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Yeah I haven't seen that piece used in Technic for ages!

Just some quick thoughts I probably should have made, or made clearer in my video. You don't really need to split the axles on the pilot truck, I didn't really notice much difference doing that, but guess it doesn't hurt. Also to help it round corners I chose not to add rubber tyres to the main loco drive wheels. The low torque of the ungeared motor, the high speed gearing plus the weight of the loco is just enough to stop them slipping too much. I mentioned that I don't fully subscribe to the idea of motors fighting each other, but of course you should always try to gear them to at least be roughly the same. I have seen one motorisation effort which used 2 PF motors linked together via a differential, but as they are linked to spin together at the same speed you really don't need a differential. I did choose the ungeared 9v motor for the loco because it's the only motor I have that spins even remotely fast enough to not bog down the 9v train motor.

Well, here's how I did it.... Runs great

So the issue appears to affect motors connected to both IR receivers, is that correct? If so, I think it would be unlikely that multiple motors, remotes or receivers have the exact same malfunction. The only part common to all these is the battery box, so I would start by looking at that first. Do you have a second one to swap it out with? After many years of storage it could also be the case that you have dirty/oxidised metal contacts on all your electric plugs. Those metal pins are much smaller and harder to clean than the previous, larger 9v metal contacts, so try some electrical contact cleaner spray. It evaporates quite quickly so spray some on and try to plug and unplug each electrical connection a few times while it's still wet with contact cleaner. Then do a final rinse spray with the cleaner and wipe away any residue. Do this with each electrical contact individually and try to avoid overspray on the model itself.

Also me for all the working mechanics of the Merc and McLaren.

Just watching the gif I feel like I can hear crashing tiny cymbals! Also......

It'll probably be an amphibious car, as we haven't had that many cars this year!

Things have changed a bit since the last backhoe, it would likely have to be licensed. I think it would be criminal for that license to be anything other than JCB, and the most iconic JCB is the 3CX. The 4CX might be more mechanically interesting due to the 4 wheel steering (at least, I think it has 4 wheel steering), but the 3CX already has a driven and steered front axle, and with it's smaller front wheels is really the most recognisable and iconic JCB. Now, if you look at what it would take to bring a flagship 3CX as a set, it's a massive challenge, the front bucket has 3 functions (raise/lower, tip and open/close) while the rear digging arm has about 4,859,259,462 functions! Okay, maybe not that many, but built into the rear frame there's the rear stabilisers, side shift, slewing, the shoulder joint, the elbow joint, bucket and telescoping boom. And if we really want to be functionally authentic there should be an extra spare pneumatic PTO near the rear bucket for an accessory attachment. It's a white whale of a design challenge, which is probably why we want it so much! It has so much potential that to not reach it would be a disappointment, I suspect not only for the fans, but for the Technic designers, at least one of which I know wants to bring us a backhoe. To reach that potential, to have all those functions, it has to be a certain size (like the BWE) with some parts being made bigger to suit. And dare I say it also needs to be pneumatic, unless you want it to have 12 motors and be either very slow or very weak. Could it be RC? Well maybe, if they bring out a new PU control valve that is stackable/daisy chain-able in some way. Then you could control all 10+ motorised pneumatic functions from only 2 ports (valves and compressor) leaving the other 2 ports for drive and steer. We've wanted a backhoe for so long, they wanted to bring us a backhoe for a while, might as well do it right and not half megablocks it. Nah, he referred to "some linear actuators", they can shove them where no backhoe would dig in normal operation!

