STEAMrollered

So having hopefully tempted you with my Great Western LEGO Show (a.k.a. STEAM) preview last time out, how did the event turn out ? Well, keep reading to find out....

It was far from ideal having to put in a full day's work on the Friday before STEAM while others were already at the venue setting up their displays and taunting me with their updates, but finally it was time to load up the car with a couple of crates full of AT-AT parts and a travel bag and set off for Swindon. The journey should only have taken about 90 minutes, but a combination of an accident on the M4 motorway and Swindon's infernal one way system meant that I didn't get there until nearly 10 pm. Luckily Martin and Darren were still up for a curry so we headed down to the local Indian restaurant for dinner, followed by a rendezvous with other exhibitors back in the bar at Jurys Inn in time-honoured STEAM fashion before people gradually drifted off to their rooms to get a few hours sleep before the big event.

After a quick breakfast on the Saturday morning, I confess that I was feeling nervous as I made my way to the event venue. When I originally built my UCS AT-AT walker it had taken me ages to get it fully assembled, and having dissassembled it for transportation to Swindon I was dreading having similar problems on the morning of the event. Sadly, my pessimism turned out to be entirely justified.... After carefully unpacking the sections on arrival at the venue, everything seemed to be coming together nicely, but just as the beast seemed to have been successfully reassembled it suffered a terminal systems failure and came crashing down, suffering what I feared would be show-stopping damage in the process. As I stared at the wreckage in horror it was hard to see how the situation could be retrieved, but salvation was at hand in the form of Pete Brookdale (cavegod), designer of the original UCS AT-AT and a fellow exhibitor. To his massive credit, he immediately stopped assembling his display and dived into the wreckage of mine, helping to repair the substantial damage and get my AT-AT back on its feet quicker than I could ever have believed possible. Pete, you are a legend and I salute you ! Having helped to get my AT-AT up on its feet, Pete then assembled his, and for the first time ever we were able to witness two of the monsters standing proudly side by side; you can see photographic evidence of this below (click to enlarge).

UCS AT-ATs by cavegod and drdavewatford

UCS AT-ATs by cavegod and drdavewatford

In addition to his AT-AT, Pete had also brought a brand new MOC which was receiving its first ever public airing - a huge UCS Rebel Transport (below - click pictures to enlarge). I confess that I was somewhat underwhelmed when he first showed me photos of the thing a couple of months back - the subject matter is inherently pretty ugly IMHO - but Pete's LEGO rendition turned out to be considerably more impressive in the brick than it was in his photographs - big, imposing and skilfully realised. The icing on the cake was a couple of Tim Goddard's X-wings which made for a superb fighter escort.

Rebel Transport by cavegod

Rebel Transport by cavegod

Rebel Transport by cavegod; X-wing by Tim Goddard (Rogue Bantha)

Our Hoth display was boosted by the presence of a third AT-AT walker, albeit with a twist - Sam Pearce had brought his excellent collapsed AT-AT model (below) which was rather ironic, considering my trials and tribulations setting up that morning.... It added some welcome minifigure action and humour to the display, and was complemented by some turrets and a small, woefully outnumbered rebel force. The Rebel defences were something of an afterthough - the turrets were actually built and added during the course of the first day of the event - and it's an aspect of the display that we might develop further if we decide to exhibit all the Hoth models together again on a future occasion, particularly if I can get round to finishing my shield generator.

