AFOL Designer Program: Wild West Saloon

Recently there's been a lot of interest in the AFOL Designer Program, where a handful of fan builders have had their designs turned into crowdfunded sets for sale. Given that a couple of the builders are good friends of New Elementary, we thought we'd ask them for an insider's view on their designs and the program itself. First up, Jonas Kramm reveals how he used this opportunity to make a Wild West Saloon that is also an exciting parts pack. 

The AFOL Designer Program is a first-of-its-kind cooperation between The LEGO Group and BrickLink. Both companies collaborate on making a small selection of fan designs into sets for sale. That may sound like a second LEGO® Ideas to you but I will take a look at the differences, and they are essential!

LEGO® Overwatch review: 75975 Watchpoint: Gibraltar

Our second LEGO® Overwatch review takes a look at the new and interesting elements in 75975 Watchpoint: Gibraltar. The largest set in the theme, it contains 730 elements, four minifigures and costs £79.99 / $89.99 / 89.99€ and has been available since January 2019.

There are some interesting new angles in this set and a few elements appear for the first time in a new colour, so let's take a closer look.

LEGO® NINJAGO turntables

Sven Franic examines the unusual and interesting new turntable pieces that come in new LEGO® Ninjago sets like 70670 Monastery of Spinjitzu.

We don't often get younger age group LEGO playsets to pick apart here at New Elementary, which makes it easy to overlook some cool new parts. Ninjago model designers have really stepped up their game in interactive play functions, and I want to see if we can bastardize some of the novelties that come in LEGO Ninjago 70670 Monastery of Spinjitzu.

One of the recent features of several Ninjago sets are the hand-held minifigure turntables. Presumably to promote interactive and social play, the resourceful designers came up with a brick-built contraption allowing players to rotate a minifigure character and fight an opponent by mimicking some impressive ninja moves.

Build & Fix contest: the winners

At last the time has come to reveal the most innovative uses of  'Ship Front 12X12X1 1/3' (Design ID 43979), as created by our readers. Our judges Sven Franic and Jonas Kramm had tough decisions to make, so without further ado let's see who their favourites were.

The five equal winners

In no particular order... the five builders each winning 70828 Pop-Up Party Bus and 70841 Benny's Space Squad are...

The Cheese Slicer, by Bas van Houwelingen

Build & Fix contest entries: Part 4

We chose a difficult, controversial seed part for our latest LEGO® contest: 'Ship Front 12X12X1 1/3' (Design ID 43979). The idea was to BUILD using the seed part in an inventive way to FIX those negative opinions that this is merely a Big Ugly Ship Hull.

Once again, New Elementary readers blew us away with their superb ideas. Our judges, Sven Franic and Jonas Kramm, have made the tough decisions but before we reveal the five winners tomorrow, we are showing you all 53 entries received – here is the final bunch. Missed part 1? Start here.

Electric rock guitar

By
Csaba Toth

Build & Fix contest entries: Part 3

We chose a difficult, controversial seed part for our latest LEGO® contest: 'Ship Front 12X12X1 1/3' (Design ID 43979). The idea was to BUILD using the seed part in an inventive way to FIX those negative opinions that this is merely a Big Ugly Ship Hull (BUSH).

Once again, New Elementary readers blew us away with their superb ideas. Our judges, Sven Franic and Jonas Kramm, have made the tough decisions but before we reveal the five winners, we will show you all 53 entries received over the course of the next few days. Missed part 1? Start here.

Honored Adventurer

By
Big Stannis

Build & Fix contest entries: Part 2

We chose a difficult, controversial seed part for our latest LEGO® contest: 'Ship Front 12X12X1 1/3' (Design ID 43979). The idea was to BUILD using the seed part in an inventive way to FIX those negative opinions that this is merely a Big Ugly Ship Hull.

Once again, New Elementary readers blew us away with their superb ideas. Our judges, Sven Franic and Jonas Kramm, have made the tough decisions but before we reveal the five winners, we will show you all 53 entries received over the course of the next few days. Missed part 1? Start here.

