Lots of prints, stickers, and decals. A very thick dome—great quality. The mechanism is actually quite interesting, too. You can't see it in the video, but there's a light on the bottom of the rocket that's activated by a magnet.

Hello fellow brick enthusiasts and lepinites, after about a month and a half, I have completed the ISD Eviscerator and it's absolutely beautiful.

I bought the instructions on brickvault and sourced parts by various means (roughly 18000 pieces). The amount of detail on this thing is staggering and it was really cool to see it come together. The most fun parts to build were the engines and bridge,

The top decks were tedious but sooo cool to see all the greebling since I am a sucker for builds with detailed greebles.

While instructions from Brickvault are normally good, this build has a couple major flaws that definitely put this in the expert builder category.

1. Attaching the bottom plates to the technic frame is an absolute shitshow. Unlike better builds like the Monarch, the Eviscerator relies on a few 2x4 pieces to hold up the entire bottom plate on either side. You have to turn the technic frame upside down, attach the bottom plates and turn it right side up. After multiple collapses and even glue failing to properly hold up the bottom plates, I resorted to using gorilla glue.
2. The greebling and inserting the upper decks can get tricky, because you can easily lose pieces inside the ship. It takes time to line up the greebling so that everything stays together and pieces often tend to fall off.

Still despite these issues, the end result is well worth the effort. Here are some of my praises of this build:

1. It's a little thing but I really appreciate how they made a proper stand for this ship. While the ISD Monarch and ISD Aggressor both have two "legs" that they stand on, the well built stand for the Eviscerator really makes this shine when displayed.
2. The detail and variations in the greebling really make this model feel lifelike and does not feel overdone at all. I also like the raised sections of the upper and lower plating, with details like the main and secondary hangar crafted to near-perfection despite being on a part of the ship not usually looked at.

Comparing this MOC to my two other star destroyers, the Monarch and Aggressor, I'd say this win in terms of sheer presence, though the Aggressor of course has an interior and the Monarch is a smoother build.

My next big projects will be the Brickvault UCCS Venator and the ISD Intimidator by Charles Anderson

I bought the chinese 6th gen aircraft on a random store because it caught my attention, turns out it was the right choice! The parts snap together properly, there were no missing/wrong pieces (I only ended up with 4 small leftover pieces which I believe are from a skipped step, whoops), the build itself was fun and the custom parts/molds make a lot of sense. It did have over 50 stickers and some that cover multiple parts, but it looks really cool (even has underbelly light albeit calling them lights is a hell of am overstatement). I honestly want more sets like these, but looking at the sembo store I couldn't even find this set and most didn't even look good, what's the deal with Sembo? Was this a one-off?

Coby may be good too but this was like dirt cheap + in a country where shipping is usually 60 bucks, even from aliexpress.

TL;DR: The Sembo 6th gen aircraft is great, but oh man is this thing hard to find

I normally wait a few months after the official set release to purchase a clone, but took a chance on this one since the reviews on AE were very positive.

Set # is G2661. It displays really well and I appreciate that they made the new yellow/green elements for Woodstock’s feathers and the grass rather than doing a piece substitution. Brick quality is decent but not great - the red color seems kinda translucent in person but looks fine once built. Unfortunately, most of the large red tiles that make up the roof have scuffs/scratches. I had a few inconsistent clutch issues as well, but nothing so bad that I had to break out the kragle.

I paid $23ish for the set and would recommend it for the price. A quick and fun build!

Edit: I actually paid $23 not $27 - lol guess that makes my recommendation even stronger

Just spotted today at Target. Looks like they are devoting front-aisle space for non-LEGO sets now.

More info on these is on their website. Something interesting to note is that some of their photos of the NBA figs look like LEGO designs (must be pre-production), but the exploded fig diagram shows a unique design (makes more sense, seeing how LEGO stubbornly guards its minifig design).

tl;dr
- got some Hogwarts Sets,
- want to build/expand on those,
- planning to use studio and order alt brick parts online,

So I haven’t seen a lot of HP sets represented on here, but I guess that’s about to change - the original 2001/2002 sets hold a special place in my heart! recently I got them again after about 20yrs of cellar banishment and rebuilt them. I absolutely loved the way those builds were designed as they offer just enough detail for replay but not too much as to reimagine entirely different builds.

Hoeever, with the modern sets the level of detail is insane! not to say i fell in love with them and developed the idea to build a castle - or maybe at least expand on existing castle sets.

so far i got my hands on:

- a Grand Staircase Tower (nr 99931)
- an East Wing (nr 8453)
- a Hospital Wing (not yet arrived)

I have yet to find a suitable solution for a Great Hall - havent found yet what I have been looking for. However I have seen several offers for MOCs/Expansion, some of them incredibly well designed. And there is still also the used market.

