ivanlan9

I remember when those stac/vert pacs were introduced. My brother had a Vega. I won't say they are worse than Yugos, but it was without doubt the worst car he ever owned. I had to do the maintenance on it. I won't say it had worse accessibility than a Saab--but it was the second worst car I ever worked on!

I've successfully used an MRC HO unit that gave me sound and momentum; it's a 12-volt DC supply that's easy to use and hook up (you'll need speakers), and I was very happy with it. There are two things not so great about this sort of solution, however. 1) it's NOT DCC, and the sound shows it--I had a choice of "steam" or "diesel" -- and that was it. 2) It very definitely produced more than 9 volts. But this was not really an issue for me, as I hate the unprototypical maximum speeds that Lego is capable of, so I would never run my trains at anywhere near max voltage. For me, it was a good setup and made running the trains fun--which was all I was after. If I had more room I would probably want to use genuine DCC--but I don't.

A very nice design!

This is amazing. I'm beyond impressed.

Gorgeous! It's especially compelling for me, because I used to have a friend who spent his summers touring England/GB canals in a houseboat. A real character, and I miss him greatly.

Very jolly!

Both versions are terrific, lovely buildings indeed. But I will point out that the last thing you want in an opera house/concert hall is a skylight. You're immersing the audience in an audio experience, and you want them to concentrate on that experience. Bleed from external lighting, skylights and windows are distracting and you are trying to isolate them from the world. Second version is better on this point, but not perfect. I wouldn't mind watching Carmen in this place (once the skylight is shielded!).

Nice. Like the colors, too. Except for the end gates. I'm pretty sure the prototype ferrys never used that system. I think they were all the drop-down type--but of course I could be wrong. Not a ferry expert!

Nice! I especially like the prototypical speed at which it rotates. Looks good too!

This. I've decided I'm not quite ready to donate all my Lego (I don't have as much as @Toastie, but I have been buying & building since 1990, and I have a LOT), but I am ready to declare that I, too, have had enough of TLG. "Playing hardball" and "winning decisively" is bullying, plain and simple, and they're doing it because they can. I vote against politicians for this (in my state the legislators ALL act like this is normal: "I got mine, to hell with you" is their mantra. So I vote against them every one. Why should I treat TLG any different? Gee, I wonder if they know how I'm mistreating my bricks! I don't think we should reward bullying behaviour, and I also believe that one pebble, strategically place, can stop an avalanche. Thus I commit to never buying Lego again. I'm not going to even buy used. Not that I need to: with hundreds of thousands of pieces filling up my house, I'll still have plenty to do before I kick the bucket.

If only BlueBrixx had a distribution center in the US, I'd be buying a ton of their stuff. As it is, the shipping puts it out of the reach most of the time, and I would really prefer to know that what I order is going to have good bricks. Although I might stay away from their older stuff, as some of the kits had parts that just didn't fit. For instance, I got the ES44AC in six-wide, and it was decent all the way through--but the trucks ("bogies") won't stay on. That's a significant bummer. The big locomotive shop building, however, had no flaws that I could find. Can't recommend it enough.

The way this conflict has been described here is that HABricks tried to negotiate, but TLG rejected their every offer and insisted on extremely punitive fines and punishments. That doesn't fit with how @Phil B described his interaction with TLG, which appears to have been characterized by mutual respect and the desire to work things out. HABricks got none of that. At this point, not only am I thinking of not buying any Lego ever again, I'm considering donating my entire collection to a children's museum. I've got stuff going all the way back to 1989 (which yes, includes every 9v train produced, except the build-your-own steamers), and the entire collection is worth over $100K. This is the plan anyway, as that's specified in my will. I'm 77, so the only real difference is getting the tax break while I'm still around to benefit from it.

I agree with @JopieK: "But I'm afraid this is a war on virtually every customization party." We already know that they prohibit sales of custom or modified parts on BrickLink, and this is simply the next logical step. I'm reminded of fan fiction. Some fandoms, such as Star Trek, allow fan writers lots of room in which to write fan fiction using ST characters, and garner lots of goodwill and kudoes for allowing it. They do, however, turn around and have come down hard on people who have put together fan videos, and will send the lawyers after them. (There is a reason there is zero fan fiction about Dr Dolittle [book version, not the awful cinematic hacks].) Other franchises will send lawyers after the minutest use of a character. You can't copyright characters, only particular arrangements of words, but you CAN trademark characters in perpetuity. And such lawyers will send cease & desist letters if they get even a whisper that one of their characters is being used without their approval (which cannot be had). Also, remember that they used to try to prevent the making of copies of instructions, when all such copying ever did was make them more money. Maybe that's what they're objecting to: that HA Bricks is making additional money from Lego bricks that Lego feels should come to them, with not a penny allowed HA Bricks. I think it's simple greed, and has nothing to do with HA Bricks delivering something to customers something said customers clearly want.

Wow. Thanks for that! My brother does N gauge, and I suspect he'll be very interested in these! (I enjoy looking at them myself, but I'm not about to try 3mm gauge--much too small for my very old eyes!)

Your 1:100 scale fits comfortably between HO (1:87), OO (1:76) and N (1:160); TT scale (1:120) was once very popular. Around 67 years ago, my dad took me to visit a friend of his who had a spare bedroom converted into a TT layout; the room was around 12 or 13 feet square, and I remember being impressed at the amount of detail and scenery that could be fitted into a not-terribly-large area.