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Lego ISS
- chriswwweb 7y agoOh wow a lego story makes it to the frontpage of HN :) Not my fav lego set, but I guess some people really like it I'm more excited about the upcoming LEGO Ideas pirate creek set
- mstade 7y agoOh there's been LEGO on here before alright: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14253672 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14253672 I bought that set and loved every minute of building it. Highly recommended!
- bluetomcat 7y agoA set with some future collecting potential maybe, but not the kind of structure Lego bricks are good for. The scale is too miniscule and the build lacks any substantial level of detail, and it's also a very repetitive structure.
- cyberferret 7y agoI built the Saturn V model a couple of years ago when it came out - a lot of fun and it now stands in pride of place in the corner of my office. This model intrigues me, but it would be a b*tch to store/display once made though... I wonder why LEGO didn't just respond to the plethora of customer requests to make the LUT (tower) for the Saturn V model? It would have been just as many parts and would have complemented the rocket model.
- mstade 7y agoI would absolutely buy a set for the tower. Like you I bought and built the rocket, and have it on display in my apartment, but having it stand vertically next to a tower would be so much cooler than the little stilts it's on right now. Sounds like a fun weekend project though, do you know of any good unofficial instructions?
- cyberferret 7y agoI found a few sites that described how to build the LUT out of standard pieces. There was a guy selling a 'kit' on eBay which comprised of some instructions as well as the standard parts all bagged up, but it was super expensive (around $250 from memory). I will see if I can still find the URLs (if they are still around). EDIT: Looks like these guys do a LUT kit: https://www.welightbrick.com/products/nasa-saturn-v-launch-umbilical-tower https://www.welightbrick.com/products/nasa-saturn-v-launch-u...
- braythwayt 7y agoThey are very careful not to mention what type of bricks are in their kits. Do you know if they’re reselling genuine Lego? Or a third-party “clone” of Lego bricks?
- giancarlostoro 7y agoThey likely just want you to buy the whole thing from them instead of doing it yourself.
- braythwayt 7y agoPossibly. But there are a lot of Lego-compatible third-party bricks out there, and lots of people online selling kits made from non-Lego bricks. I generally have no problem with this, as it allows certain types of kits to exist that Lego wouldn’t otherwise make. It’s no longer my bag, but for example Lego generally avoid military models, but third-party Lego-compatible sets fill the void. On the other hand, Lego are—to my knowledge—the only brick manufacturer licensed to produce Star Wars kits, and this company is advertising a Tie Bomber. Lego doesn’t currently make such a kit, but you can’t go around selling Star Wars kits without having a certain flair for playing very fast and loose with IP. Which leads me to want to double-check before placing any order for any kit. I’m not saying that other bricks are bad, but I do want to know exactly what I’m buying before making a decision.
- deadbunny 7y ago
- jeffbarr 7y agoThere are some really good fan-created plans for LUTs, including a spectacular 8000-piece one by Nathan Readioff. PM me for pix and other info.
- lobotryas 7y agoBecause such a set would lack playability and have zero mass appeal (you would never buy this set stand alone). There was an Idea submission for such a set and it was rejected bu Lego: https://ideas.lego.com/projects/a88109ec-9970-4fe1-98b4-9bd535856ab4/official_comments#content_nav_tabs https://ideas.lego.com/projects/a88109ec-9970-4fe1-98b4-9bd5...
- monocasa 7y agoThe ISS model specifically says it's for adults, 16+, so playability isn't a huge deal. Additionally IMO they're missing the boat by sticking to their classic distribution model that has the restraints you say. I mean sure, some sets aren't fit for shelf space in a Target toy aisle, but they should be able to JIT packaging for just about any set that's had the work put in as long as they don't run afoul of trademark.
- em-bee 7y agoi hope someone will build a thingiverse like site where you can upload any model design and order the necessary bricks to build it. there won't be a trademark issue for the brick producer, as they are only delivering an assortment of bricks. the model design comes from elsewhere. trademark may be enforced against uploaders of protected designs, but that is no problem as the design can still be shared elsewhere and it can't outright prevent anyone from ordering a certain assortment of bricks.