Hera Customs Official

By
Oscar Cederwall (o0ger)

I ordered six 43979 and started combining them in different ways. I liked the shape I got from combining two of the parts stud-to-stud. I started attaching bricks on the outside of the parts and this is the result. There are two engines with two 43979 each, and there are also two 43979 in the front of the fuselage.

Build & Fix contest entries: Part 1

We chose a difficult, controversial seed part for our latest LEGO® contest: 'Ship Front 12X12X1 1/3' (Design ID 43979). The idea was to BUILD using the seed part in an inventive way to FIX those negative opinions that this is merely a Big Ugly Ship Hull.

Once again, New Elementary readers blew us away with their superb ideas. Our judges, Sven Franic and Jonas Kramm, have made the tough decisions but before we reveal the five winners, we will show you all 53 entries received over the course of the next few days.

Anatomical Mouth Model

By
Quoting

A model of the mouth and teeth like you would find at the dentist.

Bricks & Pieces: Jonas’ Highlights - March 2019

Another month has passed and so it’s time for a new round of highlights from “Bricks & Pieces”, The LEGO Group’s service for individual new LEGO® elements. Check it out:

BnP.jonaskramm.com

A long time ago... LEGO® Star Wars™ began

Billund, 9th April 2019: Twenty years ago, in a galaxy far, far away, the LEGO® Star Wars™theme began and has remained one of the most popular franchises ever since. Today, the LEGO Group is celebrating the 20th anniversary of the much-loved theme which now includes around 700 different sets and over 1,000 minifigures.

They've provided us with some fascinating pictures to share with you, so we thought it would be fun to look back to a time when Star Wars was the theme introducing new LEGO elements and breaking the mould. All images are © The LEGO Group unless otherwise attributed.

Interesting LEGO Star Wars Element Facts

The 1999 Jar Jar Binks minifigure was the first ever to have a unique LEGO head sculpt. These are a couple of prototype versions of Jar Jar's moulded head that show the development process.

LEGO® Education SPIKE™ Prime: New Elements

Yesterday LEGO Education announced SPIKE Prime, the newest product in the LEGO Education hands-on STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Math) learning portfolio. They tell us that SPIKE Prime brings together LEGO bricks, a programmable, multi-port Hub, sensors and motors all powered by the SPIKE app based on the Scratch coding language.

© LEGO Group

Of particular interest for New Elementary is that SPIKE™ Prime also brings new elements and we have been playing 'spot the new element' in some of the images and videos released by LEGO as part of their announcement yesterday.

More on the 3x3 Technic beam

Yesterday Victor P discussed the new Magenta Connector Beam 1x3x3 that does not yet appear in any LEGO® sets. Today he reveals it also comes in Black, explores more of its potential and explains how he found it for sale on the LEGO website.

In part 1 we explored the geometry of the new Connector Beam 1x3x3 and the kind of applications it could have in Technic builds. Today we’re going to experiment a bit further and see what other builds are possible with a few of them in hand.  Since I work in construction, one of the first things I thought of doing was a I-beam:

Magenta 3x3 Technic beam discovered

Today we reveal a surprising discovery made by reader Victor P. who got in touch with us when he discovered a new LEGO® part for sale that isn't in any sets.

Buying spare LEGO® parts directly from The LEGO Group’s own service, Bricks & Pieces, seems to be growing in popularity in the AFOL community, perhaps evidenced by the message currently displayed on top of the Bricks & Pieces homepage: “Due to a large number of requests, LEGO Bricks & Pieces orders are taking longer than normal to be delivered”. (Could Jonas Kramm’s monthly parts highlight be responsible for this sudden surge in parts orders?)

I am myself ‘guilty’ of having placed an order on Bricks & Pieces in early March, and made a quite surprising discovery: a part which is not listed on BrickLink, nor on Brickset, and which doesn’t come in any set that I know of. A ghost part, I may say.