YABUM (Yet Another Bricklinked UCS MF)

[Soul]

Hey all!

I've been collecting UCS sets for a whie now (I've got the original X-wing, Tie Interceptor etc) but there are some I've missed out on over the years. Of the few I've missed, the one I regret the most has always been the 10179 MF, and every time I look at my collection I kick myself that I didn't buy one (or 10!) when they were on sale.

Well I finally decided I was going to make one, and try to do it as reasonably priced as possible, so this last week I set myself the challenge of finding all the bits in the shortest time I could (I have no patience).

Obviously the first task was find the parts list (hello Bricklink) and decide on some obvious substitutions, e.g. rigging and radar disk. Then I had to set up some tools to help.

Ended up using a combination of these tools

• Excel spreadsheet - complete tracking of all parts, substitutions, orders, prices
  
• Brickstore - used to drag down average prices from Bricklink, create files for Brickfficiency, and create Wanted lists on Bricklink
  
• Brickfficiency - tool to find combinations of stores to give good prices
  
• Bricklink (BL) - lots of searching, use of wanted lists, finding alternative parts etc
  

I then started with my own collection. Had some rules - no breaking apart any sets I had already built, and no raiding my daughters' big box of parts from all their Lego Friends sets. This didn't give me very much :) I think I found 268 parts this way. Most of my lego from my childhood seemed to be black not grey!

Next job was to check Lego.com for bricks that they sold that would be significantly cheaper than BL prices. This resulted in an initial order of around 420 parts.

Then I got reasonably lucky, as a friend on facebook put me in touch with his dad, who has a big collection of random SW lego and agreed to take the parts list and find out what he hard that I needed that he could spare. This got me 1018 parts, including 3 of the minifigs, and a load of spares for quite a reasonable price :) Unfortunately the lot had a bunch of stuff I'd already ordered from Lego - you win some, you lose some :)

Then onto the Bricklinking. This was painful.......

I spent countless hours with Brickfficiency and by hand trying to figure out which parts to get from which stores (EU only) to minimise price and shipping. Now I know I could have saved even more money by buying sub-lots from sellers, but I tried mostly to buy all of one lot from one seller just to make my life easier.

This process resulted in making a lot more substitutions as I worked out what was rare and/or expensive, or where I could make swaps just to reduce the number of stores I'd buy from.

This is by no means the whole lot but here goes (some are obvious swaps and some I didn't find others doing when searching):

• White arches for LBG arches
  
• White plates with bottom pin for LBG plates
  
• Patterned radar disk for plain one
  
• Grey arches for grey arches with slight rise
  
• 6.6L patio poles for 6L ones
  
• Technic pin connectors (smooth) with slotted ones
  
• Grey levers for grey/black levers
  
• DBG Technic 1x16 bricks for mix of DBG and black
  
• DBG cones without top groove for grooved ones
  
• Grey rigging for black rigging
  
• Black technic 4 x 6 open center for LBG
  
• Yellow technic right angles for black
  
• Black long technic pins for blue
  

I might have forgotten some, and it might be that when I've assembled it all I'll swap some around some more, but you get the idea.

Over the course of 2 days I made 10 BL orders from about 5 different countries. Quite a bit to get your head around at the start, like the varying store terms that resulting in one order being cancelled, but on the whole I found the sellers very helpful! The orders got smaller and smaller as I got to the end, which upped the postage costs, but didn't find a way round it.

This left 1 last order from Lego, where I paid slightly over the odds but felt it was better than having to do even more smaller orders to mop up the last lots.

And that's where I am now - 13 orders in total, all but 1 invoiced and some already on the way. Can't way to start building (and modding) :D

Justin

PS Also wanted to thank this forum for some of the info I got from others' threads. It really helped, so thanks :D

Edited September 26, 2015 by Soul

[Datamunky]

Glad to hear you're well on your way! Really wish I'd picked one up back in the day when they weren't extortionate, not sure i have the patience (or cash) to Bricklink one.

[Soul]

Yeah don't think I'll every truly forgive myself for not buying one when they were out. £350 at the time was a lot of money (it still is, but feels relatively less so now). Oh well :)

[ScottishDave]

Welcome to the board, and well done on bricklinking the UCS Falcon!

Thanks for sharing your experiences - it looks like you found lots of ways to keep the cost down .

