r/lepin

UCS death-slice shipped in a pretty big box.

Building a moc of the Imperial Sentinel-Class Landing Craft by gonky_brick and i am CONVINCED they didnt build this irl because there are some GLARING flaws. Technic connectors that are blocked so you cant connect the two halves together without tearing apart the whole underside of the roof, pieces that seemingly cant physically go together (attached picture) and absolutely, mind-numbilingly idiotic piece connections that come off at a slight change in air pressure. The set is beautiful and its fun when the instructions make sense.

Finally completed the Ali express Lego version of the creel house from stranger things.
Like I said on the other post, Everything was in order, have a couple extra pieces and the quality feels the same as Lego.

This set was an order from Ali Express of a MOC. With that being said, there are no minifigures included, and the printed/stickered pieces have been replaced by plain tiles. I am in the process of getting some printed computer tiles to use in it. The exterior stickers I will just reproduce on my printer with some glossy sticker stock.

The build process was very smooth for the most part. Typical of a lot of non-boxed sets on Ali to just give you a PDF or electronic copy of the instructions. Parts were in non-numbered bags, sorted by piece type and colors. I took a plastic bin and dumped all parts into the bins by size to keep from losing any.

There were some errors in the build involving stud miscalculations that needed to be pointed out, or places where I did go back in and add/edit parts for stability and ease of use:

The long passenger cabin has too many brittle connection points in its roof/ceiling. Because the parts are new and not official Lego, the joints are very stiff, causing the model to break a little. I added some extra 2×2 tiles to connect the parts a little bit more.

There is a stud miscalculation in the engine compartment cap. There is some trim that the instructions inaccurately assemble where a stud was 1/2 stud off from being able to connect. In addition, this compartment cap is so tight its hard to fit back in.

There are some stud miscalculations in the floor of one of the passenger areas. The instructions erroneously assign the wrong pieces to the spots where they in fact do not fit. There's a place with a redundant piece and some stud miscalculations that end up being non-essential anyhow because of so many layers on this thing to get the desired effects visually.

Missing pieces? There were a few minor ones. I was able to substitute for them with my extra parts bins and the bevy of random extra parts that the set included. Oddly, far more easily misplaced or less common parts had an exact count or were missing one part.

OVERALL? A great set. A lot of fun. Has great features. Fixing a few issues here and there, as with many Unofficial sets, will make your experiences much better here as well.

I am going to be using it as my main piece of my Marvel modular city. Not pictured: Official Lego Sanctum Sanctorum, Peter Parker's Apartment modular, Tony Stark's Malibu Mansion modular, expanded X-Men X-Mansion modular, modular Stark Lab interior, etc.

Edit 1: I neglected to mention another critical missing part was found when putting the external framing on the passenger cabin... a piece was left off of the assembly instructions that made the framing seat properly to fit in between the cabin partition and the "lip" of the black trim. Without an added 1×2 tile, the black double hinge piece does not have enough height to sit evenly with the rest of the frame. Will keep editing if there is interest. Feel free to ask any questions!

Edit 2: More of an add/part swap out because a part was missing... I was short one 1×4 2-stud/2-smooth piece for the passenger cabin, but I had been given 2 extra 1×3 smooth tiles and 2 extra blue 1x1 cheese wedges. I placed the 1×1 cheese wedges facing the body's natural sloping. Then, I combined it with the 1×3 smooth part to cover all 4 of the uncovered studs from the missing part. Because I had 2 extra of some parts, I was able to swap out the asymmetrical parts and make it match on both sides. It also gave the added benefit of an extra raised set of "grips" with which to remove the passenger cabin roof more easily.

Edit 3: As noted by a commenter, the "set" came with a pair of plastic baggies that had unique parts in them: 1) A translucent red windscreen for the cockpit, and 2) A "V" shaped front piece that (as noted in the images above) has "Lego" branding on the studs. Unknown if it is an official Lego piece or not. I am adding these edits to credit the commenter and add some understanding of what the reader is getting for their money

Retail price paid: $139 + tax, free shipping - I had some sale coupons and shop discounts and ended up getting this for under $100. Dunno if that might be relevant to others or not, but there ARE coupons out there that can help make it more worth your time if price is a concern.

A 1:800 scale replica of the original World Trade Center, designed by SPBrix. It's not the most exciting build—especially with nearly 3,000 grille tiles to place—but the finished model is absolutely stunning.