Sorry if this comment seems all over the place, but then so does the Technic theme! It really feels like somethings going on behind the scenes. There's so much secrecy though, we're just left to speculate. Was there some early demise of PU? Are the designers strangled by higher ups? Are they already well ahead of our concerns and ripping the bandage off quickly so to speak, or is there nothing wrong at all? Can we not get any kind of dialogue between us and the Technic team, even if we have to sign NDAs? There have been some fantastic efforts made in recent years in terms of new pieces, but the sets seem way behind. We have yet to see the Merc and McLaren, but we kind of already know the cool new pieces we can expect from them from the Yamaha and Audi. And releasing a roughly 1:8 scale car flagship the same year (if not same month) as another 1:8 scale car, something seems wrong here. It's not like they don't know what to do. We could all easily describe a dream flagship that would be considered "best ever". How about a 4000+ piece motorised pneumatic JCB 3CX in 90's flip up lid box with a grader b-model? How about a control center plus (basically a modern control center 3) based universal set, with PU2.0 which has the fully programmable control center plus remote and models including a massive robot arm, a huge black scorpion, a forklift and a futuristic space vehicle thing (in the 90s style box of course!). Imagine how cool the TV advert for that would be! If we can dream this stuff up I'm sure they can. I'm sure their imaginations aren't limited to small supercars, medium supercars cars, big supercars cars, off road cars, futuristic space cars and a real life space car. I wonder if the upcoming water vehicle will be an amphibious car.

I still want to believe the best year/era is still to come. https://images.app.goo.gl/P3hoMguu3HLaR4yo6

Locking diffs you say? That would be cool, their usefulness is in replicating the real thing. Are they useless in a purely manual model? could you not say that about the whole engine and transmission? On the other hand, their effect wouldn't be noticeable in a model you push yourself, and I'm pretty sure they would brake the diff gears if pushed round a corner too fast, unless it could be designed in a way that it disengages with enough force. If we do see locking diffs, great, but if not, it wouldn't be so bad. At least the axles won't be so horrendously massive (wasn't the axle of the zeros almost as thick as the whole wheel!) only obnoxiously massive!

You also missed my spelling of Ackermann! As far as I know yes it is.

Ide be happy if they do the same old functions as we've had before, just done much better. A realistic gearbox with low friction, large CV joints, differential with a high ratio (the ones with the red crown gear), Ackerman steering geometry, proper (as in not cam style) piston engine and a good transmission and suspension setup for off roading. It seems like slowly they have been releasing all the needed elements, the gearbox of the Yamaha (could do with perhaps a few more sizes of clutch gear), the stiffer suspension springs from the BMW/Yamaha/Ferrari, the newer diffs, the larger CVs from the Audi. Now it's time, finally, to bring it all together. But still, most of this good stuff is not new to this flagship. And I get the feeling these wonderful new parts will still be all the colours of the rainbow! Do they not realise? These parts to us are like the most desired minifigs of other themes, these are our minifigs, and look at the love those minifigures get. Dual moulded legs, gun metal grey helmets/armour and rarely does a part of a minifig escape without being printed. Why can't our most treasured and desired parts of the Technic theme get such treatment and love from the coin counters? Imagine all the gearbox gears being gun metal grey, with a tasteful ring of colour printed on them to help the casuals tell them apart. Or all pneumatic hoses in black with their end faces printed different colours. This would allow far more colour coding options but also done in a much more visually pleasing way, the best of both worlds. How about a dual moulded textured rubber over plastic steering wheel? I kinda felt a small glimmer of this looking at the mars rover, with it's new tyres coloured grey, printed wheel caps and new printed arch pieces. That's great! But this is Technic, where the mechanisms, both external and internal, should be the stars of the show. Make the internal mechanisms look authentic and good enough to show on the box. I think this is what I'm always looking for. How is this flagship moving the theme forward (perhaps I'm looking too far forward!) in terms of mechanical authenticity. Sure the outer body work has to look good on the box, but bodywork is boring! So let's see. Will this be a greatest hits of much of the good stuff that we already have (which I really wouldn't have that much to complain about if done well), or will it be something more.....astounding?

Real truck wheels are so deep they can be bolted back to back without any spacers and still have a gap between the tyres. Don't know why they never make truck wheels like this in Lego.

