Speed Champions

DeMontes

daewoo said:

TheBigLegoski said:

https://brickset.com/sets/76898-1/Formula-E-Panasonic-Jaguar-Racing-GEN2-Car-Jaguar-I-PACE-eTROPHY

I hope that two minifigs can be seated next to each other in the Jaguar I-PACE eTROPHY!
Hope this will become the new standard for all City cars too. The modular #10260 includes this really cool Cadillac convertible with room for 2 minifigs next to one another, and it is something that bugs me about so many other cars including the Speed Champions, that they are all single seat minifig cars.

It's a matter of width.  Recent Lego City vehicles have been 6 wide and that just doesn't allow enough room for 2 minifigs to sit side-by-side. 

Perhaps LEGO have a solution.

Speedman29

Love the colours, the DS TECHEETAH team have a scheme that would have worked well, but nobody has heard of them outside motorsport, whereas Jaguar is recognised brand and will hopefully lead to other SC cars (I'll have a blocky E-Type and an XJ220 please)

prettybigguy

It doesn’t matter that much to me if two minifigs can sit side by side, as long as it appears that two can. There are some 6 wide vehicles out there that can seat two though. #60231 and the pink convertible from #10260 are examples. This new windshield piece opens up some exciting possibilities for Speed Champions IMO.

TheBigLegoski

daewoo said:

TheBigLegoski said:

https://brickset.com/sets/76898-1/Formula-E-Panasonic-Jaguar-Racing-GEN2-Car-Jaguar-I-PACE-eTROPHY

I hope that two minifigs can be seated next to each other in the Jaguar I-PACE eTROPHY!
Hope this will become the new standard for all City cars too. The modular #10260 includes this really cool Cadillac convertible with room for 2 minifigs next to one another, and it is something that bugs me about so many other cars including the Speed Champions, that they are all single seat minifig cars.

It's a matter of width.  Recent Lego City vehicles have been 6 wide and that just doesn't allow enough room for 2 minifigs to sit side-by-side.  7 wide would probably do it but Lego typically doesn't do odd sized widths.  That means jumping to 8 wide.  This impacts City layouts because you need wider lanes in your streets to accommodate the wider vehicles.  I believe the current road plates are designed for 6 wide vehicles.

Quite a few six stud wide vehicles can accommodate two minifigs to be seated side by side with the aid of jumper plates. Except of course if the sides are constructed using normal stacked bricks leaving only a four stud wide interior space. Sometimes little modification is needed on six stud wide vehicles, in other cases it is much more difficult, sometimes it is just impossible, but in many cases it can be done.

I don't care for the four stud wide vehicle nostalgia some people bring up as a supposed counter-argument against widening Lego city (and speed champion) vehicles. I respect their personal preference, but that ultimately is just a matter of taste. The reason I welcome six and eight stud wide vehicles is: they look better in my opinion; offer more innovative build techniques that will add to design and look of all the cars; and last but not least, minifig side by side seating will add play value for kids.

The current (32X32) road plates have only six studs on either side, so the lanes should be wide enough for both six and eight stud wide vehicles.

It could be that I am opening up a can of worms now, but I am not all that fond of Lego's base plates. For starters, I wish that baseplates would be both more sturdy, and be as thick (or high/tall) as a regular Lego plate: (1/3) of a Lego brick. I wish that the road-plates would come in black as that resembles tarmac closer. I don't like how a straight is always packaged with a corner or T-section. You don't need that many crossings and T-sections. I also think that they are at full RRP ridiculously expensive!

Personally I am not all that concerned about the road-plates a.t.m., as I do not have room in my house for a huge city layout with lots of road plates anyway. But if/when I do, I have often thought about, even though this will be very expensive, using regular base plates and tiling those up. That way you can have single lane one-way street layouts too, or allot/allocate the  two lane road off-centre on the baseplate with plenty of room for pavement and parking space on one side etc.

CaptainLego

My main concern with LEGO possibility going eight wide is that it throws everything off. With the exception of the Mini duo, we’ve had all 6 wides the past five waves. Furthermore, it poses a issue for me. I have a LOT of cars. MOCs, non-MOCs, and set builds. I’m not about to go back and mod nearly 100 cars into eight-wide. 

Other than that, I’m not too fussed by it.

Mynatt

The brother's brick has photos of the new chassis part that they are using for the 8 wide vehicles.



https://www.brothers-brick.com/2019/10/02/lego-adds-jaguar-formula-e-and-i-pace-vehicles-to-the-speed-champions-lineup-news/

TheBigLegoski

Next thing to cause a tremendous amount of uproar in the Lego community: 8 stud wide train tracks, and wider trains. ;-P

TheBigLegoski

Finally a car that comes with seats for four minifigs! Nice!

Fauch

if they are 33% larger, does that mean a single car will cost 20€?

sid3windr

TheBigLegoski said:

Next thing to cause a tremendous amount of uproar in the Lego community: 8 stud wide train tracks, and wider trains. ;-P

They already just released a wider train... (Disney one)

TheBigLegoski

@sid3windr ;  

I know, but that is not the point since it runs on six stud wide Lego train tracks.

