New and old 8860

[dellock6]

I still remember exactly that christmas of many years ago when I was probably 6 or 7 (beginning of the '80s) and I received the 8860. I kinda knew it was coming (believing in Santa was gone...) as I pestered my parents for an entire year, so I woke up probably at 6am, rushed into the living room, grabbed the pack (I knew exactly the size by the tons of times I stared at the box in the local Lego shop) and I started to build it. It was an incredible day, and even afterwards that model was one of my favorite (together with 8851).

Long story short, I had my dark ages, came back to LEGO 5 years ago with 8043, and when I saw the 40th Anniversay chassis, I knew I had to build it, and I also took a chance to buy again the original 8860, as many of my original sets went away during the dark ages.

After building the two cars, I know I'm totally biased because of my story, but the old one is so much better! Some notes I took:

- instructions: I didn't remember how more enjoyable were the old ones until I used them again. It's not a 1000 pages book with one step for each piece, rather just 20 steps with many pieces in each step, and many times you need to look carefully at the picture to spot were a piece has to go. Also, no 1:1 scale ruler on each page where there's an axle or a beam, just a number telling you which size you need. I've read someone else in the past saying that old style instructions were not pretending that we were stupid, and I totally agree. They are not difficult, rather more challenging, and thus more funny!

- technic features: the old car has a differential and adjustable seats with both recline and position operated with gears. The new one has no differential, and seats can only be moved forward and backwards manually. Where the new one is better is steering, the rotating 2x2 plates in the old one are a bit awkward and really easy to detach while playing:

- size: I like both, the old one is really big, even compared with new cars:

but I also like the new compact design of the new one.

In general, I'm not really happy with the new one. I totally understand that using three different existing sets to make a new one has challenges and compromises to accept, and kudos go to the designer, he/she did a great job under these conditions. But as @Sariel pointed out in his review, this is meant to be a 40th Year anniversary model, and as such LEGO Technic should have deserved something more "wow". My feeling when I finished to build the new, after I built the old, was a sort of "this is it???". In comparison, Ferrari built the F40 to celebrate their 40th anniversay, something truly special. This new 8860 gives me the feeling of something cheap and done in a hurry just to "do something". A feeling I don't like.

We still have half year to wait for some true celebrating flagship set, and in a way I hope there's somewhere a secret special set besides those announced for the second half, otherwise if this is THE celebration set, I'll be really disappointed. Who cares the special 3L liftarm, give me a special set.

[1gor]

I agree that special set would be better - even to make anniversary chassis as actual set but to introduce some new parts like smaller differential as it is mentioned lots of time that there is no real differential in this 3 into 1 model.