Oh wow, one of my all time favorite sets and I didn't even know it was based on a real thing! Now I feel dumb. You learn something new every day

Funny you should say that, I haven't ever seen a truck that looks like 8868. I care much more about mechanical authenticity than looking authentic so it doesn't bother me, but it's almost like the designer invented the whole concept of this truck because they knew it would make a great set. I could be wrong though. Do you know of any trucks vehicle that 8868 could have been based on?

It looks like there might be 2 at the rear of the truck for the chassis.

Ah yes, now that you say it it's obvious! They look good though.

Even better!

I think it's actually a battery bank.

It might be an easy enough mod to do, though perhaps better with PF rather than PU, so we can use the PF extension cables. I wonder how many motor pumps could be squeezed in there!

I don't think the pre-production one looks that much better, I prefer the final one TBH. Although, the pre-production version doesn't appear to waste parts on an entirely non functional box. Lego actually has a working battery box, with real electric pixies and everything! Maybe they could have added a motor pump to the excavator and have it be powered by the otherwise useless box via a new PU extension cable or something. Add in the third cylinder for the excavator bucket and have the trailer ramp be pneumatic with an extra foldy-out bit at the end. A little more cost can bring a lot more value.

Well, fiber optics are back, that's cool. I will also say that the overall design of the car looks great! But with that big monolithic hub, which contains everything of mechanical/technical interest all prebuilt for you, there's nothing there for me.

It looks nice, I like the printed trans pieces for the headlights, the double rear wheels and the overall shaping and design of the cab looks great. And there's pneumatics so that's always a plus. But I feel like there's something missing. Maybe a sense of ambition or, I don't know, it's not quite grabbing me like I thought it would. The excavator is very bare bones, and it's a shame the arm and bucket movements are linked instead of being separate. And I still really don't like these small pin style piston engines. They are better than not having any engine at all, but if they are going to make new pieces for the Kawasaki motorbike then could they not have made an actual crank mechanism instead of a cam based mechanism? I'm also never quite sure what to make of these sets that have multiple builds instead of using the same number of pieces to make one big build. This set has a certain price point and piece count, but being split up over 4 builds, we end up with 4 small models that individually can't really match it's price in terms of functionality. We get a fairly basic excavator, a fairly basic truck, a fairly basic trailer and a box with a piece of string. There's no one thing that makes me think "Yeah, this is awesome". On the other hand, you do get 4 builds instead of just one (although you can just buy 4 small sets anyway), and when you combine them all together, they make for a fairly good play experience. So I think it will have good appeal to the target audience. For me, I don't know, I'm kinda torn on that. So 4 years in a row we have had a pneumatic set, that's enough to call it a pattern and of course y'all know I love my pneumatics, but now I wonder if it's time to shake it up a bit. All 4 for the pneumatic sets over the past 4 years have been in roughly the same spot in the early summer wave, never the first wave of smaller sets and also never the flagship set of the year. And yes, I am still so very grateful that they are still bringing us pneumatic sets, and that they made them bigger for the Arocs in 2015. Buuuuuuuuut, looking at the real excavator, does anyone else get the feeling that the pneumatics in this set still look a bit undersized even for this rather small excavator? I know some people have been asking for the return of the medium cylinders, but with the way sets are getting ever larger, I feel like the 2x11 cylinders are the new medium cylinders. I also feel like the real life concept is a bit silly. A lithium battery powered excavator, with an even bigger lithium battery pack that just begs to be a diesel generator? For the most part, they are still burning fossil fuels, only in a power plant instead of in the vehicle itself. But maybe in future we get an abundance of electricity from totally green sources (not likely we'll ever have enough if every vehicles needs a crap ton of electricity), and lets say they replace the entire power grid to handle all that power, they store this energy in a massive lithium battery that has a whole new set of practical, cost, environmental and ethical issues. I'm not convinced this is the future. Hydrogen burning ICE however.....