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- ummwhat 7y agoBased on the price per kg to get to iss, how much would it cost to send this up there and have it gently placed into a parallel orbit with candarm2?
- thenewnewguy 7y agoUnfortunately I cannot find a weight for the set on either this website or LEGO's official website.
- arethuza 7y agoAre 'parallel orbits' actually possible without active station keeping? (Thinking of Seveneves).
- TeMPOraL 7y agoNo. The orbital plane must intersect the (bary)center of Earth. If you took that model and placed it to the right of ISS, with matching altitude and velocity vectors, then half the orbital period later, you'd find it somewhere to the left of the station. If you want to keep two things close together in orbit for a while without active stationkeeping, your best bet is placing one ahead or behind of the other. Though in real life, they'll eventually drift their separate ways too, due to lots of small influences like solar pressure, residual air drag, gravitational pull of other bodies in the system, etc.
- Piskvorrr 7y agoEven worse, the actual ISS requires active stationkeeping, making it unreliable w/r/t celestial mechanics alone.
- usrusr 7y agoWouldn't there be considerable slipstream from the trace atmosphere? Aft, slightly higher than the stations center of mass there should be a point were the slower angular speed of the minimally higher orbit would cancel out with the slipstream effect, until the next stationkeeping burn. I wonder how much it would start spinning from the uneven application of trace atmosphere in that time. Might make a fun public experiment, try getting "the internet" to voice their predictions, kind of like everybody was commenting on the color of the dress. In any case I fully expect a kit to eventually make it up there but I doubt that it will see any EVA.
- neilpanchal 7y agoSide note: I love web design like this over the huge amount of white space + magenta gradients in contemporary react apps that take 9 seconds to load. The modern web app, what monster have we created!
- MayeulC 7y agoI like the technology stack, the design, not so much: it looks like it assumes a certain screen width, so that I get either: - Too much black space on the right if fullscreen - An empty red column on the left, and I must scroll to the right to see the text if tiled. Moreover, there is still a lot of javascript on the page for ads, tracking (google analytics), youtube, so it could be faster. I see a lot of minimalist, well-written contemporary blogs as well; it mostly seems to be marketing websites that have bloated out of proportions.
- rovek 7y agoYou're right, it does assume a certain screen width and doesn't scale at all in any way. I was also thinking when I returned to HN from the article that I couldn't actually read HN because the white-on-black was such an extreme colour scheme, my eyes took about 10 seconds to adjust.
- franga2000 7y agoOk, some responsive design wouldn't exactly hurt (zooming in one-handed on my phone on a shaky bus took me longer than a bloated "modern" web site would take to load), but I definitely agree with your sentiment. No cookie warnings, no full-screen popups, no sluggish animations and yes, no huge margins that turn my rather large phone screen into a 3310.
- _-___________-_ 7y agoI didn't find it difficult to use one-handed at all. Double-tapped on the text which zoomed it to perfect reading width, then double-tapped again to zoom out and double-tapped on the images to have a look at those. Not sure what phone you're using but I think those gestures are universal?
- coder1001 7y agoIt's great to see Lego innovating in this way, I wonder how much less business they do nowadays given the proliferation of mobile/digital gaming and social media keeping the new generations pretty occupied!
- bluetomcat 7y agoSets like these are targeted mostly at adult "geek" collectors and maybe represent less than 1% of total sales. The Ninjago, City and Creator themes have been quite strong in the last decade, at least from my observations as an occasional gift buyer.
- Shivetya 7y agoThat it is reasonably priced makes it all the better. While I can afford otherwise I always find them more enticing when they don't go past a hundred dollars.
- ryanbrunner 7y agoAs a parent of a 6 year old, Lego is still pretty hugely popular (arguably even more so than it was 20ish years ago). The Lego section of most toy stores is front and centre, and it's a super common gift for younger kids. I could definitely see kids aging out of Lego earlier than they used to, though.
