I love a good fire engine. While I cringe a bit at seeing a fire truck called “vintage” when it’s from an era I remember well — I clearly recall watching big fire engines go by during the 1979 4th of July parade in Freeport, Maine — this hook and ladder truck by Glaktek is gorgeous to behold. A new take on one of his earlier builds, both builds also fit within the scale, parts selection, and basic building techniques of official LEGO sets, which makes its unique shape all the more beautiful.
Welcome back fight fans, to Sin City Nevada for another round of Friday Night Fights. Since large parts of this blog’s ancestral homeland (Washington State) seem to be going up in smoke this week, we thought it appropriate to turn our attention to mini-fig scale fire trucks.
In the shiny red corner, we have Isaac Mazer and his super-accurate Rescue 134, inspired by an engine from an actual ladder company of the same name, in his native Toronto:
In the even shinier redder corner, Galaktek takes a step away from the real world and goes future-retro with the FutureCity Fire Engine from the planet Incendia XII (which sounds like it probably needs a lot of fire trucks).
As usual, constant reader, you are tasked with deciding, by way of comment, which truck is destined for glory and which is destined to rust in the fire house. On the last edition of Friday Night Fights, Concept Art Ships, Jake nailed it to the wall in an 11-4 showdown against Alexander. Tune in next week for another action packed edition of Friday Night Fights!
So said Malachi Constant in Kurt Vonnegut Jr.’s “Sirens of Titan“. Malachi would no doubt have been a fan of Alex Jones’s (Orion Pax) latest creation the Seagrave Fire Engine. The model features a number of custom chrome elements, but if you stripped it all away or replaced it with a more purist solution, the model would be no less stunning.
And since it is just after 4:20 here in Vegas, I figured I’d throw in some extra Paxian eye-candy for the stoners out there. Enjoy “Emerald Ivy”
Whoah…dude…don’t bogart the spliff.
A bit of chrome goes a long way to add realism and distinctiveness to Alex Jones’ (“Orion Pax”) fire truck.
In an odd but awesome twist, LEGO City leaves the, well, city and heads for the hills in 2012. All of the law enforcement and emergency services that form the core of each year’s LEGO City sets are represented by wildland firefighters and park rangers instead.
Looks like there are some interesting new brick…bricks.
Oh yes, there are bears. I am so building a moonshine still out back of this hillbilly cabin.
In the same vein, the firefighters battle forest fires with their bulky wildland equipment.
I wonder if wunztwice will approve of the chainsaws…
Via Eurobricks.
After the LEGO Cuusoo Beta launched in English last week, I’ve been keeping an eye on the site to see what people are up to. As announced last week, winning projects have to reach 10,000 supporters, and the winning designer keeps 1% of the proceeds from the LEGO set’s sales.
Projects from several Japanese builders are also available on the English site, including one of Hidaka‘s classic, oft-imitated pianos.
Other cool projects include a Back to the Future Delorean and Macross/Robotech Valkyrie.
Of course, we here at TBB don’t want to be left out! Dan already mentioned his Protype Attack Mecha Alpha Zero design, while Nannan submitted his massive “Mirage” collaboration with Tyler:
I thought I’d go a bit smaller, with a couple of my favorite vehicles — a wildland fire engine and WW2 ambulance:
It’ll be interesting to see where all of this goes!
Bartosz Kacprzyk (the oneman) creates his version of the fire truck from Fahrenheit 451. I love the fitting retro-futuristic style of this vehicle and the plow, which I think makes the creation stand out. The warm lighting also adds to the presentation; we don’t need to see a pile of burning books to know that things are about to heat up.
I was really torn between which of Marin Stipkovic’s vehicles to blog, his garbage truck or lime fire engine. Both had been sitting on my to-blog list for a few days, then I realized that I could do both. Eatin’ my cake.
The fire truck is slightly more glamorous, because . . . well . . . it’s a fire truck.
Check out other pictures of the garbage truck, and fire engine.
Who says fire engines have to be red or yellow? Leigh Holcombe (worker201) certainly doesn’t. Here’s his 8×8 tactical fire fighting truck, full of hooks, ladders, and all those compartments that make fire trucks awesome.
UPDATE: 10197 Fire Brigade is now available from the LEGO Store online.
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In news that I strongly suspect reveals the mystery question mark in the 10194 Emerald Night announcement video, LEGO announced 10197 Fire Brigade at LEGO fan events in Germany and Portugal.
Here’s the full announcement from The LEGO Group:
10197 – Fire Brigade
Ages 16+. 2,231 pieces.
US $ 149.99; CA $ 199.99, UK £ 97.85, DE € 149.99
Build an authentic vintage fire station!
Ding ding ding! There’s a fire in town! The fire brigade drives to the scene from this detailed and realistic 1930’s fire station. Designed to fit with other modular buildings like 10182 Café Corner and 10185 Green Grocer, the station features rare LEGO® pieces and innovative construction techniques. It includes a ‘30s-style fire truck, 4 minifigures, a fire-dog, an opening station garage door, and a removable building roof for interior access. It also includes 2 fully-furnished floors with fire-fighting tools, racks for the firemen’s helmets, fire-pole, ping-pong table, kitchen with fully-stocked fridge, couch, bookshelf and a roof with a water tower and bell. Measures 14″ (35 cm) high and 10″ (25 cm) wide.
- Includes a 1930’s-style fire truck, 4 minifigures and a fire-dog!
- Features lots of realistic details including fire-fighting tools, racks for firemen’s helmets and even a fire-pole!
- The station house features an opening station garage door and 2 fully-furnished
floors including a kitchen with fully-stocked fridge and a ping-pong table!- Remove the roof for interior access!
- The roof is equipped with a water tower and bell!
- Fire Brigade features rare LEGO elements including bricks and plates in dark tan, 1×1 dark red tiles, a red hot dog and the 3x6x5 Belleville® arch. It also features gold fireman’s helmets, a tan hand bag and a red sliding garage door!
- Measures 14″ (35 cm) high and 10″ (25 cm) wide.
- Add Fire Brigade to your LEGO® Town and combine it with other modular buildings like 10182 Café Corner and 10185 Green Grocer!
September can’t come soon enough for me, and you can guess where my second fire station will show up in October.
I’ve uploaded a full gallery of photos to Flickr:
UPDATE: Andreas Haase has photos from 1000steineland 2009, showing interior shots of the upper story:
Check out the album on 1000steine.de for more event pics from the event in Berlin.
The fire engine I built last year was mainly inspired by other LEGO builders, so I wanted to design something from scratch on my own. Here’s the result:
My brother sent me a link to the S&S Fire Apparatus Co’s awesome Wildland Ultra XT, and I just had to build this amazing vehicle — used by the US Bureau of Land Management and local departments where brushfires are common, such as the San Diego Fire Department.
Check out more photos in my LEGO S&S Wildland Ultra XT photoset on Flickr, plus instructions.
Bill Ward just posted a cool old-fashioned fire engine:
Check out the photoset on Flickr and some background information in Bill’s blog post.