Details: Here's an interesting little LEGO machine - it uses various LEGO TECHNIC parts to replicate a toy marble machine. On it's own, that would be cool enough, but this also has a motorized ladder that lifts the marbles back up to the top of the course regularly. The mechanism appears to be a sort of enlarged cam type thing. You can get the idea fairly quickly from the video below. Oh, and I saw that there was an RCX in the video, but since it's being used as an expensive battery box, I'm not going to count this one as a robot. Here's the video of this in motion:
Details: I'm sure most serious Mindstorms fans have seen this 'bot by now, but as an avid Coke drinker, I consider it a classic. This bot is actually pretty simple - it's a worm-gear based pouring mechanism that is activated by a light sensor. The dark color of Coca-Cola triggers the light sensor - so the cup is always filled to the same height each time, and never overflows. Touch sensors monitor the arm's position, and inventive (if whimsical) mounts keep the glass and the bottle of soda in place. Oh, and the whole thing is mounted on a chassis too, so if you want a robot driving around with an open Coca-Cola bottle and a full glass, you could have it do that.
I'm aware of the fact that a few more advanced models are out there now that do similar things. It's seeming a bit intimidating to track them all down though. Feel free to send your favorites to legomodeloftheday@gmail.com
I know that this isn't technically a LEGO model and that most people have seen this before, but I wanted to make sure I posted something today. This is not actually a sequence of LEGO models - almost all of the studs-up mosaics used were taken apart and reassembled differently to make the next frame. The effect, however, speaks for itself.
Details: Yeah, another series of models. I'd have a hard time picking which Mario Kart characters to feature though, and they're all equally well done. There's a bit of sculpted stuff, a bit of studs-not-on-top stuff, and a lot of newer pieces I don't have any of. It's an interesting project, but frankly, not my cup of tea. To be fair though, the way these are put together is quite inventive.
What you can see here is an DT-75 M tractor built in the 50s in the former Soviet Union - the plough is just my version of the great Marakoeschtra design - dedicated to Tim Gould
Also, note the use of minifig hands, chains, studs-not-on-top techniques, and wheels.
Details: OK, so I lied yesterday when I said I'd get back to focusing on original models. I have a bit of a stockpile of things to post here, and it makes sense to get some of these groups of models done on one page.
So anyway, these "models" are individual pieces of furniture, done in a nice old-fashioned-wood style. They're apparently intended for castle-themed creations, but if you ask me, they'd look great as antiques in any mini-fig scale LEGO building. Some of the parts used are fairly expected, but some of these are a bit more unusual - legs and hands from minifigs, tiled plates, pneumatic tubing and such. Of course, these all seem much more special when you consider how hard it is to find some of these parts in brown.
Details: As you may have noticed, there was no model of the day yesterday. Frankly, there are just too many awesome models in that photo pool! I'm still not done looking at all of them. I'm doing another bloated gallery of pictures today as well - maybe tomorrow I'll get back to posting a "daily dose".
I have previously mentioned one of Izzo's fantastic dragons. Now he has completed a series of several dragons, as if to tell a story. Not all the dragons are as good as that first one I mentioned, but they are all fairly impressive. If anyone knows the story or a link to page with it, send it our way and I'll add it to this post. In the mean time, the rest of the Dragon series is today's "modelS" of the day.
Photos have started emerging online from the BrickFest event. You can have a look at them here: http://flickr.com/groups/brickfest/pool/. There are quite a few models there that are really well done. There will probably be some links to more detailed coverage of the event here soon.
This robot can play a perfect game of "Wii Bowling" on Nintendo's Wii Entertainment System. For the uninitiated, the Wii is controlled through a "WiiMote" which is sensitive to movement. This allows for realistic and active video games. However, these new units have been controversial because we don't really need yet another video game system, much less one that has a remote that begs to be flung across the room.
Anyway, so there's this "Bowling" style game for that platform that is apparently rather easily beaten. This robot pushes a button, swings the wiimote, and releases the button - and that's all it takes. Put that in a loop and a timer, and voila - a perfect score, one strike at a time. The link above has more detailed documentation, but that's the gist of it. This robot is both beautifully simple and surprisingly effective. Then again, this isn't a real bowling game, so issues such as the ball's weight didn't have to be taken into account.
Since you need a "wiimote" to operate a Nintendo Wii, I won't count this as "cheating". Some books were used to help the 'bot from jumping (the momentum of the swing would make the 'bot jump if the books shown in the pictures and video weren't there), but that's probably just a time-saving measure (sure, they could have put together a bunch of LEGO just to weigh it down, but why?)
Here's some embedded video action for you. I recommend watching it here only. This 'bot has been getting a good deal of "viral" attention lately, and some of the comments on the YouTube page are offensive and/or obscene.
Details: This enormous model of Star Trek's "U.S.S. Voyager" (which you may remember as the "Enterprise"-style spaceship trying to find its way home in the series Star Trek: Voyager from some years back) is really something. The sculpted body of the ship captures all of the proper details, as far as I can tell. Although the interior is not shown, it looks like down-to-scale furnishings are skipped in favor of realistic exterior lighting. If you look closely, you can spot a LEGO TRAIN speed regulator (which you can buy somewhere). That makes it look, to me, anyway, like this is using entirely-LEGO lighting, and powering it from a wall electric outlet. Of course, all those little lights are also working with quite a few clear and translucent LEGO bricks that are sculpted into the body of the ship. Assuming that no cheating was used to make the electrical stuff work, this is quite a feat.