Crashed AT-AT by Sam Pearce

Rebel Defences by Sam Pearce

People surged into the venue as soon as the doors opened at 10 a.m. on Saturday morning and the place remained pretty full until late on Sunday afternoon. Much of my time was spent just standing next to my display chatting to enthusiastic attendees of all ages and answering tons of questions, typically "How many pieces does the AT-AT contain ?", "Is it glued ?", "Where can I buy that set ?", "How much did all the parts cost you ?", "Surely those aren't proper LEGO parts ?", "Can I buy that from you ?" and of course "Where are the toilets ?". I did however manage to get away from my display now and again and check out the other exhibits, and the standard was incredible. Probably most impressive of all was a spectacular collaborative castle display - The Land of Tigelfáh - created by eight talented builders, all whom richly deserve a name (and Flickr) check : James Pegrum (peggyjdb), Harry Russell (Kǻrrde), Thomas Coleman (Malravion), Luke Watkins Hutchinson (- Derfel Cadarn -), Barney Main (SlyOwl), Colin Parry (Cuahchic), Jimmy Clynche (Invicta Bricks) and Steven Snasdell (workshysteve). Aside from the sheer excellence of their display, one of the most impressive things about it was how cohesive it was. I would have expected eight separate builders to have produced something of a patchwork, but in the event their display was superbly realised and meshed together beautifully. I took tons of pictures but none of them remotely do the display justice I"m afraid; I've nevertheless included a few below just to give you a flavour of their achievement. It was I believe the culmination of two years planning and building, and watching the eight builders tearing their display down at the end of the event, knowing that the display would never be reassembled again, was quite poignant.

Tigelfáh Castle by James Pegrum (peggyjdb)

Tigelfáh Abbery by Colin Parry (Cuahchic)

The Land of Tigelfáh

The Dark Isle by Luke Hutchinson (- Derfel Cadarn -)

Another other standout display was Bright Bricks' half-scale brick-built Rolls Royce Trent 1000 jet engine. Commissioned by Rolls Royce themsleves, I'd previously seen the model featured on a host of websites after it was unveiled at the opening of the 2012 Farnborough Air Show, but it was the first time that I'd seen it 'in the brick' and it's amazing. Over 150,000 bricks have been used to create a working replica of the engine complete with a ton of moving parts such as the fan blades which suck air into the engine. You can see a couple of pictures below (click to enlarge) and (on some devices at least) a short video.

Rolls Royce Jet Engine by Bright Bricks

Rolls Royce Jet Engine by Bright Bricks

Located next to the AT-ATs was a huge model of Space Shuttle Endeavour attached to its external fuel tank and solid rocket boosters. Build by Ed and Annie Diment, Naomi Farr and Stuart Crawshaw in less than a month, this 30,000-piece model was accompanied by a display of pretty much every space shuttle set that LEGO have ever released.

Space Shuttle by Ed (Lego Monster), Annie (Mrs Monster)
Naomi and Stuart (OptimalControl)

Orbiter by Ed (Lego Monster), Annie (Mrs Monster)
Naomi and Stuart (OptimalControl)

Ian Greig was another builder who served up a space-themed display, showing his Tintin-inspired moon rocket (below - click to enlarge) while his other half Julie had some neat Dr. Who-inspired creations on show including a Cyberman vignette.

Tintin Moon Rocket by Ian Greig (Bluemoose)

You're all Mime now by Julie Greig (jujem71)

Renowned spacer Tim Goddard had a bunch of cool stuff on display. In addition to his X-wings mentioned earlier, he showed some models which will feature in his soon-to-be-released collaboration with fellow space guru Pete Reid, LEGO Space: Building the Future. Tim's no one-trick pony, though - one of my favourite models in the whole show was one of his non-space-related creations (the Micro Viaduct below), and he also had a dragon on display which was later seen paying Tigelfáh castle a visit....

by Tim Goddard (Rogue Bantha) and Pete Reid (legoloverman)

by Tim Goddard (Rogue Bantha) and Pete Reid (legoloverman)

Dragon by Tim Goddard (Rogue Bantha)

Micro Viaduct by Tim Goddard (Rogue Bantha)

I thought that one of the cleverest exhibits was another of Stuart Crawshaw's offerings. He reimagined a host of different official LEGO sets in the style of 1980's LEGO space theme Blacktron with some cracking results. His Blacktron-inspired rendition of LEGO's Horizon Express, for instance, was excellent, as were a number of other models across a variety of LEGO themes. I was particularly amused to see a Blacktron version of the Indiana Jones Shanghai Chase vehicles that I reviewed here just a few weeks ago.

