Ambroise

Exo-Force. It was really neat. I always considered it like a space theme. The asian/manga/sentai style was very well executed.

Monsters Fighters for the spooky mood (and its similarities with Adventurers). Maybe Hidden side later too (but that is too early. Ninjago for the buids, and the Asian/Futuristic mix, and because my son likes it very much!

Adventurers and Aquazone. I discovered them both much later. I find Egyptian-inspired sets (with some nice prints) and under-water world (with nice specialized pieces) quite stimulating for the imagination.

3: 10 4: 6 13: 4 11: 3 15: 2 7: 1

Thank you for these pictures and analysis. I'm curious about the 6-wire cable protocol, so that I can figure out if/how to use "old" PF motors. I'll wait for the views of the other sides of the PCBs. Do you expect that the 6 pinouts (GND, TMS, TCK, TDC, TDI, RESET, VCC) will be easier to access from the other side, and allow for somme TTL/serial connexion? That would be interesting.

True, but having the Lego's instructions in .pdf facilitates greatly the production of the copycat manual. All "fakes" are just pre-orders for now. Some people are probably very busy at replicating the new pieces. I don't know how long it will take them to produce the full set, but the longer the better.

Great interview, great model, great show. Although I will have to wait a little to get the Chiron, this event makes this day a special day. Thank you Lego.

10: 10 22: 6 3: 4 24: 3 15: 2 1: 1

Classic Space (above all) Futuron (as it complements CS) Blacktron I Galaxy Squad Space Police III Exploriens

The GS vehicles catched my eyes first, but then the insects' vehicles grew on me too. I enjoy the theme a lot. For me, it was close in spirit to CS, with colored spacemen, and nice looking ships with gimmicks (separating into several sub-ships for example). The bugs reminded me of District 9. All in all, very neat. A lot of white pieces to buld large spaceships. I strongly recommend it. The second wave sets were heavily discounted in France and the theme was clearly not popular at the time. But curiously, I had troubles finding the "first" wave sets to complete my collection.

Thank you for the initiative and for the hard work. I appreciate having all the modifications in a single and clear pdf.

Very impressive indeed...

Very cool! Real CS spirit! The only thing that bugs me are the white plane reactors, but I remember I also found them tempting when I was young. I really like the second and third pictures.

Arghhh... shipping date will be July 4th for (my?) Benny's Spaceship... They sold to fast for me!

Impressive model... Thanks for the review!

Category A : 3 : 2 pts 5 : 1 pt 24 : 1 pt Category B: 9 : 2 pts 7 : 1 pt 17 : 1 pt

The Intelli-train was released at a time when The Lego Group was having huge financial problems (2003, although the development probably took more than 2 years.). The name "Duplo" was even abandonned at that time, and the intelli train was in the "Explore" range (which makes it somehow difficult to find on Peeron). One expensive thing to develop (that was already there in the previous iterations 3932 and 3933, as well as 2741 and 2745) was the "reverse direction" feature. After a quick survey on kids' requirements, TLG realised that kids were not using all the functionnalities, and especially If they want the train to move backwards, they simply take it off, and put it back on the track in the opposite direction. So the new trains do not have such extra features, in order to reduce development and production costs (and the Duplo brand is back). I personally enjoy the Intelli train a lot, they have became quite rare and vauable. Following Peter Nolan, I will probably replace the broken pinion on mine soon (although the eBay price for a new one is a little high I think).

Knight rider and the Mean Machine from wacky racers? Congratulations for all of them!

The complete Galaxy Squad range is also gone from S@H in France (and all over EU I think). Too bad, I really enjoyed it.

I opened mine today, and got #22, which i'm very happy with. I think the distribution was completely random (all plates have probably been mixed before being packed in all the bags).

Very interesting quest... Sorting some City lot from the 80's, I noticed a lot of train windows (like the ones from my 7710, but yellow instead of blue). After a little search I found they were from the 7740. Unfortunately, there were no train bases, no boogies, no couplers, no track, and no motor. But almost all the other bricks, windows (some rare and expensive like the small grey ones), slopes (yellow, grey, corner), were there ! I then started a quest similar to yours, but noticeably different : my 7740 now runs with Power Function, new boogies, new couplers. I agree this is not the real one, but that was the trade-off to have it running without exploding my budget...

I don't know if this is the best location for that, and I don't want to hijack the topic, so please tell me, I'll remove that and post it elsewhere. With in mind the idea to have System trains run on Duplo tracks (I have a lot of Duplo tracks) I faced several challenges. The first one being that old (I mean 80's) boogies won't touch the sleeper of Duplo tracks, because their axle is encapsulated in a brick which is too thick. Fortunately, recent (present PF at least) boogies have almost no plastic below their axle and there is enough free space so they can run on Duplo track. Then I came to the same problem as the one Robert indicates and illustrates here : http://www.cailliau.org/Alphabetical/L/Lego/Duplo/Train/Rails/Dimensions/ together with the fact that Duplo rail spacing is shorter... But System wheels are running on the flange of the rail on their System rails, while they have to run on their outer circunference on the Duplo tracks. Using the not-so-appreciated flexible tracks, I built this : which works pretty well with recent boogies. Here is a side view : and a top view : It is funny (although most probably not random) : the flexible track inner rails (not realistic at all) have the same spacing as the Duplo rails.

I'm impressed by the knowledge you guys have gathered... Personnaly, I use more of an "experimental" approach and I make an heavy use of the mechanical play (or clearance ? sorry for my bad english) to close most of my loops. I never though about theoretical solution, until I saw this topic some months ago, and the posts by Robert today. Section 2 of Robert's analysis of rail dimensions ( http://www.cailliau....ils/Dimensions/ ) made me remember how I tried to connect Duplo and system tracks, with the goal of having system rolling stock running on Duplo tracks. I got a partially satisfactory solution (that I will post here). The APR problem is very interesting and usefull (how frustrating it is to have just completed a nice layout and observe that some points are visited only once...). I'll try to have a deeper look at it.

To me, the price per piece (ppp) only gives an indication. I've noticed most technic sets have a low ppp (supercar 8070 for example, even with power functions!), whereas small licensed sets have a high ppp (polybags and battle packs for example). Minifigs are counted as pieces, but it probably costs more to produce them, and I guess it is the same for printed parts. Licensing a set also costs. Once you fix the theme --- for example "creator", where there is no minifig (well, up to now) and no very low-price technic pins, and almost no printed pieces--- then you may compare ppp... This may then eventually make sense, especially because some little pieces (1x1 tiles for example) are curiously expensive on Bricklink. I don't think that Lego indicates the ppp or promotes it in any way. Brickset does, because Brickset tries to help people and proposes this quantitative, but somehow misleading, measurement. It is also very easy to compute, which may explain its popularity. About weight, Brickset also indicates the weight of a set (unfortunately, this includes cardbox and instructions I think, but both matter and both grow with the total bricks weight, so with the size of the set). So technically, one can compute or estimate price per gram. I've done that for some LotR first wave sets, and curiously, it was giving the same indication as ppp, which was strange... As a conclusion, and as a collector and/or a MOCer, I do not pay attention to ppp when deciding to buy a set; I do not think a set with a low ppp is a good deal as I always search for special pieces that appear in a few sets.

I remember this yellow 4.5V motor in set 744 (the battery box was black). Like kungpo, this was one of the very first sets I got as a child. I still have the box ... Not unique, and not expensive.