It's a bit unfortunate that the Twin Towers are actually the least stable part of the build. We think a different mounting solution could have made them much sturdier.

DO NOT BUY IF YOU WANT CONFUSING INSTRUCTIONS AND YOU WANNA KEEP YOUR SANITY. I JUST FINISHED MINE I JUST FINISHED IT SND I TRY TO FIX SOMETHING BUT NOOOOO IT MUST BREAK AND WHEN I FIX THE THING THAT BROKE ANOTHER THING BROKE ABSOLUTELY MENTAL

Hi everyone! I'll tell you what's happening: I have this row of houses at the top of my shelves, and each one has the typical lighting system, which is basically a string of fairy lights with a manual switch. The thing is, every time I want to turn them on or off, I have to take each building down one by one and put it back in its place. So here's my question: Is there a system that can connect the lighting for all the houses and be operated with a single switch for all of them at once? Ideally, it would be self-contained and wouldn't need to be plugged into a power outlet. Thanks in advance!

The sail is darker than in the box art. There are many gold elements.

Was at A.P Plaza today and all the Lego vendors seemed to be getting in Minas Tirith! Only picture I got. This one was taken in Brown Shop (D1-17) of AP Plaza.

Both from Ali, no missing pieces and very fun builds, not too repetitive for me, but i did build the left and right sides of both the imperial shuttle's wings and the executor's top cover at the same time so i didn't really have to repeat much of the builds.

I know these have been around for a long time and now I'm happy they're part of my collection.

I'm expecting a few more sets, so you'll see a couple of my posts in the following weeks lol

I bought the creel house from stranger things on Ali express for $80. My first non ‘Lego’ set.

I wanted to see if it would be worth it and so far I’m on bag 17 and everything is perfect and in the correct bag. It does have like 2 or 3 bags of the same # but other than that it’s straight forward. The only headache was putting together the mini figs. I’m thinking on getting the retired LEGO set from 2019

Took just over a month to arrive, really fun build! No missing parts but had 1 warped part on Charizards tail which is barely noticeable. Had 1 piece in Blastoises jaw that was completely filled rather than hollow, couldn't use it and it, found a slightly taller piece from the random bits box and sanded it down to fit. Bags were all well labelled and aligned to the official instructions.

Unfortunately the listing no longer exists but I got it from Ali Express for roughly £110. My first big lepin set and really impressed with it.

Its an absolute beast of a set so make sure you've got space to display it!

I recently purchased some figs from J's Exclusives section of J's Little Things. I haven't seen those anywhere else so I do think they're pretty exclusive. They cost a little more than other replica figs but not terribly so. The delivery was within a week for a US address.

I must say, in my opinion, these are some of the best, highest quality figs I've ever seen. Some people hate the more elaborate figs with additional bits and pieces as they make the figs bulkier, have less mobility, and take away from the classic minifig look. I acknowledge that opinion, I just don't share it. They look better with more details, imo. All have 360 printing. No bubbles in any of the sabers.

I will break down my thoughts fig by fig but overall, I loved them all. I only wish J's does more of these.

Darth Marr: The star of the show for me. Simply incredible. Go watch the Old Republic scene where he dies. Perfect replica in minifig scale. Comes with leg clips for extra texture, a cama/skirt, and the hood and shoulders are one piece. .The spikes come separately and have tiny pin connection I haven't seen before that has to be pushed in but it fit very securely on the first push. This is true for a few other models so I won't reiterate it for them but rest assured, once assembled, it looks amazing and nothing is loose.

Valkorion/Thexan/Arcann: All great, coming with their own armor pieces. Arcann comes with two regular arms but also his custom molded robotic arm, and a "scarf" piece for his mask. Valkorion has his signature smug look as a second face print.

Kreia/Darth Traya: As a robed old lady, she uses the wider dress base instead of regular legs. The heads come double printed, and the hair is exquisite, perfectly accurate to the game. I am not exactly sure how the cowl attaches but it is very secure, I think it has inside grooves that match the shape of the hair. It's not very visible from the pics, but the arms for both of these figures aren't standard but with flared robes hanging. All figs from this haul came with 3 hand pieces, by the way, I simply didn't include the left hand on Kreia for lore reasons. The lightsaber setup for Darth Traya is decent and looks great BUT the piece which connects to the base, a clear transparent Brick Round 1 x 1 with Open Stud part 3062b unfortunately didn't have good clutch power, causing the stand to sag forward. This however is extremely easily fixable and I will be getting another clear piece to replace that one soon.