Blacktron display by Stuart Crawshaw (OptimalControl)

Blacktron Horizon Express by Stuart Crawshaw (OptimalControl)

Blacktron Shanghai Chase by Stuart Crawshaw (OptimalControl)

Rod Gillies sci-fi display was another that caught my attention; while not exactly a purist approach, his model entitled "The Unit 13 Incident" incorporated a working plasma plate and plasma ball and looked really cool, while the distinctly Steampunky "Mister Brunel's Jaeger" was a bit bizarre but intriguing nonetheless....

"The Unit 13 Incident" by Rod Gillies (2 Much Caffeine)

"Mister Brunel's Jaeger" by Rod Gillies (2 Much Caffeine)

Saturday just flew by, and almost before I knew it it was 5 pm, the public were being ushered out of the venue, and I learned that my beloved Watford Football Club had secured a decent 2-1 away victory at Huddersfield. And both AT-ATs were still standing, so an excellent day all round.... The day's work done I returned to Jurys Inn, and there was just time to grab a drink or two in the bar and watch Manchester United squeeze past an unfortunate Sunderland side in the evening kick-off before heading upstairs for the exhibitor group dinner. Dinner was followed by the traditional Saturday evening STEAM auction and then more drinks in the bar before exhaustion caught up with me and I crashed out.

Sunday dawned beautiful and sunny, and having set up the day before most people got to head off to the venue a bit later compared with the Saturday. On arrival at the venue I peered nervously into the main exhibition hall half expecting my AT-AT to have collapsed overnight but was delighted to see it still defiant and upstanding. The museum opened its doors just before 10 a.m. and once again the venue rapidly filled with eager visitors.

LEGO City College by drdavewatford

In addition to my AT-AT, I had also brought my LEGO City College MOC (above) to STEAM; this formed part of a display of models (below - click to enlarge) that Brickish Association members had previously showcased within LEGO brand stores. Regular readers of this blog may remember my College MOC from a couple of previous posts (here and here) and it was nice to have the opportunity to show it again. Perhaps my favourite of all the showcase models on display was Jason Railton's lovely lighthouse (below - click to enlarge) which was a late arrival on Showcase row.

Showcase row

Permanence by Jason Railton (joefish (;_}{)

Ralph Savelsberg is a much admired designer and builder of cars and military aircraft, and he brought a few examples of his craft over to STEAM from the Netherlands where he's based. Pride of place went to his 1/36 scale B-52 Stratofortress strategic bomber (below - click to enlarge) - how those massive wings don't droop beats me - although some of his models of iconic British vehicles are no less impressive, with Morse's Mark 2 Jaguar possibly my favourite of the lot (although alas also the most poorly photographed....).

B-52 by Ralph Savelsberg (Mad Physicist)

Eddie Stobart Truck by Ralph Savelsberg (Mad Physicist)

Morse's Jag by Ralph Savelsberg (Mad Physicist)

Caterham 500 by Ralph Savelsberg (Mad Physicist)

Talking of cars, another of my personal favourites from the show was Ed and Annie Diment's model of an iconic LEGO set of my youth - Set 392 Formula 1 - lovingly recreated at 6 times the original scale and flanked by the original model complete with box and instructions. If you look closely at the large scale model (below - click to enlarge) you'll notice that they've even reproduced the stickers from the original set using LEGO - very slick !

by Ed (Lego Monster) and Annie (Mrs Monster) Diment

Another exhibit worthy of special mention was first-time exhibitor Simon Pickard's magnificent Battle of Thermopylae. This tells the story of how a small Spartan force under the command of King Leonidas held out for 3 days against overwhelming numbers of Persian invaders, a stand most recently popularised by the film "300". Simon's model is intricate and beautifully put together; I was particularly impressed with the rockwork, not to mention all the minifigures that he's managed to amass...

