Teddy

Hi KimT, I do not know if I actually want to go into a discussion with you about this, but you tickled me. The version of Anio has 4300 parts, of which I guess most parts were spend on greebles. Further, it has no minifigs. Given the price setting of the current SSD and SW sets it would cost about 500 Euro as an official set. If I would get 5000 parts from BL for my own creation, I will probably pay around 500 Euros as well, but than again I can buy them in tranches and its a MOC (easier to justify to my girlfriend ). Expensive yes, you are right, but not a zillion dollars either. Kind regards, Teddy

When I first read about the SSD I was really excited. Believe it or not, I passed on the MF 10179 (should have stored one, stupid me) and the current dead-star, because I could not convince my girlfriend we had display space for them and I really really really need them. We went to the Lego store to look at them and she described them as being too big, ugly, expensive and grey (my big grey castle is still on display in our living room though ). Even though she is a Star Wars fan herself and I can basically collect all regular SW sets she did not like those UCS sets. We also watch the CW cartoon together and I'm allowed to collect the regular sets of the CW as well. For the UCS SSD set I did not need to convince her we needed one, she likes the appearance of the ship in the movies. Now, that I have been studying the photos over and over again, I am really disappointed with the official UCS set. Flat ugly un-detailed bottom, big gaps, repetitive greebling, and weird profile compared to the original. I can live with those imperfections a bit with a regular set, but not with a UCS set. Personally, I am unsure if I will buy this set now. The price factors in as well, because I cannot justify buying such an expensive set to my girlfriend, to than scavenge it for parts. Now, I think, I rather buy parts online and build my own. Just my two cents. Kind regards, Teddy I agree 100%, Anio's version is vastly superior.

Thanks for the review! Bought this set last weekend and must say I quite like it. That said, the bottom is aweful and the technic beam looks ridiculous. The gaps on top anoy me a lot. If you are a star wars fan, buy it. If not, leave it in the store and order a CC building.

This is awesome! The walls are so nicely done with the tiles in between. Sheer brilliance. The architectural details are both awesome and recognizable. I really love those windows. Your painting skills are excellent! Just a shame us mere mortals cant obtain them. To be absolutely honest, I am not a huge fan of decals. But given Lego's own recent use of stickers on windows (Queen Anne's Revenge) I am beginning to accept them more.

Hi L-Space, the mottling on the walls turned out really great. And i feel really honored and a bit unworthy that you put my avatar in the last photo. I also like the fact that you put mottling on the roofs as well as it gives it a bit more of an organic look. Reddish-brown and old brown also work well as a mottling colors together with dark red in regular red colored roofs. Are you planning a complete shot of all your University MOCs together? Kind regards, Teddy

Thanks for all the nice words everybody!

That is a great looking railway station! As far as I can see it is a great rendition of the original. Tonight I will take some time to take a better look at the photos. Kind regards, Teddy

If this is real, it just shot to the top of my wanted list.

Thanks hoexbroe! Today I found some time to make a movie of the locomotive with the simplified driving train. This movie was shot with my webcam, so the quality is not all that. Hopefully, you can still notice the increase in speed compared to the previous movie. Kind regards, Teddy

This is awful, shocking, and saddening news. All the best to Dieter his family and friends. Kind regards, Johan

Hi L-Space, this is way better than the previous iteration! The highlights in the masonry look random and natural, and give a real mottling effect. Really well done. Kind regards, Teddy

Hi Hoexbroe, no it probably is not the best way to measure the width. But, on the other hand, in a layout were the train needs to enter for example a tunnel it will probably require a 12 wide tunnel. So for those cases it is better to define the maximum overall width as the width of the creation. In a layout with only railway station platforms it may be better to define it as 8 or 9 wide, due to the stair cases under the doors. Kind regards, Teddy

I really would want to go, but my birthday is on the 5th and we have family coming over. So hopefully I can attend next time. Kind regards, Teddy

This is really great locomotive! Don't give up on 8 wide yet, though. Although, one could even argue yours is 9 wide due to the bits sticking out on the side. In my experience 7-8 wide is a very nice width as it is close to a 1:45 scale, were Lego wheels are more towards 1:50 and track gauge is more towards 1:40. So, in my humble opinion 1:45 is a great looking compromise between these dimensions and there is no viewing angle morphed too much compared to another. Well, that is just my opinion of course. Kind regards, Teddy

Good bye TheBrickster. Thank you very much for all the effort you put into making the EB Town forum a nice spot on the internet for AFOL Town fans. Hopefully, you will still drop by the Town forum now and then. Kind regards, Teddy

