created a new page on my website to learn more about all of the Powered Up components, and released a beta version of the labels discussed earlier in this thread. LINK: brickarchitect.com/powered-up The labels are designed for a Brother Label Printer, which prints on durable, glossy plastic label tape. I decided to include physical dimensions on the labels, and tried to balance using the "official" name for each part, while standardizing the naming scheme. As always, If you see an error in the labels, or on the website, let me know! Sincerely, —Tom

@Mr Hobbles, @Jetro, & @kbalage - Thank you, this feedback is super helpful. I decided that Mr Hobbles is ultimately right - If the motor is capable of "smart" (angular) functionality, I should credit it accordingly. The software will continue to improve, and 3rd party app platforms are inevitably going to become more mature. This leaves just one motor that can track relative rotation, but not precise angle. I decided to describe 26913 / Boost Motor as "Interactive" but not "Smart". Notes: Also added labels for the various Battery Packs & Hubs, and all of the sensors so far... I will probably add a fourth label strip with just three categorical labels: 1. Hub / Battery Boxes, 2. Motors, 3. Sensors. (This makes sense if you sort into categories instead of by element) It looks like I am missing two of the Spike Prime sensors (Force & Distance). Does anyone know their Part ID's? Feedback Welcome! If this collection is complete, accurate, and useful, I'll release it as soon as I can. Sincerely, —Tom P.S. Before anyone asks, I am not planning to go back and support the older Power Functions or EV3 standards.

Wow, this got complicated and technical quickly! I love how quickly we got into the idiosyncratic differences at the Technical I/O layer. This is great! What's not so great is how confusing this all is for end-users! It sounds like there might be a discrepancy between the featureset exposed from within the LEGO sanctioned apps, and the additional functionality embedded in the physical motors. I'm inclined to simply describe them as either "Simple" or "Smart" with the additional "Angular" description only on those two motors where the capability is exposed through the LEGO platform, namely the two SPIKE PRIME motors. Thoughts?

This was all very helpful. Here's the text that I settled on for each of these labels... Motor, Med. Simple (WeDo) 21980 Motor, Med. Tacho (Boost) bb0893c01 / 26913 Motor, Lg. Smart bb0959c01 / 22169 Motor, XL. Smart bb0960c01 / 22172 Motor, Med. Smart (Spike) 54696 Motor, Lg. Smart (Spike) 54675 Motor, Train bb0896c01 / 28740 As always, if I can update it to be even more clear, I would love to make it better. ex: should I add "Simple" to the Train motor to explain that it doesn't have any rotational information? Should I add "(Control+)" to the two other Smart motors?

Makes sense to me. I do wish there was a less confusing term than "TachoMotor" but nonetheless consistency is important! Let's discuss on the LAN forum if there is a way for us to influence the part naming on BrickLink, to make it better! (Now that TLG owns BrickLink.)

This is exactly what I needed... Thank you so much! Is the "Tacho" vs. "Smart" terminology widely used? I'd like to use the easiest-to-understand terminology possible. Thanks for letting me now... I missed it because it's missing on BrickLink! https://www.bricklink.com/catalogList.asp?pg=1&catString=121&sortBy=Y&sortAsc=A&catType=P&v=1

I have a related question for this group... I am exploring adding all of the Powered-up compatible components to my popular LEGO Brick Labels collection. In order to make these labels great, I need to better understand the differences between the five Powered Up motors currently available. Current Powered-Up Motors: bb0959c01 / 22169 - Motor, L. Control bb0960c01 / 22172 - Motor, XL. Control 21980 - Motor, Med. Basic bb0893c01 / 26913 - Motor, Med. Interactive (Boost) 54675 - Motor, L. Interactive (Spike) I believe that these motors differ in the following ways: Some motors have only one speed vs. some motors have electronically-controlled variable speed. Not clear: Some motors send information about the current angle back to the hub / or they allow the hub to precisely specify which angle to rotate to. Not clear: Do some of the motors send information about mechanical resistance back to the hub? (This would be different information than the angular info.) My best guess is that: bb0959c01 / 22169 - Motor, L. Control - Electrically control speed, but no control / info about angle? bb0960c01 / 22172 - Motor, XL. Control - Electrically control speed, but no control / info about angle? 21980 - Motor, Med. - No control of speed and no info about angle (just on/off) bb0893c01 / 26913 - Motor, Boost Interactive - Electrically control speed, and control / info about angle? 54675 - Motor, Large Angular (Spike) - Electrically control speed, and control / info about angle? If that is the case, I would be inclined to describe the simplest motor as "Basic", then "Control", then "Interactive". Is that a good characterization? Sincerely, —Tom P.S. a preview of the motor labels are attached to this message.