Battle of Thermopylae by Simon Pickard (brick.spartan)

Hopefully by now you're starting to get a sense of the incredible diversity of subject matter, the high quality of the builds, and the sheer number of excellent models on display. It's impossible for me to cover everything, not least because as an exhibitor I didn't have time to go round, examine and photograph all of the displays. Even so, here's a round up of a few more exhibits that caught my eye, and apologies in advance to those exhibitors whose work isn't featured.

Le Brique Parfum by Yvonne Doyle ({YVD})

by Yvonne Doyle ({YVD})

by Barney Main (SlyOwl)

by Barney Main (SlyOwl)

by Naomi Farr

2CV by Nick Barrett (TechnicNick)

Mini by Nick Barrett (TechnicNick)

by Richard Selby

In addition to the models above, I have to mention Simon Burfield's excellent Mindstorms creations, not least his amazing orange tank-like vehicle dubbed "The Beast" which is powered by more than 20 motors and spent the weekend being driven around the venue by a succession of excited children; my own little boy had a turn in it and absolutely loved it.

By around 4pm on Sunday attendance was thinning out, the mosaic (above) was finished, and I was seriously flagging; by 5 pm I was ready to pack up and go home. My AT-AT had done me proud - despite my misgivings on Saturday morning it was still standing as the last of the attendees filed out on Sunday afternoon. OK, so I had a bit of a mishap while I was taking it down and packing it away for the journey home, but we won't dwell on that.... After packing everything up and saying my goodbyes it was back on the road for the journey home and a well-earned rest - unquestionably another fantastic STEAM experience, and tired or not I can't wait for next year !

Big thanks are due to Martin Long and his faithful lieutenants Gemma and Jonathan for organising a cracking show - Martin assures us he'll be giving up his store next year and getting back to exhibiting, and about time too. Thanks to all the traders and caterers for meeting our shopping and subsistence needs, and to all the helpers - Sarah, sirKevbags and the rest - who helped out on the various exhibits during the show, held babies and mopped our fevered brows.... Although ostensibly an event for showing off the best of Brickish, STEAM is also a top social weekend, and it was great to catch up with Caz, Nick and Indy from minifigs.me, Matt from Jedinews, and a ton of fellow Bricksetters - Huw, atkinsar, kempo81, caperberry, Legopants, Legoboy, LostinTranslation, Supersympa, princedraven, carlq, CapnRex101, sirrich69 and a whole bunch of others. Thanks also to those folks who came over to introduce themselves as readers of Gimme LEGO, fellow Bricksetters, or both.

A final note : If any of the exhibits I've mentioned above have been attributed to the wrong builders then please let me know ASAP and I'll correct the information. Also, I've added Flickr usernames and links where I had them; if yours isn't shown then please get in touch and I'll add them.

Full STEAM Ahead

So here we go again - as I write this it's less than 48 hours until Saturday 5th October when the Great Western LEGO Show, better known to LEGO afficionados as STEAM, opens its doors and gets underway. STEAM, which is arguably the highlight of the UK AFOL calendar, is far and away the UK's biggest LEGO show, and this'll be the fourth consecutive year that I've attended.

For the uninitiated, STEAM is an annual event which is hosted by the Museum of the Great Western Railway in Swindon, and which showcases some of the best LEGO models built by Brickish Association members. The show has a reputation for the spectacular, and standout creations featured in previous shows have included Ed Diment's stupendous 7-metre long model of USS Intrepid (picture below - click to enlarge),  a beautiful model of Westminster Abbey built to celebrate the marriage of Prince William and Kate Middleton and containing 180,000 bricks, and more recently a massive, minifig-populated reproduction of London's 2012 Olympic Stadium. I'm delighted to report that there's going to be another amazing showpiece model this year; my lips are sealed, but trust me that it's a worthy successor to the spectacular creations of past years, and I personally can't wait to see it up close and personal.

