Category Archives: Models

This is what we’re all about. We scour the web for the best custom LEGO models to share with you. From castles and spaceships to planes, trains, and automobiles, you’ll find the best LEGO creations from builders all over the world right here on The Brothers Brick.

More Awesome Lego Vehicles from The Dark Knight Rises by Tiler

Flickr user Tiler has recently been working through creating various vehicles from The Dark Knight Rises in Lego form. We featured his Tumbler models not long ago, but he’s been hard at work since then adding to the roster. Although we’ve seen many fantastic versions of Batman’s vehicles over the years, but what grabbed me about Tiler’s creations is that they’re in a much smaller scale than most of what we see, without lacking in detail. His latest vehicle is Bane’s truck, which is an awesome monstrosity, and Tiler has perfectly captured the extreme industrial-military look of it. Be sure to also check out his Batbike (below) and terrific Bat.

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The simpler things in life.

Sometimes all you need are a small number of pieces to create something wonderful. That is exactly what Brickshelf user Jetboy (badjoy) did with this Black Temple. The use of the technic tread links to form the columns of the Greek style temple is ingenious!

EDIT:
You can also find more on his Flickr account.

Big thanks to Titolian for pointing this out to me.

Desalination plant

Gilcelio Chagas from LUG Brasil is known for his miniland scale cars, but his recent model is something much different – a desalination plant made for an electrical engineering project. There are numerous details in the elements and custom decals, which you can appreciate in the Flickr set.

Perijove’s LEGO MSL Curiosity Rover hits 10K on CUUSOO [News]

UPDATE (June 14, 2013): LEGO MSL Curiosity Rover is go for launch!

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Back on August 5th when I first highlighted the excellent Mars Science Laboratory Curiosity Rover project by Stephen Pakbaz (Perijove) on LEGO CUUSOO, the project had been online for about eight months and had accumulated about 1,300 votes.

In a sign that timing is everything (with a little help from a few friends on the web), Stephen’s Curiosity project hit 10,000 supporters this weekend. In fact, the project gained its final 5,000 supporters in less than 24 hours.

(I wanted to use a picture of the model we haven’t already used several times here on the blog. Stephen’s proposed model for the project doesn’t include the skycrane, but how awesome would that be?!)

I used Stephen’s instructions to build the rover myself yesterday, and it’s a really excellent model. The build itself was very enjoyable, and I even learned a few SNOT techniques I hadn’t seen before. The final model includes so much detail and functionality it’s really fun to play with, in addition to being just shy of fully functional (with working “rocker bogie” suspension, stowable mast & arm, and little details like forward and rear haz-cams).

However, Stephen’s rover does include a handful of unusual parts, and parts in quantities or colors that I don’t have (especially the Technic parts for a mainly SYSTEM builder like me). Even with my substantial, relatively well-sorted collection, it took me the better part of an afternoon to dig around and gather all the parts, and I still had to place a couple small Bricklink orders to replace parts I don’t have at all in the right colors.

All of this is to say that an official set will be a great way to easily get all of the necessary building materials for a reasonable price — as I’m sure LEGO won’t be charging $2 for the white bracket (of which the model requires two), for example.

Congratulations to Stephen, and I can’t wait to see how LEGO handles this particular project. Specifically, I’d love to see LEGO accelerate the approval of this project, given LEGO’s existing partnership with NASA, the clear educational value of the model, and the current “space fever” gripping the world.

Finally, in case you missed it last week, be sure to check out our interview with Stephen Pakbaz (who worked at JPL as an engineer on the Curiosity project) right here on TBB.

R-6 Froghopper Reconnaissance Walker

We all know Jon Hall (JonHall18) can make amazing Sky-Fi planes…they have been featured several times on TBB. Well the other day he excited many of us when he posted a design sketch of a couple mecha. The result is rather amazing, Jon absolutely excels at getting very non-LEGO shapes out the brick!

Be sure to check out the full photo set for all the views!

Is that Ma.K I smell?!?

Those that know me, know that I love Maschinen Krieger (Ma.K). However, it had been a while since I built anything in the style (about 8 or 9 months actually). Well my tweaking began shortly after I posted Logan’s updated Fireball. Then when he posted his minifig scale SAFS Raccoon…well I completely fell off the wagon at that point.