- nl 7y agoLego is now the biggest toy manufacturer in the world as well as the most valuable: https://www.retaildetail.eu/en/news/general/lego-worlds-largest-toy-manufacturer-first-time https://www.retaildetail.eu/en/news/general/lego-worlds-larg...
- mhh__ 7y agoLego do - of course - have the mostly excellent LEGO [Franchise] here video games too. "I'm playing both sides, so that I always come out on top"
- deadbunny 7y agoHaving seen the sheer amount of Lego my nephews receive for birthdays/christmas I'm gonna say Lego are doing just fine. With that said I'm sure the Licensed sets have helped their bottom line for sure.
- MayeulC 7y agoI wonder, have they confused the (big) radiators with (small) solar panels? It certainly looks so in the box package!
- ZiiS 7y agoLooks really accurate to me; the box shows blue/flat solar-arrays and white corrugated radiators in the usual places.
- rtkwe 7y agoNope looks pretty much dead on to me. See [0] for the real ISS vs [1] for the box art. The relative scales are a little off due to the available pieces (the larger radiators are pretty big compared to the solar arrays). [0] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/81/International_Space_Station_TCS.png https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/81/Internat... [1] http://www.collectspace.com/images/news-012120g-lg.jpg http://www.collectspace.com/images/news-012120g-lg.jpg
- MayeulC 7y agoAh, I stand corrected, thank you. My mental image of the ISS was somewhat distorted, it seems. And I had no idea the main solar panels could pivot to align with the large radiators! (For instance, here we can see both solar panels not completely aligned: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=iss+radiator&t=ffab&ia=images&iax=images&iai=http%3A%2F%2Fglobal.fncstatic.com%2Fstatic%2Fmanaged%2Fimg%2Ffn2%2Fvideo%2F051013_serrie_iss_640.jpg https://duckduckgo.com/?q=iss+radiator&t=ffab&ia=images&iax=...)
- rtkwe 7y agoI didn't know the smaller radiators existed at all TBH. Makes sense though since they're on the same structure as the solar panels it would ensure those are basically always in the shade more or less since the solar panels will want to align perpendicular to the sun. As for the solar panels they can rotate each individually around it's long axis and the group of 4 at each end as a unit around the long axis of the truss.
- mrkwse 7y agoI desperately want this but would have nowhere to display it. Does anyone know what the production lengths of Lego Ideas sets are? Am I likely to be able to buy this in a year or two, or is this going to be the only opportunity?
- cosmodisk 7y agoBuy it now,put the box under your bed and once you have where to display, you'll do.
- mobilemidget 7y agoAnd even if you forget about it, say 20 years :), you might have a nice investment laying under the bed.
- spaceandshit 7y agoDo lego sets appreciate?
- danpalmer 7y agoFrom what I've seen recently, Lego Ideas sets tend to have a lifetime of about 1-2 years, but can become harder to find later in the cycle as I think their production runs are a bit shorter. Regular models tend to be 1-3 years from what I've seen. I believe if you have a Lego account and show some interest, maybe liking or adding to cart or something, they send you a notification when it's retiring. I've had a few "retiring soon" emails from them but I'm not sure exactly what triggered that.
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- agumonkey 7y agomy first thought was : please let me add real solar cells on this and make it a "light + sound" revival unit
- INTPenis 7y agoA bit too small imho. Go big or go home. I want a space shuttle big enough for lego figures, and same scale space station.
- LoveMortuus 7y agoYeah, right? I was expecting a price point around hundreds! You know, something that makes you say, that's cool, but I ain't buyin' that! (Yet)
- Someone 7y agoAt about 1:40, the ISS would be about 2.5 meters by 1.8 meters. I doubt they would sell many, unless it were made of Lego Duplo.