USS Intrepid at STEAM 2010

STEAM consistently stands out for the sheer diversity of its displays; confirmed exhibits rather bear this out and include a minifig-scale model of the space shuttle Endeavour, Burf's latest crazy Mindstorms contraption, Ralph Savelsberg's B-52 Stratofortress, and a huge collaborative display featuring the medieval town of Tigelfáh; you can get a sneak peek at some of the exhibits here to further whet your appetite, and rest assured that these examples are really just the tip of a rather large iceberg - the venue will be overflowing with cool stuff to see. Although the wealth of LEGO creations are the main draw, there'll be a lot of other things going on as well. Show attendees will be able to participate in the construction of a huge LEGO mosaic; there'll also be a series of talks and building workshops from LEGO experts, plus a huge selection of sets, minifigures and merchandise to buy from the on-site pop-up LEGO brand store and independent LEGO traders.

My first visit to STEAM in 2010 sucked me deeper into the AFOL community, so much so that for the last couple of years I've been an exhibitor as well as an attendee, and that'll be the case this year as well. Early on during my well-documented quest to reproduce Cavegod's massive UCS AT-AT I decided that once I'd completed the monster I'd really need to give it a public airing. It'll therefore be coming to STEAM, but it won't be alone.... I won't spoil the surprise, but let's just say that I'll be joining forces with Pete (Cavegod) and Sam Pearce to put together a collaborative display which should hopefully put a smile on the faces of any Star Wars fans out there....

Although I've really been looking forward to STEAM, I certainly wasn't relishing taking my completed AT-AT (picture above - click to enlarge) apart and boxing it up for the trip to Swindon; given the stress I experienced trying to assemble the blasted thing the first time round, I'm looking forward to reassembling it all over again even less.... Hopefully I'll at least have Pete to help me rebuild it, however, so fingers crossed that it'll be back in one piece and on display when the show opens on Saturday morning.... You can see my AT-AT reduced to its constituent sections below (click to enlarge) prior to being packed into a couple of crates along with about a mile of bubble wrap and shoehorned into my car's pitifully inadequate boot and back seat.

STEAM really is a special event, and even if you only have a passing interest in LEGO you owe it to yourself to come along and check it out - you won't regret it. You can find more details about the show, including directions to the venue, on the official Great Western LEGO Show website.

If you do make it down to Swindon then please come and say "hi"; assuming I've managed to reassemble the AT-AT it'll be pretty hard to miss so I shouldn't be too hard to find.....

UCS AT-AT : They think it's all over...

When I last wrote, the various AT-AT sections had finally been completed, so it should simply have been a case of putting them all together and the AT-AT would be done. As I'm sure you've gathered by now, however, nothing about this project has been simple, and there were actually a couple of things I'd need to do before I could embark upon final assembly....

Firstly, as I've mentioned a number of times during this seemingly interminable journey, the LDD files I've been following were in very much 'first draft' status when I received them, and predictably enough a number of issues have been identified. Cavegod (Pete), the AT-AT's designer, has dutifully revised the LDD files along the way, but there was consequently always going to be a need for me to make a few tweaks to the various completed sections prior to final assembly of the model. Much of the last week or so has therefore been spent making these modifications, some of which necessitated a wait for a couple of Bricklink orders to arrive.

The biggest issue to remedy involved the internal skeleton of the body (above) which thanks to a mistake in the LDD file ended up one stud too long and therefore needed chopping down to size. This sounds potentially quite involved, but in practice it wasn't too big a deal, particularly as Pete has now revised the offending LDD file so I could closely study the necessary modifications and implement them. A further issue concerned the dark bley platforms which project out from the sides of the body, one on each side (you can see one of them in the picture above); these structures were unfinished and slightly out of position on the original LDD file. Once again the LDD file has now been corrected, and thankfully the necessary modifications were straightforward, although they did require a few additional parts.