I do not know if that licensing deal is exclusive. It's possible that LEGO could produce another set, but they do not seem motivated to do so. While fans of the LEGO Architecture series adore sets like Fallingwater, Villa Savoye, or Farnsworth House, I suspect they sell a small fraction as well as The White House, Eiffel Tower, etc... I honestly think we need to accept that these types of buildings are not financially practical for TLG, and focus on making awesome MOC's of these architectural wonders. ---tom

I don't... I might post my complete list as a future article, though. It sounds like you would be interested, at least!

That's right. I confirmed with LEGO and it is August 1 in North & South America, June 1 everywhere else. This has created a lot of anger and confusion of forums with a lot of LEGO Architecture fans from the USA who can't understand why the set comes out two months later in the country where the building is actually located... (They have a good point.) I did get a review copy from LEGO, and have posted my review at Brick Architect. I liked the overall composition which includes both the East Wing and West Wing, and the level of detailing significantly exceeds the 2010 version. Also, the price-per-part is excellent (especially when released in USA for just $100). Unfortunately, the proportions of the central building are completely wrong, the instruction booklet had several errors, and I strongly dislike the unfinished look of the landscaping, where roads and pathways sit above the grass and so many studs remain visible (instead of being smooth tile at the same height). Thusly, it only barely earned our 3/5 star rating, which is a pretty big step down from the original 2010 #21006 The White House, which is in my top 10 list of LEGO Architecture sets (there are 50 sets so far). Please feel free to check out the review (which includes a ton of photos). I'd love to hear your thoughts, too! - #21006 (2010) vs. #21054 (2020) - Executive Residence only. Sincerely, —Tom

I reviewed two of the three sets at Brick Architect... Taliesin West - The better of the two, but some minor issues associated with the LOZ bricks. Unity Temple - A perfectly satisfactory model, but not as inspired as Taliesin West. —Tom

I'm doing my first AMA, right now on Reddit. I look forward to answering your questions about my book, LEGO Storage topics, my Brick Architect website, and more. Remember, it's an AMA, so you can Ask Me Anything!JOIN ME LIVE AT: reddit.com/r/IAmA/

I searched for the thread but couldn't find it. Does a moderator want to move this post into that thread?

I know that many readers here are from Europe, but I also suspect that many of you have learned that there's a big budget season of LEGO Masters in the USA, with LEGO Batman Voice Actor Will Arnett, and Judging by Senior LEGO Designers Jamie Berard & Amy Corbett. The competitors are world-class LEGO artists, who have created some really amazing builds. (It's not hard to find the first four episodes online...) I had the opportunity to meet about half of the contestants this weekend at Bricks Cascade. I have to say, what a great set of folks—they were all very nice, passionate about the LEGO brick, and patient with weekend attendees who spent upwards of an hour in line to meet them! I also learned that many of the contestants are sharing behind the scenes details on YouTube, articles on their blogs, and even microscale renditions of the models that they built during the competition. Because it's so hard to find all of these resources, I put them all in one place. (It's fascinating to learn more about how different teams tackled each of the challenges so far!) LINK: https://brickarchitect.com/2020/meet-the-lego-masters-youtube-instagram-twitter/ The article has two sections: The first section includes social medial links for all of the contestants who have public websites, blogs, YouTube, Instagram, and Twitter accounts. The second section is organized by episode, with links to the specific articles/videos/images which the contestants have shared with fans. I do apologize that I missed the opportunity to take a photo with all of the cast which attended the show, but did get this great photo with Corey Samuels... Photo with Travis Samuels, from team 'Brothers Who Brick' Let me know if you find additional content from the contestants so I can add it to the article! Sincerely, —Tom Alphin P.S. Have you seen the show—what do you think? (I have a few minor gripes with the show, but would rather hear what you think first...) Leave a comment below!