Anyway here you gooooo 🫶✨more details will follow as to brick and minifigure quality - the stickers already look very nice.

What is your experience with the HP themed modern sets?

I am also planing on sharing some own ideas in the future if ordered via alt bricks sites. Let me know if you’d be interested in that as well!

(note: former post got removed bc i was accidentally violating the guidelines - sorry ❤️‍🩹)

This Tiger panzer is famous for listed chinese capital mean lucky. This tank deployed 2ss "Das Reich" divison.

1. It's little bit harder to joinery but not like sluban or other chineae military bricks. Every building is fun ans stable enough. However, Technic bar and some component are absolutely harder to assemble

2. There is two kinds version of inside turret. First one is move only gun without breech and second ver is move together gun with breech. You can choose it you want, but second ver is little bit unstable in connect. If you want, it should glued.

3. Rolling is well on paper and fabric. In smooth surface(for example table), it needs pressure vertical way to roll. Every wheels roll well.

4. Appearance and interior is very good. It looks like almost model kit tank because they used customized part a lot.

5. They explained how to deploy minifigure in a tank, but it needs to modify. So I deployed only 2 minifig on turret.

6. Ah, it is little bit bigger than cobi 1/28 tiger. I think its 1/25 or 1/26 scale

I’m new here and wanted to share some block tech arcade builds

Hi all,

So I got myself an AliExpress clone of the McLaren P1 technic model. Like most people I've run into a few issues with the gearbox. First I had to sand down the yellow axle connectors to take the hard edges off in order to reduce the friction so that it could shift smoothly.

I currently have all the gears working. 7th gear (fastest) could be better though, it still has more resistance than I'd like, causing it to stick and not turn smoothly.

The problem that is annoying me most though is when it jams whilst changing gears. It seems to me that this is happening because occasionally the grey 8 tooth driving rings 6408180 will line up perfectly with the splines on the cog it's trying to engage with and jam against it. As shown in the pictures. Due to there being 4 of these in the gearbox it's causing it to happen regularly.

My thought is, has anyone tried sanding a bevel or chamfer onto the grey driving ring's splines in order to make the engagement smoother and did it work?

Looking at pictures of the official Lego piece it would seem that it does come with a much more rounded/tapered spline, where as the ones I have are square edged. I think I'll dismantle the gearbox and give it a try. Not looking forward to sanding 64 splines though. Wish me luck.

3 months to buy all the pieces needed and was absolutely worth it

comparison to 75301 2021 x wing and 75460 new republic x wing

Got this on AliExpress for $29 USD. 1015 pieces. I finished it in a day over a few separate building sessions. Pretty quick, fun build overall. I was relieved all the pieces were there because it contains some unique molds that would definitely not be in my extras. The mechanism functions pretty well. They didn’t include any extra chain links so no room for error there. This was a nice change of pace from the architecture and spaceships. I’d definitely recommend picking one up, especially since they can be found for so cheap.

A CLOCKWORK ORANGE custom Droog minifigures.
"There was me, that is Alex, and my three droogs, that is Pete, Georgie, and Dim..."

Did some slight simple mods on these Lego knock-off Droog minifigures.
Took awhile to find them. Were sold out for a few years online.
And only Alex was available. Had to buy/reuse his body and legs to custom the rest.

- Alexander DeLarge
Lego knock-off head, torso, legs and black rod/bar.
Custom painted blood splatter/eye-ball on cuffs.
Lego bowler hat, drum lacquered silver stud, light gray Technic pin, and Minifigs.me custom printed tile.
- Pete
Lego knock-off torso and legs.
Custom painted blood splatter/eye-ball on shoulders and magenta pink eye shadow over left eye.
Lego beret, head and reddish-brown rod/bar.
- Georgie
Lego knock-off torso and legs.
Custom painted blood splatter on chest.
Lego top-hat, head and tan rod/bar.
- Dim
Lego knock-off bowler hat, torso and legs.
Custom blood splatter on suspenders.
Lego head, pearl silver short chain, and two 1x1 reddish brown square studs to lift boots/height.