Revan: Definitely wide and bulky with the big hard cape but the mask is next level. It clips into the hood via small pins. I liked that the lightside Revan's mask has a different colored print, but I don't like the robes being pure white. I always envisioned his outfit as off-white/cream. The large skirt pieces restricts movement but it's nicely detailed. The heads are black and unprinted. Imo, the masks are definitely the highlight of those figs.

Darth Nihilus: Just as bulky as Revan but I think it works really well for him. Gives him that imposing look. The hood, mask, and cape are one piece that fits well. The head has printing of the hollow eyes you can almost see through the eye holes of the mask. It's really good. The fig came with a saber but I think I'll pose him with red lightning pieces. The skirt deserves a special mention as it comes in two pieces. The inner piece clips to the outer one via pins and the outer one goes on the fig as normal. This gives the fig that multi-layer texture to the bottom half. Not very mobile like Revan but this is Nihlus. You come to **him** or get consumed.

Knights of Zakuul: I got 10 of these guys. Very well made, although I personally will be making one modification. The blade part of the lightsaber pike feels a little long to me, so I will be getting some 3L bars to replace the 4L ones they came with. Great printing all around, the shield has multiple connection points for the handle so you can play around with where it's connected and how it's held. The head comes with these tapered blue light prints which look great once the helmet is placed. I am surprised J's doesn't offer Senya Tirall, Valkorion's partner and mother to his children. It would be the same mold as the Knight of Zakuul, as she is one of them, but in white, and with a different head mold.

Sith Acolyte and Sith Troopers: Not much to say about them. They are the worst of the bunch, but only because they're being compared to the greatness of the rest of this haul. The acolyte comes with a cloth coat which feels very nice and fits well. The Sith troopers helmet is a big disappointment as I expected it to be more textured. The rest of the fig is great though. Like the weapon, the armor piece, and the communicator/radio that can slot in the back of the armor. I think WM410 Imperial Soldier helmet might be better so I need to get a couple of those. Actually, the more I look at how it's supposed to look, the more I think J's is fine.

This set had been on my list for a year and a half. So when I finally got my hands on it, I was very excited

The set has over 2500 pcs, which is about 1100 more than comparable offering from Lego (SF-24). So detailed build was expected. However while the end result is stunning and much larger than Lego SF-24 (slide 4 & 5), it does have its issues.

CADA has labelled this set as 8+ (slide 6). I do know Chinese kids are smarter in STEM than majority of the kids for their age group, I am still skeptical about an 8 year old Chinese kid ability to make this set.

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The set has 36 bags divided into 4 sections (9, 9, 7, 11)

Section 1 is for chassis & engine (slide 8)

Section 2: Half of the nose and prepping for section 3. (slide 10)

Section 3: Side pods (slide 11)

Section 4: Remaining nose, rear wing and engine cover (slide 12 & 13)

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The good: The packaging is amazing (slide 17 & 18). While its not as great as a 1:8 from Lego (ref: Mclaren P1), its much better than what Lego offers for its large F1 cars. That's a better apples to apples comparison. The end product is amazing with lots of details like side pod, venturi tunnels etc which are missing from the Lego offering. There are no stickers. Instruction manual is at par with Lego's 1:8 super/hypercars (slide 7). It has a molded Halo (slide 14) whereas Lego uses flexible tubes.

The bad: Some of the building techniques are pretty convoluted, esp section 3. The side pods design is unnecessarily complicated with many angled joints and ball & socket joints. This becomes a problem esp when some of the friction pins refuse to work as intended which leads to parts coming off and frustrating building experience. The set does not feel as sturdy as the Lego ones.

The ugly: CADA expects you to open all the bags for that section in one go. If you do not have the space and time to keep the parts, sort them and then find the right part, then this set is not for you. I wish they get better at it esp given how much better it is compared to Lego's F1 sets.

If you like a building challenge then this set or the latest Alpine offering from CADA is a must buy.

I did find the original creators MOC instructions on Rebrickable and purchased them for 3 euro instead of waiting 3 days for the pdf from the AE seller

Lego ninjago has some very cool pirates in their series but never produced any official figures for them, have any of the various alternatives made any of these figures?

Id love to acquire some of these, and or other interesting minifigs that are different from the lego figures

I finally got around to applying the stickers to Wekki 516952B Chinese Pancake Stall.