Lastly, I decided to make a couple of tweaks to increase the stability of the legs as I was nervous about their ability to support the weight of the AT-AT's body. The joint between the foot and the lower part of the leg (above) isn't very strong, and as a consequence, when the leg pivots at the ankle and the weight of the body is applied there's a risk of the leg giving way. This is guaranteed to bring 6000+ pieces crashing down so is to be avoided if at all possible.... Following some discussion, Pete suggested a simple modification to help support the leg when it's in a flexed position, and in addition to this I made a couple of further tweaks to increase the strength of the ankle joint and offer additional support and stability. Only when these had been completed did I feel sufficiently confident to proceed with final assembly of the AT-AT.

So here we go, then.... Step 1 : Attach neck to body. A couple of Technic pins protruding forward from the front of the body act as a guide to ensure that the neck is in position, after which the neck can be firmly bolted on by threading a bley Technic axle down through a series of interlocking, overlapping Technic liftarms sticking out from the neck and body. You can see the results below - click the pictures to enlarge them.

Step 2 : Attach the legs. Before I even attempted this came the realisation that with the legs attached, the AT-AT would be too big for my rudimentary photographic layout.... So where to build and photograph it ? Well, I didn't want to assemble it on my floor on the basis that the carpet wouldn't provide a firm base for the AT-AT to stand on. That, and I really didn't fancy its chances of surviving for long on the floor in the middle of my study. A solution was found in the form of the tables which support my work-in-progress LEGO City layout; thanks to my glacial rate of progress (yes, yes - I know I promised to provide an update on that project about a year ago, but I've been busy....) there's still a huge empty space in the middle of it. A space big enough for a colossal AT-AT, in fact. The downside is that there's no nice plain backdrop there to photograph the AT-AT against, so apologies for that - you'll just have to live with the distracting background until I can find a way of properly photographing it....

OK, adequate space located, it was time to figure out how on earth to go about precariously perching the body on top of the legs. Having tried to lift the body with one hand a few months back with catastrophic results (my hand-hold came away from the body, which proceeded to plummet to the floor and distintegrate on hitting the floor....) I decided to call for help. Pete tells me he's built a handle for the body of his AT-AT to allow him to attach the legs single-handedly, but I've yet to do this, and so it was that my reluctant wife was called into action and asked to hold the body of the AT-AT at just the right height for me to attach the legs. Attaching the legs involved threading a single Technic axle through the top of each leg and into the lower part of the body; the outer end of each axle also holds in place the large printed dishes that you can see at the top of each leg. Once each leg was attached, there came a point when I had to tell my wife to carefully let go of the body to see whether the legs would support the weight without collapsing. I don't mind admitting that this was incredibly nerve-wracking - if I hadn't seen Pete's AT-AT in the flesh I would have doubted that the legs could hold the weight. We both held our breath, but thankfully the legs held firm, and with a huge sigh of relief I stepped back and recorded the moment for posterity below (click to enlarge).

Step 3 : Attach the sides of the body. Here the concern was less about actually attaching the sides to the body and more about the fear that all the pushing and pulling involved in getting the sides into the right position and bolting them to the Technic frame would destabilise the legs, causing them to give way and bring everything crashing down. The other potential problem I faced was the fragility of the sides themselves - as previously described they're not very robust and have a tendency to break apart at the slightest excuse. In the event, attaching the sides turned out to be reasonably straightforward and didn't even require the help of my glamorous assistant. The sides are suspended from the top of the body's Technic frame by a couple of Technic pins with stop bush, and they rest at the correct angle relative to the body as a result of being pushed outwards by the platforms projecting from the sides of the body. The only complication did in fact turn out to be the fragility of the sides themselves - they broke apart a couple of times while I was trying to manipulate them into the correct position for attachment, setting me back a few minutes on each occasion while I effected a repair. Eventually it was done, and you can see the AT-AT with one and then both sides attached below (click pictures to enlarge).