His brilliant design really got me itchin’ to build a suit that was more of a proper scale compared to minifigs than what my previous designs achieved. And as a small ode to Tim Gould’s original, I thought I would try and replicate his look (because his really is responsible for introducing me to the genre years ago). After some quick LEGO playing before bedtime with my son tonight we came up with a pretty fun little design that should be relatively easy to replicate in different variations…I have to say that I am quite pleased with the result actually :)

For those interested, I also did a fun little stop motion instructional video :P
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tromas/7806357120/in/photostream/

EDIT: Pascal (pasukaru76) has now created instructions in LDraw.

So needless to say, I think it is a safe bet that I will be producing more Ma.K deliciousness in the near future…stay tuned!

Stargate Goa’uld Death Glider

The Death Glider from Stargate is a challenging ship to build due to its curved shape, but Kevin Walter convincingly replicated it in Lego. The brick-built canopy looks very good.

Halo 4 M363 Sticky Detonator

Halo 4 is coming out this fall, and Nick Jensen is taking no breaks in the expansion of his life-sized Halo arsenal. Here is his brick-built version of the Sticky Detonator along with working features.

The Awesome Mechs of Nathan DeCastro

Nathan DeCastro has been posting some killer mechs lately. The LR-S-65 Chenza (pictured below) is my favorite so far. The trans-blue windscreens give it an dashing look, and Nathan’s incorporated some infrequently used pieces in brilliant ways. Be sure to check out his flickr stream for some other sweet mechs, too.

Landscape Contest

Running from August 10th to September 10th, Flickr member Bruno is hosting a contest focused on building landscapes as opposed to vehicles and/or buildings.

DETAILS
Presented to you by Bruno and coupons provided by Brick Takeover
Imagine a peacefull landscape, green trees, flower fields, bunnies hopping around… AND OH MY GOD IS THAT A MANIAC WITH A FLAMETHROWER BURNING EVERYTHING TO SHREDS?!
So far this introduction, I’ll now tell you what the actual meaning of this contest is. You’ve all seen countless builds of apocalyptic wastefields, magnificent castle landscapes and so on. This contest focuses not on the minifigures dwelling in the landscapes, but on the landscapes itself. The goal is to create whatever landscape you like, be it a swamp, a volcanic island, a nuclear fallout landscape and so on.

RULES AND REQUIREMENTS.
-The build can be microscale, a vignette, a diorama or a scene, choose whatever floats your boat.
-You cannot enter previous builds THAT WERE POSTED ONLINE.
-The minimum size for it should be 20×20
-Maximum 2 entries per person
-No height restrictions
-YOU MUST HAVE A BRICKLINK ACCOUNT IN ORDER TO RECEIVE YOUR PRICE
-Minifigures are allowed, but should be kept under 3.
-Third Party accesoires such as Brickforge, Brickarms are allowed.
-Painting isn’t allowed, cutting stickers, flextube or whatever is.
-Don’t have any ideas? here are some themes: Apocalyptic, Castle, Prehistoric, Medieval (not necessarily Castle), Roman/Greek, futuristic/Sci-fi, Steam Punk, Sea-life, Natural.
-Judging is done by me, Eturior and Andreas.

PRIZES.
The prizes are split up into coupons for a 1st, 2nd and 3rd place. The coupons are funded by me and provided by Brick Takeover’s excellent shop. 1st place will receive a coupon of 30 euros, the 2nd place for 20 euros and the 3rd place for 10 euros. Again, the prizes are funded by myself with my hard-earned money so keep in mind that I can’t really afford any fancy price.

LINKS
Discussion Thread
Entry Thread

Signs of life

Chris (Ironsniper) has built a lovely, contemplative mecha that incorporates old-style hinges — since replaced by “click hinges” — and printed tiles for some lovely spot color. What grabbed my attention though, is the story that the model tells.

Chris’ minifig-scale “BFG Suit” gets an upgrade as well, with an impressive gun that incorporates studs wonderfully into the design.

GP-1 Blackjack “Ground Pounder” walker

Jeff Churill (Cooper Works 70) mixes great shaping in LEGO with custom stickers and BrickArms to create this imposing walker that looks like it emerged from the military-industrial complex of World War II.

Buttoned up for combat, this is one walking tank I wouldn’t want to face on a dark battlefield. The feet and legs are definitely the highlight for me on this mech.