MOC: Eight New City Vehicles

[L@go]

V-LV-47A to V-LV-48A, V-LC-15C

Hello again!

In February, I shared four car MOCs with you here on EB, and your response inspired me to go back to my digital drawing board (MLCad) and fiddle with some new designs. After a while I had a few vehicles I liked and ordered the necessary bricks to build them, and after having stored them on a shelf for a while I finally managed to take some pictures of them a couple of weeks ago. Now I've edited the pics and gradually uploaded them to Flickr (you may have seen one pop up every now and then in the Lego group there), and I thought I'd present them here. Maybe you'll like them, maybe you won't - and maybe you'll have suggestions for improvement, or maybe you'll be inspired to make some designs of your own.

I very much enjoy building vehicles. I've been a petrolhead (gearhead to you Americans) all my life, and used to love building cars as a little boy.

As with my last batch of cars, I've stuck to the style and scale that TLC has done their latest city vehicles in - ie four-wide, but with the wide wheels, and with hinges for mirrors. I've also used the NXT 'XFxxxxxx' tiles for (rear) numberplates where possible. I'm quite happy with these cars, and they're a colorful bunch.

Here we go:

1) The hatchback.

This was inspired by a MOC I found online, but I haven't been able to find it again after I built this. Anyway, it's pretty standard.

I think the 4x4 tile with studs on edge works well for a bonnet (hood).

2) The convertible.

This was also inspired by a MOC by another builder, probably on Brickshelf, but this is also quite standard:

I thought it suited the female driver (whom I, like some chauvinist pig, have placed on the bonnet in one of the pictures. I apologize for any hard feelings - it's not meant to offend anyone...) and I felt that the medium blue stripe along the side made it just a bit more attractive.

3) The Longnose.

I wanted to experiment with longer overhangs (I've always been fascinated with such cars) and quite like the way it turned out. With its orange colour it looks somewhat like a (very) mild version of The Beast, a crazy 70s creation by a guy named John Dodd.

There's a few things I like about this - mainly the orange/black colour scheme, the proportions, the rear window and the spare wheel.

4) The minivan.

The main goal with this was to get a car with an unusual colour, and with the limited number of bricks available in medium blue I limited the colour to the luggage compartment in the back.

I gave the driver a medium blue torso to match the car, and he looks like a young and dynamic guy :) This car features three doors to the luggage compartment and some step plates for easy access. I like the combination of white and medium blue.

5) Stinger.

This may seem like a strange creature to you, but it's inspired by the Grinnall Scorpion III, a long-time favourite of mine that I dream of owning at some point (I tried one a couple of months ago, and it definitely did not put me off the idea).

As you can see, it's a single-seated (no surprises there, as most Lego vehicles are), three-wheeled sports car, with the engine in the rear and free-standing, F1-style front wheels. This is actually a project I started in MLCad a couple of years ago, but finally ended up with a design I was reasonably happy with. The rear end works best for me.

6) The roadster.

Designed to be a topless version of the Sports Coupé in my first batch of vehicles, it's slightly modified with a huge air intake and a different grille.

The thought is that it's been customized slightly, so it felt like a good idea to use some customized bricks from ChromeBricks :) and, as you may have noticed, it's a product of the M division... the driver is such a fan that she's even bought the sweater.

7) The Super Blower.

A low-slung, open-top sports car with a big rear spoiler and an oldtimer-style front end. This is slightly related to the Hot Rod from the first batch, but with a less hot rod-like look.

This is about as low as you can get with the standard 4x12x3/4 base - although it's probably not very safe to have the driver's head stick up like that... but then again, I'm not sure this scary-looking tough guy is all that concerned with safety. I like the look of this one, it's just about as menacing as I wanted it to be, and I think using the two flared mudguards back-to-back worked quite well.

Before I present the last and very different vehicle, let me show you the five founding members of The Hotrodders, the city's custom car club :)

8) The rescue flatbed.

I wanted to make a truck with a very cab-forward design, driver placed in front of the front wheels, and it occurred to me that building a road rescue truck could be a nice way to utilize this design.

I'm happy with this - it looks good in red, has a nice offset 7-wide flatbed, and it's got some nice working features - drawers, storage compartments, and a winch. The two workers, who seem to have slightly different attitudes towards service, sadly don't fit in the cab together, but well, you can't win them all...

The rescue team at work!

That's all for now, but there's more to come from me still - I've made a lime green 'shooting brake' to go with my Lime Light MOD, which I haven't had the time to take pictures of yet, and I'm waiting for the bricks to build a few more cars - a couple of which I think will be particularly nice.

