Synopses & Reviews
The LEGO® Technic Idea Book: Wheeled Wonders is a collection of hundreds of mechanisms for cars, trucks, motorcycles, and other vehicles that you can build based on their pictures alone. Each project uses color-coded pieces and is photographed from multiple angles, making it easy to see how the models are assembled without the need for step-by-step instructions. Every model illustrates a different principle, concept, or mechanism that will inspire your own original creations. You're encouraged to use these elements as building blocks to create your own masterpieces.
The Technic models in Wheeled Wonders spin or move things, drag race, haul heavy gear, bump off walls, wind up and go, and much more. You'll discover how to build differential gears, implement steering and suspension, and design clutch and transmission systems to use in your own vehicles.
This visual guide, the second in the three-volume LEGO Technic Idea Book series, is the brainchild of master builder Yoshihito Isogawa of Tokyo, Japan. Each title is filled with photos of Isogawa's unique models, all of which are designed to fire the imaginations of LEGO builders young and old.
Imagine. Create. Invent. Now, what will you build?
NOTE: The LEGO Technic Idea Book series uses parts from various Technic sets. If you don't have some of the pieces shown in a particular model, experiment by substituting your own parts or visit the No Starch Press website for a list of the special parts used in the book.
Synopsis
LEGO Technic is designed to allow builders to create more advanced models with moving parts, like those built with LEGO MINDSTORMS. The LEGO Technic Idea Book: Wheeled Wonders offers hundreds of ideas and examples for building mechanisms with Technic. This volume focuses on vehicles that can drive, turn, move things, and go backwards. The book is color throughout, with little to no text accompanying its diagrams. The book's illustrations demonstrate various ways to build Technic vehicles, which you'll use as a starting point for your own creations. Wheeled Wonders begins by teaching readers about tires, rotation speed, and how to build a simple car with a motor, then demonstrates more complex actions, like how to use differential gears; make a car turn or move items; add car suspension with rubber bands or springs; and go backwards and forwards and switch rotational directions. The LEGO Technic Idea Books are for anyone who wants to create a moving masterpiece, as well as those who want to make original robots with MINDSTORMS. It can also be used to demonstrate how machines work and to experience the fun of mechanics.
Synopsis
What exactly is a slope? What's the difference between a tile and a plate? Why is it bad to simply stack bricks in columns to make a wall? The Unofficial LEGO Builder's Guide is here to answer your questions.
Focusing on building actual models with real bricks, The Unofficial LEGO Builder's Guide comes with complete instructions to build several cool models but also encourages you to use your imagination to create your own fantastic creations.
Inside, you'll learn:
- The best ways to connect bricks and creative uses for those patterns
- Tricks for calculating and using scale (it's not as hard as you think)
- The step-by-step plans to create a train station on the scale of LEGO people (a.k.a. "minifigs")
- How to build spheres, jumbo-sized LEGO bricks, micro-scaled models, and a mini space shuttle
- Tips for sorting and storing all of your LEGO pieces
The Unofficial LEGO Builder's Guide also includes the Brickopedia, a visual guide to nearly 300 of the most useful and reusable elements of the LEGO system, with historical notes, common uses, part numbers, and the year each piece first appeared in a LEGO set.
The firm foundation for your LEGO hobby starts here!
Synopsis
This volume on LEGO TECHNIC focuses on vehicles that can drive, turn, move things, and go backwards. The book's illustrations demonstrate various ways to build TECHNIC vehicles, which readers can use as starting points for their own creations.
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About the Author
Allan Bedford is a lifelong LEGO fan and builder whose most ambitious model to date is a 5,000 piece replica of Toronto's famed CN Tower. He is active in the online LEGO community, having contributed ideas and discussions for several years. Bedford works as a computer programmer analyst by day and spends his spare time cycling, designing board games and, of course, building with LEGO bricks.