- rtkwe 7y agoPretty sure that would be the physically largest retail set ever sold if they did the minifig scale of 1:45 (ish) [0]. Looks like they might be making it roughly microfig scale judging by the scale of the included microfigs vs the rest. I'd rather maybe double the current size for more detail and chances for little greeble details but this size does make it easy to justify even with my current set backlog. [0] It's a little messy because minifigs are quite squat and wide compared to their height.
- vanderZwan 7y ago> microfig Had to look that up[0], since I haven't closely been keeping up with LEGO since my childhood, and for now lack children of my own to renew interest. Interesting concept, but it doesn't look like they're still "officially" used? EDIT: Oh, the article states that this set comes with two microfigs. My bad, I should pay closer attention next time! [0] https://lego.fandom.com/wiki/Microfigure https://lego.fandom.com/wiki/Microfigure
- rtkwe 7y agoI was wrong about the name the wiki seems to call what's included in the ISS set Nanofigures. Though it seems like places use both nanofig and microfig interchangeably since microfigs are discontinued. https://rebrickable.com/parts/90398/minifig-trophy-statuette/ https://rebrickable.com/parts/90398/minifig-trophy-statuette... https://lego.fandom.com/wiki/Nanofigure https://lego.fandom.com/wiki/Nanofigure https://www.firestartoys.com/Shop/LEGO-Minifigures/LEGO-Nanofigures.html https://www.firestartoys.com/Shop/LEGO-Minifigures/LEGO-Nano...
- Waterluvian 7y agoI just wish it was to-scale with the LEGO Space Shuttle I had as a kid.
- edgefield0 7y agoMy son and I love building lego together, especially the robotic type, but I often worry about the tremendous amounts of plastic waste being created with every lego sold. I guess it pales in comparison to plastic bottles, but still. We are turning the earth into a giant trash heap.
- Gravityloss 7y agoLego last long and are repurposable. I personally think they are not really meant to be built according to instructions in the long term. It's the same way a framework is not meant to do a todo app. It's something the kid does on first pass when learning how the system works, before starting on the actual cool stuff.
- rtkwe 7y agoThere's kind of two types of sets made today the play sets for kids and display sets for adult collectors. I do agree though that LEGO isn't really plastic waste because most of it doesn't get thrown out and kids collections get reused and resold to collectors and are relatively rarely thrown out.
- em-bee 7y agoin my experience the original model is built once and then rarely ever again.
- NikolaNovak 7y agoI feel that compared to virtually every other use of plastic, Lego is probably the most benign. Compared to other toys, it is better built, lasts longer, doesn't need batteries, doesn't use obsolete/deprecated protocols, isn't fashionable / faddish, and is therefore typically used for a long time by a child through the years and then frequently reused by several people/families/generations. My son is still playing with basic Lego bricks that were my older cousin's bricks in the 80's. The amount of plastic waste we've caused and gone through in the last 40 years is many many many orders of magnitude higher than those few sets :|
- wpskidd 7y agoSo, when do we get a SpaceX kit??
- rurounijones 7y agohttps://ideas.lego.com/projects/1abc6458-52e8-4e7d-a04c-04ba917b6e5b https://ideas.lego.com/projects/1abc6458-52e8-4e7d-a04c-04ba... Needs 800 more supporters to reach the 10k threshold.
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- monocasa 7y agoThis apparently comes with a little dragon capsule.
- crazygringo 7y agoWow. I grew up in the early 80's building Lego Space sets -- all Lego men in spacesuits and shapeships and space stations, but all fictional. It kind of blows my mind a bit to see a real-life space station built with Legos now. I mean, I know they've had a space shuttle and rocket sets for a while, but those were still just somehow fundamentally "earth-bound". (And Lego never did make a Skylab set.) But a space station... for some reason that just feels more properly futuristic in a way. And in a Lego set, almost like fiction finally coming to life somehow.
- npstr 7y agoUsed to have a KNex model of the ISS when growing up, it was great for someone who was dreaming of going to space :)
- jedberg 7y agoI wonder if it was designed with strong attachment points for hanging it from the ceiling.