I sympathise with you regarding the price: I've spent a lot more than £350 on my own bricklinked Falcon... but to be honest, that's my own fault: I keep modding it!

[Soul]

Oh that £350 was the price of the original when you could buy them new. This bricklinked one has cost me around £550 with the shipping!

Edited September 15, 2015 by Soul

[Schneeds]

The really fun part is checking all the orders to make sure everything came as ordered so you don't get half way through and discover a crucial missing component ;)

You've done everything right so far though :)

[rollermonkey]

There are old light grey levers out there for a lot cheaper than the LBG ones. There's someone on BL that sells them in a single superlot of 60, for a reasonable price, too.

(That's the substitution I made)

Edited September 15, 2015 by rollermonkey

[Soul]

Oh interesting. I was thinking of painting the black ones (there was a seller on ebay who sold 60 pre-painted but I didn't want to pay that much).

Will see if if I can find this guy on BL (but will wait till I've built it with black levers to see how much it annoys me :) )

My lovely wife let me buy the UCS Tie Fight last night to keep me busy while I wait for all the MF parts

[lostcarpark]

You could swap the light grey levers into the light bluish grey lever bases to make the substitution less obvious.

Are you thinking of lighting it?

James

[Soul]

I've seen a few LED mods and it does look good. Not sure which way to go yet though - the one where you keep the 1x2 trans-blue tiles or the one with the 1x1 blue studs.

TBH though I think I'll just get it built first and then go from there :)

First order I made has arrived from Lego. They gave me a few extras which was nice. However I must have had a spreadsheet cockup as I ordered a load of 2x4 slopes, when I was supposed to order 2x2 inverted slopes. So now I've a) paid an extra £5 and b) don't have the slopes I need Oh well, think I'll wait until the end and do 1 correction order from Lego, as I'm bound to have made some other mistakes!

[Soul]

Bunch more bits arrived :D

[belkor]

Cool.

How many pieces have you got so far - couple of thousand?

Also, being a tad nosey here but I spy an Openbet business card on your desk! ;)

[Soul]

I'm currently at ~1700.

You know OpenBet?

[lostcarpark]

I'd chance my arm and call LEGO customer service and say you accidentally ordered the wrong part, and see if they'll do you a favour.

James

[Soul]

Hmmm could be worth a go

[belkor]

I'm currently at ~1700.

You know OpenBet?

Yeah - I'm a techie with one of openbet's big UK customers :)

[Soul]

Hah small world

[Lobot]

Hi Justin, it's good to see that someone else has been drawn into the addictive world of Bricklinking UCS sets!

You've done well to keep it within 13 orders and £550. Both times I built a Falcon it was around £600+ although I did source only new parts and I tried to keep it original as much as possible. Your photos you've brought back a lot of happy memories and it's so exciting when all of the parts start to arrive! I look forward to see your next updates; it's massive when finished. Have you considered the Death Star II (10143); that's a great set to build and it's relatively cheap compared to a lot of others.

[Soul]

Hi Justin, it's good to see that someone else has been drawn into the addictive world of Bricklinking UCS sets!

Thanks Lobot

Three more deliveries arrived yesterday, from Italy, Ireland and Denmark. Couple of lots were wrong, but the sellers are correcting and service has been excellent. Very impressed with my Bricklink experience so far!

I'm now up to around 3200 pieces

Oh and my UCS Tie Fighter arrived as well, so I've got something to build while I'm waiting

Edited September 19, 2015 by Soul

[Mr Man]

It's always nice seeing these.

[Kristof]

Thank's for the pics. I always feel like it's me who's getting these packages :D I hope there will be as few errors as possible in your orders and the remaining will resolve fast. Good luck!

[Soul]

Somewhat off-topic Tie shot

[Soul]

More orders have arrived. So far I'm up to 4221 parts with only 3 orders left to get here. Even got a bonus Stormtrooper from one of the sellers who got my order wrong

I could probably start building now, but kinda feel like I should wait until I've got everything first just to build the anticipation!

[joebiwankenobi]

That single stormtrooper is screwed going up against the falcon by himself.

Edited September 23, 2015 by joebiwankenobi

[Soul]

Ha yes he is a little

Another good thing about store cockups, is since that store is sending you replacements anyway you can stick bits you youself have mucked up into that package and save the postage. So my missing inverted slopes should be coming in one of my corrections.

Of course it would still have been better not to have cocked it up myself in the first place

Edited September 23, 2015 by Soul