SNOT studies

[Carbohydrates]

Hello! As mentioned in my introduction thread, I'm just now getting back into LEGO after a long hiatus and am working in CAD as I don't really own any physical bricks - only 3 sets at the moment.

I've recently been fascinated by the way bricks go together. Their dimensions are so precise, it allows for some very creative SNOT work. This has led to me playing with a few concepts here.

First off, this is a pretty rudimentary technique. 5 plates tall = 2 bricks wide, and you can turn a section sideways to "frame" a 1x2 brick. Like I said, this is pretty basic, but I'm posting it for reference.

Okay, but I wanted to use this as decoration in a pillar, but the problem is there's that ugly technic brick with the half pin showing on the side, so I came up with a different way to hold it all together.

The four side panels are two pieces, with one held in place by a headlight brick. The other one is held in place by the form of the first and is not actually connected by studs anywhere. Put together, the whole unit is actually very solid.

Here it is built into a pillar:

Here's another application of the general technique. Potential castle decor?

Assembly:

Part 2493, The 1x4x5 window frame, has an opening that's 8 stacked plates wide by 5 studs tall. This allows enough space to use it to house a bank of windows, composed of two halves. The studs facing left and right keep the assembly from falling out of the frame, as long as there's something behind it as well.

Application in the form of a mini-scale skyscraper:

I was reading Classic-Space earlier today and there was a thread on fitting 45 degree slope bricks together without the gap. I went ahead and made this, which turned out to be much more difficult than I thought it was going to be. The goal was to build a 4x4 octagon into the wall with no gaps and only 1 brick depth. I wish it was cleaner, but I've tried a few designs now and this is still the best. I think I'll tackle it again in the future, though.

This turned out to be good practice for 1/2 plate vertical offsets:

Works as a window as well:

Finally, there's no real practical application for this, but it was fun to build. This is mostly just practicing the nestled headlight bricks technique (is there an official name for this?), which is a favorite of mine.

Anyways, thanks for viewing! Let me know if you found this interesting, useful, or incredibly boring!

[Ricecracker]

Thanks so much for sharing this with us! I really like the first one the best. It has the most uses, IMO. I'm sure these will be put to good use.

[Basiliscus]

This is genius!

All of these techniques are superb. I didn't realise you could do that with the window frame - that's definitely something to keep in mind. My favourite is the angled wall without a gap! That's a fantastic technique that must have taken a long time to figure out.

I'd love to see you build these for real!

[BlueBard]

Amazing SNOT techniques, and very useful, specially the windows!

Great post!

[Zorbas]

Anyways, thanks for viewing! Let me know if you found this interesting, useful, or incredibly boring!

Boring? The work you 've done is absolutely great! It's like a very good tutorial to SNOT techniques!

Amazing SNOT techniques, and very useful, specially the windows!

I couldn't agree more. The windows technique is probably the best!

[Shoc]

Wow! Those are great, they must have taken a while to think up. I might have to use one or two of those SNOT techniques some time, they're genius!

:skull:

[thire5]

Great job! Especially the octagon looks perfect. I have to build it .

[Captain Green Hair]

Thanks for sgaring this, this really gives some usefull tips!

I'm still struggling with the SNOT at times, but i love a bit of puzzling though.

[Freddie]

Very interesting. That last technique is used extensively for building tanker for trains. I don't recall them being that refined, though. I also like the pillars.

For the green square with white octagon, replace the nestled headlight-bricks with a single 1x2 brick, and the lower half, replace the plates and tiles with a 1x4 plate and 1x4 tile. That should give it a nice, clean look. Besides, there's no need to overcomplicate things. Indeed, eventually you will notice that the "nestled headlights"-technique isn't perfect when used in rows, as there are some 0,01mm or something there that causes some extraordinary stress to the bricks.

Also, seeing your interest in extraordinary building techniques, here's an interesting article written by Jamie Berard - creator of Café Corner and Green Grocer, about stressing bricks with do's and don'ts.

[Holodoc]

Very interesting techniques, Carbohydrates! (funny name, btw)

I bookmarked this page.

[Carbohydrates]

For the green square with white octagon, replace the nestled headlight-bricks with a single 1x2 brick, and the lower half, replace the plates and tiles with a 1x4 plate and 1x4 tile. That should give it a nice, clean look. Besides, there's no need to overcomplicate things. Indeed, eventually you will notice that the "nestled headlights"-technique isn't perfect when used in rows, as there are some 0,01mm or something there that causes some extraordinary stress to the bricks.

Thanks! As I said, that's one of my most recent builds so it's really in "first draft" stage - compared to the others, it's pretty sloppy and unrefined. I took your idea also cleaned up the bottom-right a lot more by rearranging the bottom section and I'm much happier with it now. It's much cleaner, I think:

Thanks for your advice and the link to the article, I'll go ahead and view that as well.

[Asuka]

A very smart and useful work, thanks for sharing these interesting techniques!

[djo]

thank you for sharing your great SNOT.

it will be useful for our MOC.

thanks again. you're really creative indeed.

[MetroiD]

Two words: THANK YOU.

I've been trying to develop some good SNOT techniques with the older bricks & parts (90s sets) but it's really not been too easy. This sheds light on why it is precisely that TLC is on a winning course with the newer range of parts enabling builders to use various SNOT techniques.

[KimT]

I've added this to the following index.

Advanced Building Techniques

[General Armendariz]

This is very useful