Older Technic Instructions in better resolutions - discussion topic

[Kostq]

Hello there,

I've started collecting Technic from around the 42046 times and I've owned many pre-42046 sets. PDF instructions are a godsend by LEGO and all praise goes to them for this.

HOWEVER - 42000 and 42009 made my eyes bleed because of the lower resolution and bad contrast of the PDF pages. Black and DBG were a real pain there, also 2L pins on black beams - boooy did I edit some steps - contrast, colours - or watch speedbuilds on YT to see it better...
As I own sets like 42037 and other - the PDFs online hurt my eyes every time I try to use them for reference.

My topic has the following questions:

0. Is there any HD-topic/collection with such instructions?
1. Is it LEGAL to scan your instructions and upload them or TLG can sue you as they own the rights?
2. Is it LEGAL to re-do their instructions in Stud.io and upload them somewhere /like our LDD/LXF/IO topic?
3. Is there any point in doing so?
4. Are you happy with the old PDFs?

If the topic isn't according to the rules you can safely delete it - I still have my instruction booklets for the sets I own.

[The01]

You're right, many old instructions are only available in very low resolution and they are everywhere the same, I checked Rebrickable, Peeron and lego.com. To answer some of your questions:

0. I haven't found any.

1. The Fair Play notice by TLG says:

Quote

Scanning Of Copyrighted Materials Into A Web Site
The LEGO Group owns the copyrights to its building instructions, publications and to the photographs used in our catalogs and on our packages. Copying, scanning and distributing these materials on the Internet would be an infringement of our copyrights. Nevertheless, at the present time the LEGO Group does not object to scanning of limited extracts of these materials in unaltered form for non-commercial purposes of exchange of information or good faith commentary. However, scanned /images/info should not be given such prominence as to indicate sponsorship of the Web site by the LEGO Group. We would ask that the photographs be scanned without distortion or overemphasis of the LEGO logo. A disclaimer and notice must appear indicating that the copyrights are owned by the LEGO Group (e.g. LEGO Group. This is an independent site not authorized or sponsored by the LEGO Group).

2. see above, it's probably the same, however some people have done it.

3. The point: Higher Quality

4. They are better than nothing, nice to have them.

[BusterHaus]

48 minutes ago, GTS said:

2. Is it LEGAL to re-do their instructions in Stud.io and upload them somewhere /like our LDD/LXF/IO topic?

Most sets, including the ones you mentioned, have LDR files (or similar digital format) created by the community.  They are available online for free. If you are stuck, you can always open it and zoom in on the section that's of interest to get the answer for your own build. 

Creating instructions from these files is also possible, but I wouldn't try to replicate them 1:1. Legal reasons are one concern, but just finding the right view angles would take a while. Also, most Lego instructions have more steps than are needed by a seasoned builder, so you could also combine steps and make them shorter and a bit more challenging. 

The whole idea would be to make them look different from Lego's official version, while following the building sequence.  But I'm not a lawyer, so take this with a grain of salt. 

[astyanax]

1 hour ago, GTS said:

3. Is there any point in doing so?

For me personally, no. Whenever I acquire an old 2nd hand set, I just go on BrickLink and order the corresponding paper instructions. They're typically cheap; the main cost is in the shipping (weight). Hasn't failed yet, and I've personally had no need yet for PDFs of old instructions.

Just as I like handling plastic bricks, I also like handling paper booklets.

[2GodBDGlory]

This website here has heaps of scanned instructions: https://brickfactory.info/

It's definitely an older looking site, but seems to have been pretty well updated so far, and works fairly nicely.

I haven't used it much lately, since I find the Lego PDF ones more convenient, but when I was a kid I spent hours just looking through the instruction books!

[Fuzzock]

5 hours ago, 2GodBDGlory said:

This website here has heaps of scanned instructions: https://brickfactory.info/

Man I remember stripping that site with my FTP. For some reason the disabled that after a while...

Annoyingly I lost the instructions a few years later. :(

Ian...

[1963maniac]

This is the link for 42000 from LDraw's OMR: https://omr.ldraw.org/files/1047 . 42009 does not seem to be available there.