Step 4 : Attach the head. This somewhat unexpectedly turned out to be one of the trickiest jobs. As you can see in the pictures above, projecting forwards from the front of the neck is a black rectangular structure with a couple of bley tiles on top and a bley Technic pin sticking out of the front. This structure slides into a slot inside the AT-AT's head, and the pin anchors it when it's in the correct position. Sounds simple. Lining up the head, getting the structure into the slot and getting the pin to click into place took a number of attempts, though, and all the while I was sweating that all the pushing and pulling would make the whole thing collapse. The head is quite fragile, and with all the pressure I was applying I managed to break the windscreen and roof section off the head. This however turned out to be a blessing in disguise as it ended up being easier to slide the head on to the neck without the roof being attached as I could better see what I was doing. Once the head was locked into position I carefully replaced the roof and windscreen and took the picture below (click to enlarge); the gap between the side of the head and the roof is a little wider than it should be as a result of all the pushing and pulling but this should be easy enough to fix with a bit of careful manipulation...

Step 5 : Cover the body. The roof which covers the body of the AT-AT consists of 3 distinct sections which are dropped into place one at a time. Fitting the roof sections was pretty straightforward - all sit on top of the upper edges of the sides of the body - and the fit was mostly pretty good although a little final tweaking is still needed in a couple of places. Also, the rear section has a tendency to slide backwards, and I'm going to need to add a stop to the underside to prevent this. The completed AT-AT with the roof sections fitted can be seen below.

And the finishing touch ? Well, no Star Wars UCS model is complete without a display plaque to go with it, and fellow AT-AT builder Morten has designed a suitable display sticker (below) which I now have a copy of, so thanks, Morten !

And so more than 11 months after I published my first post about building a copy of Pete's AT-AT it's finally finished ! Although I've seen Pete's original on a number of occasions I have to admit that I was still taken aback by the sheer size of the thing when I'd finished building my own - it's absolutely huge ! The scale is somewhat hard to convey, but the rebel pilot minifigure that I've posed on the top of the AT-AT's body in the picture below (click to enlarge) should hopefully give you a sense of how massive it is....

Regarding the final piece count, it was around 6,220, give or take; I can't offer an exact figure as it's calculated from the first draft of the LDD files which contain a few errors as previously mentioned, plus I've made a few minor modifications along the way to improve stability. So let's say 6,250 for the sake of argument. And the cost ? Well, I had around a third of the pieces already, and I estimate that the rest cost me about £600 including shipping, although I'm certain I could have done it cheaper if I'd shopped around more; I believe that fellow AFOL Rocao recently managed to source the necessary parts for around $600 excluding shipping, and Pete reckons that the whole lot only cost him £250...(!)

And lastly, was it worth the effort and the cost ? Well, on the one hand I can safely say that it's been quite the most frustrating build I've ever experienced, by a country mile. Admittedly this was in part because I was to some extent a guinea pig. working with the first draft of Pete's LDD files, but mostly it's just because it's a mighty tricky build at times. It's also nerve-wracking to put all the sections together, wildy impractical to display, and can't be moved when constructed.... But despite all of that, just look at the thing ! As a huge Star Wars fan, and indeed someone for whom the AT-AT is perhaps my favourite vehicle from the Star Wars universe, it's definitely been worth all the expense and pain to see this monster standing proudly in my house. Massive kudos to Pete for designing the thing and putting together a set of LDD files for it, and if anyone wants to get hold of a copy of the most recent version of the LDD files and have a go at building one yourself then please get in touch and I'll forward your details to Pete.

So what now ? Well, plans are afoot to show the AT-AT later this year at a public event where it'll be part of a display featuring a number of big Star Wars MOCs - I'll share more details in due course. Until then I think I'll just stare at the finished model with a huge grin on my face while I decide what to build next....

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