Hobby Thread - Sept 21, 2024 [TRex]

Welcome hobbyists! Pull up a chair and sit a spell with the horde in this little corner of the interweb. This is the mighty, mighty officially sanctioned Ace of Spades Hobby Thread. A spin of the Ace of Spades wheel of hobbies has come up with a theme of Legos (or other similar building blocks) for this week.

Did you build things with Legos as a child? Do you still build as an adult? Do you follow the directions or make your own creations or both? What are your favorite builds? Do you collect Lego sets? What are your favorites? Do you assemble and display? Have you spent absurd amounts of money on small colored interlocking blocks? Is your collection organized by set or has it become a giant pile of mix and match pieces? Do you give Lego sets as gifts? Do you seek collectible Legos?

As per usual Hobby Thread etiquette, keep this thread limited to hobbies. Politics and current events can wait for other threads. Play nice. Do not be a troll and do not feed the trolls.

The Lego origin story is a good place to start:

More detail here from the corporate historian of Lego on the occasion of the founders 100th birthday.

How Lego bricks are made:

Videos are usually not allowed in the Lego factory, but here is another if you are interested. The variety and complexity of parts being made was interesting:

Lego broke ground on a new plant near Richmond, Virginia in 2023. They are targeting the second half of 2025 to start production. In the meantime, there is a small visitor center building (in the shape of a yellow Lego brick) with Lego history and a model of the future factory (made out of Legos).

Apparently the most expensive Lego thing you can buy is not a Lego set. It is a three day tour of the Lego facilities in Denmark with a $3,000+ price tag. Spaces are very limited. In addition to a tour of the manufacturing facility (filming not permitted), the tour includes the Lego library which contains an example of every Lego set ever built. Packaging is done in Czech and Hungary so that is not on the tour. Check out more from someone who went:

Full scale McLaren P1 Lego car driven by F1 driver Lando Norris around Silverstone:

Yes, it is a PR marketing stunt to promote 1:8 scale retail Lego sets at $450 a clip, but still fun.

If you like 1:1 scale Lego cars, you might like a Bugatti Type 35B (35,000 bricks, not operable):

Lego fun facts:

The word Lego comes from the Danish phrase leg godt which means to play well.

There is a tiny three-digit number stamped on the interior wall of all Lego bricks. The number indicates which mold was used and where in the production line the brick was located. In case of a defect, Lego can trace the error back to its origin and fix the problem.

On October 24, 1961, Godtfred Kirk Christiansen was granted the patent for the LEGO TOY BUILDING BRICK, U.S. Patent No. 3,005,282.

Diagrams from the original US Lego patent application:

James May builds a house (best when said out loud in Clarkson Top Gear intro cadence):

Are you attending the upcoming Texas Moron Meetup? If you don't know what that is, check the Sunday evening Gun Thread for details and get thee to Texas. Cybersmythe is wise in the ways of 3D printing and is offering name tags to any among the horde who are interested.

For a limited time (as long as his enthusiasm lasts), Cybersmythe is making 3D printed name badges FREE OF CHARGE for Texas MoMe attendees. These badges will come with magnetic thingies to hold them on and will include your name and the Ace of Spades logo. They look something like this:

Think you need no stinking stinking badge? Think again. You need a stinking badge. Send a note to Cybersmythe to order yours now - cybersmythe at protonmail dot com.

3D printing is in the queue for a hobby thread theme, so stay tuned if you are into that sort of thing.

Did you miss last week's hobby thread with a hobby spaces theme? The comments may be closed, but you can re-live the content.

Horde art and hobby space: Tankascribe sent photos of the latest painting project to emerge from the Tankascribe Studio:

This one is 12x16 inches on stretched canvas and took approximately 49 hours from start to finish. We belong to a medieval recreation group (the SCA, Inc.) and this lady was reigning as Queen of the Kingdom of the West at the time the photo was taken by a talented photographer.

The painting went through the three usual stages of: 1) block-in (9 hours), 2) refining (25 hours), and 3) detail work (15 hours).

This one contains much symbolic detail on the silver crown and carved wooden throne, all of it meaningful, so none of it could be omitted.

Full process:

Comparison of source photo and painting result:

Honoring the theme last week of spaces where hobbying happens, here is where the Tankascribe painting magic happens. What might otherwise look like an ordinary dining room is cleverly disguised as an art studio:

Thank you!

Notable comments from last week:

Words of wisdom:

"Because despite all our troubles, when things are grim out in that wide round world of ours, that's when it's really important to have a good hobby." Posted by: tankascribe at June 22, 2024 07:41 PM (HWxAD).

If Legos are are not your thing and you have trouble finding something in the content or comments that resonates with you, there might be something wrong with you. In that unlikely event, hijack the thread for your hobbying as you see fit. We will feature a different hobby next time around. Send thoughts or suggestions to moronhobbies at protonmail dot com. Ace of Spades medical coverage does not cover accidents caused by walking on Legos left on the floor in the middle of the night.

posted by Open Blogger at 05:30 PM

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