For more views of both these cars and my previous ones, including MLCad renders of all, have a look at the Vehicles set in my Flickr.

Hope you've enjoyed looking at my pictures. Comments are more than welcome!

L@go

Edited July 12, 2012 by Phred

[22kane]

Very cool city vehicles. I really like The Longnose and The Super Blower. They look like something that Lego should release. Great work!!

[LEGO Guy Bri]

Awesome MOCs 'L@go'. Some neat and interesting designs. That 3-wheeler is really funky. I built something similar a few years ago with a single front wheel. I also really like the muscle car with all the chrome. Great job

[lightningtiger]

Nice car collection but an AWESOME rescue truck 'L@go', keep them coming and Brick On Drive On !

[cimddwc]

Great cars!

[-zenn]

I'm diggin' the Stinger, lovely work. Nice incoporation of that tricycle front fork, but that windscreen look a bit off.

[martyboy70]

I like the Super Blower-reminds me of Mad Max's Interceptor.

Edited September 1, 2011 by martyboy70

[LEGO Train 12 Volts]

Very beautiful creations!

My favourite are the minivan and the superblower!

Another good work!

[L@go]

Thank you so much for the response!

Very cool city vehicles. I really like The Longnose and The Super Blower. They look like something that Lego should release. Great work!!

Thanks! I find it hard to pick personal favourites, but I'm happy with those two.

Nice car collection but an AWESOME rescue truck 'L@go', keep them coming and Brick On Drive On !

Thanks! I'm not surprised that's your favourite

Great cars!

Thanks a lot! As you can see, I'm using the air scoop in a more conventional matter than you do

I'm diggin' the Stinger, lovely work. Nice incoporation of that tricycle front fork, but that windscreen look a bit off.

Thanks! I realized early on that I had to use the tricycle fork to make the design work. About the windscreen, I see what you mean, and I've tried different solutions for it - it's possible that the best one would be a transparent double cheese slope of some sort, but those don't exist yet. For now, I can't think of an improvement, although the panel is undoubtedly a bit disturbing for the aerodynamics. If you look at the Scorpion, you'll see that it has only a little deflector and not a full windscreen - so I could have used the same windscreen as on the Super Blower, but that would be very different, and I could have placed the panel on a hinge, but then I wouldn't have room for the steering wheel. Decisions, decisions...

So, you guys have named six different cars as favourites. It's fun to see that you have different tastes, and that you like my vehicles - it inspires me to keep designing!

[SilentMode]

Very well done!

[The Blue Brick]

Awesome designs. My favorite is the roadster.

[Peabo]

Nice work!

[Hinckley]

You have an incredible knack for building vehicles. These are all amazing in their own way. I've blogged them, too! As a fan of six-wide vehicles, I especially like the tow truck. It's very realistic, yet in a classic scale, not overly bulky, yet all the detail is there. And the four-wide vehicles you've built are very nice! I may prefer six-wide, but if I had to have four-wide, I would be very happy if they were the quality of yours.

[L@go]

Thanks again, guys!

You have an incredible knack for building vehicles. These are all amazing in their own way. I've blogged them, too! As a fan of six-wide vehicles, I especially like the tow truck. It's very realistic, yet in a classic scale, not overly bulky, yet all the detail is there. And the four-wide vehicles you've built are very nice! I may prefer six-wide, but if I had to have four-wide, I would be very happy if they were the quality of yours.

I'm honoured, both by your kind words ( ) and by the blog post. Thanks a lot!

[seawideyp]

Very cool city vehicles

[LegoJalex]

That's nice! I like the vehicles, simple but well designed. Nice photos as well!

[Capn Frank]

Very cool city vehicles

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[golfman]

Congrats on these vehicles.

From this lot I prefer the Roadster.

[charly1221]

My personal favourite is the minivan, I also like the medium blue & white combination

[cgarison]

The car hauler MOC brings back fond memories of my green Matchbox Super King car hauler from when I was a tike. Very nice build.

And the rest of the cars are awesome as well. Great Work.

[Strider98]

I especially like the rescue truck, and the way that the other vehicles could be loaded on to it. Great little set of vehicles!

[droomangroup]

i like the rescue truck as well, although the cab is a bit too forward for my taste. i know there isn't really the room, but i totally want to move the front wheels up a stud or two. still cool truck, i like the ladder grill, i need to do that, with the 1x2 grill tiles i've almost forgotten about that old trick.