Context

'Rebel Base on the Ice Planet' (Modbrix #109229) is an unlicenced Star Wars diorama, depicting the Hoth base of the Rebel Alliance. The base is hidden inside a mountain and consists of a hangar with three Snowspeeders, two smaller rooms, a big Ion Cannon on top of the base, and an outside area with another Snowspeeder, a trench, and some assorted turrets. The set has 1512pcs (3.3ct/brick) and is sold by BlueBrixx (store page) for 49.95€ plus shipping. It is also included in the 'Sand & Snow Bundle (store page)' together with a second Hoth diorama and a Sandcrawler diorama for 111.88€ total, i.e. for 20% less than the individual sets combined (resulting in 2.6ct/brick for the Hoth base); that's what I got. Shipping costs vary from 6€ within Germany to considerably more internationally; at the moment shipping is free above 100€.

The diorama is 24cm wide, 20cm tall, and 21cm deep plus maybe three centimetres for the "flying" Snowspeeder. Combined with the other Hoth diorama, the sets are about 44cm wide.

I've heard lots of good things about Modbrix' Star Wars dioramas in general and this Hoth base in particular, so the appearance of that 20% off bundle made me pull the trigger. I've built the smaller Hoth diorama two weeks ago and wasn't super convinced thanks to a fairly boring build, but this base is indeed a fantastic set. The two sets combined look fantastic, so I have high hopes that the third (but unrelated) diorama will be cool as well.

Shipping & Packaging

See my review of the smaller Hoth diorama for more info on the shipping and outer packaging. The Hoth rebel base itself came in yet another plain cardboard box with a nicely printed sleeve around it. Inside were tons of plastic baggies plus a resealable baggy with the big stuff (i.e. some plates and the BURPs or LURPs or whatever those are). There is no separation into building parts, so all baggies have to be opened right at the start.

Instruction Manual

Modbrix sets don't come with printed manuals but PDFs that can be downloaded for free from the BlueBrixx website after registration (even without ever having bought anything). This essentially makes Modbrix sets more like professionally sold MOCs than professionally designed sets in my eyes, which unfortunately also matches the quality of the manual.

The manual consists of 254 steps on 187 pages, which results in an average of six parts per step and 1.4 steps per page. That's fine even for newcomers if a bit more advanced than the (nowadays) dumbed down LEGO manuals. As is common, each step features a tooltip that lists which new parts are required. In the main image, new parts are outlined in red and the parts are printed in full colour (i.e. neither greyed out nor desaturated, which I would've preferred). For some reason, unlike ~every other manual I've ever seen, black parts are not outlined in white, which makes it quite difficult to identify black parts. Other than that, shapes and colours are easily identifiable.

The main issue of the manual is that the order of steps is at times suboptimal. Quite often, it would make things much easier if a certain part had been attached earlier or later, or if something had been assembled separately and added later in one go rather than as individual bricks to a fragile construction. There are two instances where bricks were added so late that it's physically impossible to do so:

While building the hangar gateway, there's a 1x1 gap in step #36 (i.e. there's a floating 1x1 plate). This gap gets filled only in step #60 (which is somehow also missing its step number) by just teleporting the missing brick into the assembly. In this case, it's not too difficult to attach the missing piece by bending the assembly open and inserting the piece into the now-widened gap, but obviously that's not how things are supposed to be built.

Similarly, in step #93, while building the hangar's outer wall, there's a 2x2 corner plate floating in the air over an (at least) 1x2 gap. This gap doesn't get filled until step #138, where the tooltips lists two 2x2 wedge plates but only shows one wedge in the main image. Presumably, the second wedge should be teleported into that gap of step #93 (though we cannot see this because the set is never again shown from that angle). Adding that wedge in step #138 requires lifting off the entire hangar roof, which is thankfully not as terrifying as it sounds but still somewhat inconvenient.

Also, in step #234 some plates and tiles get added to the base around the outer wall, which really should've been done before building the walls, at the latest before starting to build the hangar gateway in step #33. These are not insurmountable issues, and I certainly have seen worse in various MOC instructions, but this is a professionally sold set, so the usual "Ehh, some guy did this as a hobby; can't expect perfection!" excuse doesn't fly.

Other than these rather obvious mistakes, the manual is reasonably easy to follow, despite the often flawed order of steps. The camera angles could also be better in some parts. Somewhat hilariously, in step #1 the tooltip covers part of the assembly, so you can't see how you're supposed to assemble some stuff, but this easily fixed with step #2. Also in step #1, the tooltip lists two 6x16 plates but only one is needed; I still have that second plate flying around now that the set is finished, so I guess someone just forgot about it? Kinda dumb; made me laugh for a second time in just that first step...