Dear all, Like Ralph_S, the modular buildings got me back into Town building. And I agree 100% with his assessment. Personally, I prefer a complete building. So front and back walls. I already started building back walls in my childhood, as the open back building appeared weirdly "open" to me. Up until a few years ago I never build interiors for my buildings. My girlfriend her grandmother is a huge fan of my Lego MOCs, and she is an avid doll-house builder. She really encouraged me to add interiors into the buildings. At first I was hesitant, as I did not feel the need. But, of course I was willing to give it a go anyway. Now I really feel interiors add a lot to the creation. Just the knowledge it is there gives the building an additional dept to me that is hard to explain. The glimpses through the windows and the surprise of visitors when I show them the interior is more than worth the effort for me. A building with a nice front facade a solid back wall and a complete interior gives me real satisfaction, and feels complete to me now. A building lacking this is still considered incomplete by me or a work in progress. My library MOC still lacks an interior. But, I am still planning for it and putting bricks on top of BL and S@H orders for the interior of the Library. Kind regards, Teddy ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Here are some examples of: The front: Back walls: Interior detailing:

Hi everybody, thanks for all the great replies! I have to admit I have not checked this topic lately. The brown SNOT walls look much better in real life than on the photos. I have had quite some difficulty photographing the 3D texture effect of the tiles, and it did not come out quite as nice as the real deal. But, I really love how the tiled walls look. Dear armchair_superhero, I would be very glad to give you my ideas and opinions. But, keep in mind, they are just that my ideas and opinions. As you may have read in this and other topics there is quite a broad range in opinions regarding Town building and scaling. I would like to encourage you to open a topic on your LDD, as it certainly deserves a topic of its own, and I would be very happy to comment in it. kind regards, Teddy

This is great stuff! Those are all really well done indeed.

Dear all, since I am planing to make instructions for this MOC, I have simplified the drive-train yesterday. Now only the 4 flanged wheels are powered directly via the two M-motors and the blind wheel is rotated via the coupling rods. Surprisingly the speed of the locomotive went up significantly. my guesstimate is about 20%. Especially in corners the speed has increased. Apparently there was quite some torque between the gears and the flex cables resulting in more internal friction than necessary. Now that about 4 gears are removed and the blinds are moving freely with the driving rods the entire driving train appears to move a whole lot smoother. Further, I have bought quite some 5 studs long flex cable and noticed that there is quite a bit of variety in their length. Some of them are about 2 mm too short, which is too much for the gears in the LEGO Universe. When I use those slightly too short flex cables, the locomotive just freezes up completely. The funny thing is that this variety can occur in the same stock of cables. On Bricklink most of them are listed as 5L. For someone building this model with flex cables as rods that are those 2 mm too short it may be a frustrating ordeal. I did notice that on BL they also sell 38.2 mm, 38.8mm, and 39.5mm flex cables. Probably, they are all listed as 5L at most sellers. The one needed for the rods to function properly is the 39.5 mm variety. With them the BR 01 1075 runs smoothly. Kind regards, Teddy

This is a very well build locomotive and a good rendition of Jay Hurst his design! I am too very curious how it is powered and how it behaves in switch points in particular. Kind regards, Teddy

Hi Duq! I will see what I can do. I am planning to put a set of instructions online in pdf for free, but that will take at least another 3 months. As you can see in the photo below the motors are attached to a 4x4x4 studs technic cube, with a 2x4x(2/5) slot on top for the PF cable. The cube has attachment points for the curved slopes on 4 sides and Technic axle holes to connect the motors on two sides. At the core of that 4x4x4 cube is this technic brik (picture is a link): This brick provides the strength to hold the motors and the gearing together. A similar construction build via separate bricks risks being torn apart by the motors when the train stalls. Further in the tank I make 4x4x2 studs cores with the aid of these brackets to make the boiler tank stiffer (picture is a link): And at some strategic points I connect these bricks to interlock the four sides of curved slopes (picture is a link): Further I interlock sets of two curved slopes via 2x4, 2x6, 2x8, 2x10, 4x4, 4x6, or 4x8 plates running across the middle of 4x4 curved slope sections consisting of two 2x4 curved slopes (picture is a link): Click for larger photo on Flickr (picture is a link): That is roughly how I build it and the secret behind making the boiler two plates leaner in its diameter. Hope this helps. Kind regards, Teddy

That is too bad. You could consider to align the locomotive in a straight line without tracks. Personally, I am very interested in a photo of the locomotive without the boogies turning. Kind regards, Teddy

Hi blueandwhite, that is exactly what I meant. Hi L-space, as blueandwhite mentioned, your work is stunning as it is. My comments are mearly meant as constructive criticism. This is another folder that shows some examples of random mottling by Milán Bikics: Link to Brickshelf folder Kind regards, Teddy

This looks very beautifully done. Do you happen to have a photo of the locomotive on a straight? It is hard to fully grasp the locomotive when it is crawling along curves making the tight Lego bends. Kind regards, Teddy

Dear all, today I uploaded a better video of my locomotive to youtube. It is still not top quality, but it is better than the previous one. It was shot by my girlfriend her grandmother who was over to celebrate new years day with the family at our house. She shot it with her standard camera. She mailed me the video yesterday, and I received it today. Not via email but via an actual CD in the mail! Along with other family movies and photos she shot that day ofcourse, but I am not putting them up on Youtube. Kind regards, Teddy Thanks Lego Train 12 Volts.