The most magical thing about Lego and a very big reason as to why it's been so popular for so many years is the flexibility - the endless possibilities of what can be made from those little bricks.
Most of my sets I keep as the original build for a while and then start to progressively build them into other things. This is a story of one of those sets.
It started life in as the classic MINI (you can read about me building it here but it looks like this
It only stayed like that for about 6 weeks, then rebuilt it into a Renault Floride (That build here
That was close enough to two years ago, and it's been sitting on a shelf gathering dust, so much dust so when I was thinking 'I really want to build something' last week I thought, let's see what I can do with the Floride.
I didn't want another car, I considered a gun which was impressive, but I'm not sure really me so I eventually settled on the Plane from my favourite website - rebrickable, where people upload their designs (MOC standing for My Own Creation)
Now it really has been maybe 3 or 4 month since I built anything so I was a little concerned, plus amateur redesigns are always a little sketchy - there is a reason Lego sets take a long time to design, but I forged ahead.
So this is where we start from the rear, there is always something with MOCs as well - they immediately start looking like the thing you are building, which is never the case with official Lego Sets
The taper in this is quite nice i9t's about 6 bricks wide at the front and four at the back. The we just build it up a little more.
And then you put a top on it, and the giant steering wheel from the MINI, It was a problem in that set and I didn't know it yet but it was going to be a problem in this set as well, also, planes don't have steering wheels it was actually just to give the body a circular feel.
Note here that we effectively have half a plane, Lego would never officially build like this, there would be joining bits sticking out the front.
Now life get difficult, this is the front, cool right? it's actually build in two halves and joined in the middle to allow for a rod for the propeller to go through it. I must be out of practice, because I stuffed soemthing up building this had to take it apart and start again.
But I do like the exhausts.
Then it's time to join the back and front, and this is our nice problem, this whole thing is held together by a single stud, it's technically possible, but it's flimsy and all get out.
This is where I would leave it for the night, I told myself than maybe the wings would add some structural integrity to it.
Now this is sitting on my dining room table, I'm working at home the next day so as I sit on endless boring calls, I fiddle with the Lego pieces that are lying around, somehow I end up making so trees and a eyeball
But eventually the work day finishes and it's time to get back to the plane. time for some wings.
And they have added not structural integrity at all, in fact these are held on by two just four studs right in the middle and not the same single stud holding the front to the back. I know this has to go on a stand which I quickly build, and then it's time to attached the plane to the stand and we are done....
until the moment the whole thing falls apart
time for a rebuild, and a re-engineer. Now there are few things harder in Lego than trying to fix someone elses mistakes, you are trying to keep as much of the original design as possible, you are trying to be faithful but you are also trying to make the darn things stay in one piece.
I got there by removing the huge steering wheel, running some long pieces down the centre of the plane, adding so pieces under the wings, almost all of these came out of the 'stand' so then I needed to design a new stand - I have always been a big fan of just using transparent pieces for stands, particularly for something that's meant to be flying. But an hour after the disaster of it all falling to pieces, we had a completed plane.
It's maybe a little too elongated, and maybe a little flat at the front
But then again for something that started life as a car it makes a pretty good plane