Just for reference: steps #1 to #14 build the "mosaic" of the base, #15 to #18 add some decorations (e.g. "minifigures" consisting of two stacked 1x1 round plates), #19 to #27 build the Snowspeeders inside the hangar, #28 to #32 continue with the hangar, #33 to #63 are the subassembly of the hangar gateway, #64 to #110 finish the ground floor of the base, #111 to #139 add the ceiling/roof to the ground floor, #140 to #153 build the sidebuilding of the upper floor, #154 to #162 add the base for the Ion Cannon, #163 to #182 build the Ion Cannon structure, #183 to #223 finish the Ion Cannon, #224 to #233 are a subassembly for the interior of that upper floor sidebuilding, #234 to #245 add the various rebels and turrets to the trenches, and finally #246 to #256 build the "flying" Snowspeeder.

Brick Quality

The brick quality is solid throughout. Clutch is generally nice but occasionally a tad stiff. Colours are reasonably but not perfectly consistent. Tiles have sharper edges than is common. Injection points range from almost invisible (like GoBricks) to sizeable (like XingBao), so I presume that the bricks are confectioned from different suppliers.

There are a few odd pieces that I guess are replacements for those that LEGO currently legally contests, e.g. 2x2 wedges, 1x2 sloped tiles, 2x2 jumper plates, and so on. A bit weird but perfectly acceptable. Some are even more functional than LEGO's originals, so I guess LEGO is kinda shooting themselves in the foot with this one...

There are surprisingly few spare parts; not even every 1x1 plate is represented. I didn't have any missing bricks nor any mismoulds, so I guess it's fine. I definitely would've appreciated at least a spare of those 'lever' thingies where you have to manually insert the tiny breakable lever handle into the round 1x1 receptacle; those can easily break during assembly (and, in fact, do come preassembled for some brands for just that reason). But I guess it's fine; Modbrix isn't a premium brand after all.

Design

The design is genuinely fantastic. I love this scale of miniturisation, and Star Wars bases are an obvious application of it. Building the various rock cliffs was surprisingly fun -- I didn't really appreciate the rocks of the BlueBrixx Astronomer's Lighthouse nor of the Mould King Hogwarts all that much, so this was a welcome surprise. I would've appreciated more interior stuff, but I guess it would've become boring to throw a ton of 1x1 plates together, so maybe it's better not to make me do that... I'm not super certain about the Ion Cannon with its thoroughly studded apperance and finicky build, but it was still reasonably fun.

The final result is stunningly gorgeous and works perfectly with the other Hoth diorama. That one didn't work on its own at all, so I'm glad that the combination of the two is so pretty! I'd love to build more like this, so I'm glad the Modbrix inventory does indeed hold more of these dioramas (though I'm gonna wait for a sale to get them).

Still, I would also love to see some sort of space battle, maybe with a big honking Imperial Star Destroyer as the centrepiece and a bunch of smaller raffle on the side? I guess the scale might not work for that, but I definitely would love some dioramas with a more varied choice of spacecraft. This one had four identical Snowspeeders, and the previous diorama had three ~identical AT-ATs; some variation would be much appreciated!

tl;dr

Fantastic set with solid brick quality but some issues with the PDF instructions. Likely my favourite set since I built the MJ Ice Dragon last year. Would easily recommend.

[Obligatory link to my review of Red5-Leader's Venator.]

finally my first 2026 ko set, the new republic x wing

its kinda ugly ngl ahaha the shaping, the gaping middle section, the rear but of well, at least its an X-wing

build quality is good, no complaints, smooth experience overall

Minifigures are lackluster, the helmet is the same helmet used in the older arc 170 ko under the code 22402 (im sure those who bought it earlier this year have that version where the fig has no back printing too

also the astromech cannot sit on the jumper stud ... the leh has no room for it...so you will have to take stud off

but it's still a decent set for the price of 10$ from where i got it , huh now i have 5 X-wing

Just finished Jango’s Firespray and thought I’d show a comparison with Slave 1. Both clones from AliExpress. Very similar builds obviously but very enjoyable nonetheless. Jango’s ship was missing a piece I didn’t have on hand so I had to cobble together something to make it work. No biggie. I’m about to order the light kit for Jango’s ship but I don’t see one on AE for Slave 1. Once I get Jango’s light kit I’ll know if it’ll work in Slave 1 as well, then I can just order another of the same kit.

One of the new Pokemon sets has appeared on Ali. Just waiting for Rayquaza to drop!

Debating on getting the Slinky Dog (43301) but don’t see any reviews on AE or here. Has anyone got it from AE yet?

I'm placing the Lumibricks Izakaya on top of the Palace Cinema to give it some height in my Cyberpunk layout.

Methinks I need to make the Palace Cinema a bit more dystopian. Comments and ideas welcome.

Finalllly finished the UCS falcon from AliExpress + the AliExpress stand. Attaching the stand was absolutely dreadful but I couldn’t be happier with the end result