Break free of the chains that bind you – and turn them into a boat

Aido K‘s latest LEGO masterpiece has left me lost for words. Well, not completely speechless – but this is a family-friendly website, so I can’t publish my audible reaction. My favourite genre of creation – if you can call it that – is people using the engineered properties of the LEGO system of parts in unusual ways. That’s where the idea for this build came in: LEGO bricks are designed to work under compression – that is, being squashed together. Aido turned that on its head, so this uses elements in tension (i.e. being pulled). So that boat in the middle is almost entirely shaped by chains under tension and the pull of gravity. It’s beautiful!

Chain Boat

That means the boat can fold down flat for easy transport – which is just as well, as this model made its debut at the Brickvention show in Melbourne over the weekend. Seeing the boat rise from the chains is very satisfying!

3 comments on “Break free of the chains that bind you – and turn them into a boat

  1. semcg

    You know, I purposefully have my adblocker turned of for Brothers Brick, but repeatedly in the last few weeks, I’ve had ads that appear covering the entire page and have to be manually closed before continuing to view content. I love to support small sites like TBB, but if it continues I’ll probably block them all again.

  2. Andrew Becraft (TBB Editor-in-Chief)

    Yeah, our ad provider rolled these without without prior permission (which itself is annoying). I’ll have a word with them and get them dialed back to something more reasonable. We appreciate everyone who chooses to help support sites like TBB — which provide content for free to the community — and we absolutely don’t want to turn readers off. It’s always a fine line between paying the bills (which are substantial) and providing a good reader experience. Thanks for the feedback, and thanks for understanding!

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