42175 Volvo FMX Truck & EC230 Electric Excavator

[pleegwat]

I think they're just trying to do too much with too few pieces and it comes out looking cheap.

[Maaboo the Witch]

Box rox.

[1gor]

At least we know it has 6 cylinder inline engine; it looks more and more interesting set.

...and rear wheel drive...

[msk6003]

Looks like this set's engine also use kawasaki's new parts.

[Tazmancrash]

Reminds me of 8872 forklift transporter from 93.

But I like it. I'll probably pick 1 or 2 up.

No B model. But I'm sure that will change.

[Maaboo the Witch]

Having pored over a six-page article on the EC230, I can see that several railings on the set version are missing because the rear section is too short. The tracks are also shorter than those on the real thing.

It's a shame, because otherwise it's pretty accurate. I also reckon it'll scale well with the EW160E, since the EC230 is smaller.

[R0Sch]

Luckily only the excavator is "electric". A nice piston engine is always cooler to build and listen to. Wonder when we will finally see some new pneumatic parts. A compact air tank, a medium cylinder, etc.

[Ngoc Nguyen]

12 minutes ago, Maaboo the Witch said:

Having pored over a six-page article on the EC230,

Care to share the article?

[lmdesigner42]

Nice to finally get some official images of this set. 2274 pieces does seem like quite a few for the number and complexity of the functions, considering e.g. 42128 or 42069. On the back of the box pic where the cab is tilted, there appears to be a 12:16 gear connection for the steering. Is that the first time for an official Technic set?

[Maaboo the Witch]

Just now, Ngoc Nguyen said:

Care to share the article?

It's in the September 2023 issue of Earthmovers magazine and not available online, sadly. But here's an online article with an image that shows what I'm talking about. Note the railings.

[johnnytifosi]

Of course it had to be these lame pins again for pistons. Why has Lego stopped using proper crankshafts, cylinders and pistons everywhere? The scale argument is irrelevant, I'd prefer a proper inline 3 or v6 to this lame I6.

[Oh_Hi_Mao]

13 minutes ago, johnnytifosi said:

Of course it had to be these lame pins again for pistons. Why has Lego stopped using proper crankshafts, cylinders and pistons everywhere? The scale argument is irrelevant, I'd prefer a proper inline 3 or v6 to this lame I6.

I recall few same scalled trucks (42098 and concrete mixer). Both had simple engines like this one. I think 42171 Mercedes F1 is the recentmost set with "proper" engine so no, Lego didn't stopped using it in new releases.

[Zerobricks]

1 hour ago, lmdesigner42 said:

Nice to finally get some official images of this set. 2274 pieces does seem like quite a few for the number and complexity of the functions, considering e.g. 42128 or 42069. On the back of the box pic where the cab is tilted, there appears to be a 12:16 gear connection for the steering. Is that the first time for an official Technic set?

I think so, though it's totally a legal connection with half a stud offset in one direction and a stud offset in other.

[dhc6twinotter]

Oh cool, it does have a fake engine!  That’s a plus!  

[SNIPE]

13 hours ago, Stereo said:

It's 41531 fan housing on the left, and 68869 rounded 4x4 tile on the right, no?

 

Bar 6L with stop ring in orange (behind the cab) is a new colour, I haven't spotted anything else unique to this set.

I belive so, I could replicate the tile and just use something like 60208 x4 instead of x2 41531 but...

We will see ... because I have to buy the 1:8 supercar and the mercadees 4x4 too

5 hours ago, dhc6twinotter said:

Oh cool, it does have a fake engine!  That’s a plus!  

OH awesome! so the cabin DOES flip up! awesome

Edited May 2, 2024 by SNIPE

[Paul B Technic]

My plan is to get this as a base for some C models.

[Nuts4Lego]

I’ve always hated the fake engines in all but the bigger scaled sets, for the smaller scales i much prefer these dinkier ones with the correct amount of cylinders.

 

i like the idea of this set, will be cool to see the models people make from it.

[Erik Leppen]

I have zero interest in this set.

I hate to see a big set being spent on small vehicles. Big sets are the only opportunities for big vehicles, while small vehicles can be done in small sets as well. This set has the features of a small set and the price tag of a big set. That's a shame, in my view.

The truck would have been a nice 60 euro set, the trailer is something people can make form their own pieces (it doesn't seem to have any noteworthy functions), the excavator would have been a really nice 70 euro set, and the "generator" simply doesn't belong in this theme at all.

[allanp]

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.....

Edited May 2, 2024 by allanp

[msk6003]

yes. I also think the dump truck version of the FMX would have been better instead of the trailer and battery pack. This also had the potential to incorporate pneumatics into the dump bed operation, making it a combination of two pneumatic sets.

 

Or someone will make dump truck using part on trailer and battey.

[Oh_Hi_Mao]

Interesting find. If you click on building instructions in lego.com page (link: https://www.lego.com/fr-be/service/buildinginstructions/42175 ) you will see pre production model with a red trailer, gray excavator tracks:

 

Edited May 2, 2024 by Oh_Hi_Mao

[Maaboo the Witch]

This set is 50% hit, 50% miss. Bit of a letdown for the biggest Volvo set yet.

[Ngoc Nguyen]

Wow TLG leaking their own preliminary images...

[Maaboo the Witch]

1 minute ago, Ngoc Nguyen said:

Wow TLG leaking their own preliminary images...

And it has the correct amount of railings! What happened?

[Lixander]

Now that the new sets are available to see on lego.com, I found something interesting: the Volvo FMX truck has a tilting cab and an inline 6 cylinders engine.

Spoiler

P.S.: Sorry for the spam. Above is already mentioned this.

Edited May 2, 2024 by Lixander