Nice set #71044 BTW, whether you are a Disney fan or not, both the building and train are beautifully designed.

colay

Um, 8 wide? How are they going to fit into my (poorly constructed) garage?

redarmy

colay said:

Um, 8 wide? How are they going to fit into my (poorly constructed) garage?

Quite like that..build it several stories high and you have the perfect storage/display.

colay

Thank you. I need a lot more spares to go higher, but glad you liked it. I thought it was a little boring. But, I'm limited with colours. I picked up a load of greys, black, light grey thinking I was going to do a SW scene for the Falcon, but don't think I'll ever have the time patience or money lol. I'll see if I can make it stronger and add levels

Mynatt

https://www.hothbricks.com/lego-speed-champions-76899-huracan-super-trofeo-evo-urus-st-x-premiers-visuels/

8 wide Lamborghini images. Huracan looks appropriately sized but the Urus looks huge. Going to be a weird shift moving towards the 8 wide body style. 

Edit: Oops didn't check the front page.

madejp86

Well I guess this theme is done for me. 6 Stud wide was awesome for the city, 8 seems to big

JRBricks

Good grief does every single piece have a sticker?

Fizyx

JRBricks said:

Good grief does every single piece have a sticker?

It doesn't look like it has too many more stickers than the average recent Speed Champions car.  I actually hold the amount of stickers in Speed Champions sets against them a lot less than many of the other themes, since there is so much detail that would be basically impossible to show with just bricks at this size, but it also clearly wouldn't be economical to print all the pieces, especially since almost none of them would be reusable for other sets.  It makes for some great looking cars without boosting the prices too much.

madejp86

All the garage doors are 8 studs wide so how are these 8 stud plus wheels supposed to fit now? 

Bumblepants

I was really hoping for a modern/classic duo not a racecar/SUV. I will probably be getting less speed champs this next year it looks like.

Modeltrainman

@Bumblepants, same. The lack of American brands, and the switch to 8 studs wide kind of kills my enthusiasm.

madforLEGO

Not crazy about 8 stud wide cars, but am interested in the 6 stud wide windshields

madejp86

only thing I will get here are the manuals and try to moc these to 6 studs

pxchris

I'm looking forward to seeing more of the Lamborghini Huracán especially. But in general, I think that Speed Champions looks to be going strong into the new year. 

colay

Yes, Im very disappointed in 8. Sucker people into 6, then make their entire collection look odd. Should have been called Speed Champions+, or, still make SC, and have these as a different theme. Very unenthused

CaptainRogers

I'll still grab the cars since this is a favorite theme of mine, but I do agree switching things up will result in some inconsistencies across the range. It'll be interesting to see what more they do with a 1/3rd increase in width though. 

drdavewatford

I agree that 8-wide will look incongruous alongside 6-wide, but then LEGO make cars in a variety of different scales anyway (Creator Expert Mustang, DB5, Mini, VW Camper etc.) so maybe we just need to look at this as a Speed Champions reboot, say a fond farewell to 'old Speed Champions' and look forward to more authentic Speed Champions cars in future.

I have to admit that I'm looking forward to seeing what the designers can do with 8-wide. While some of the 6-wide offerings were excellent, many weren't great and a few were frankly ghastly; hopefully there'll be fewer missteps from now on.

colay

Maybe they should offer us a 'free' upgrade of older vehicles to 8 wide! :) lmao

SumoLego

(And they're not really compatible with the current roadplates, either.)

sid3windr

Road plates, garage doors, etc. This is more than a bit annoying.... but I'll still be suckered in.

gmonkey76

Hopefully they remake some of the old cars. The thing that bothered me the most on the 70s Charger is how they had the modified plate on the outside of the front grill, and how it stuck out of the body lines. Can't wait to see if I can make it and the Mustang better with the new base and windshields, and moc the car chase scene from Bullitt

redarmy

That is going to severely upset my perception of size...

drdavewatford

I've just realised that I spied the inspiration for the upcoming LEGO Huracan Super Trofeo model, or something very similar, when I visited the Lamborghini museum and factory earlier this year.....



Thought I recognised it!

drdavewatford

In fact the Super Trofeo Evo, which is the basis for the LEGO model, is the facelifted version of the above car with a shark fin at the rear and a few other tweaks to the design and livery, but it's very similar. 

Bumblepants

The new Ferrari looks excellent and filled with neat building techniques. Not as excited for the Audi, mainly because it will be out of scale with the Ford Fiesta. I know they are different time periods but it still would have been nice to put the rally cars together. The Audi also just feels too big/bulky for a rally car at 8 wide.

TheOriginalSimonB

I've been waiting for that Quattro since I got back into LEGO, so also gutted about the change in scale.

MaffyD

I'll have both of those, thanks. And that Ferrari can be changed into an F40 I reckon, using pieces from the old scale one...

Speedman29

The Audi is on my list for 2020. If only the 205GTI T16 from Ideas made it through, you'd have the perfect pair.

Mr_Cross

#76895, that is a lovely looking model. Definitely buying two of that as soon as I see it. Then after I've built it, I'm going to mod/moc a Lamborghini Countach* with that windscreen.

*my favourite car as a child.

drdavewatford

TheOriginalSimonB said:

I've been waiting for that Quattro since I got back into LEGO, so also gutted about the change in scale.

Chances are that Quattro will look a lot better in 8-wide than it would have done in 6-wide so you should be pleased.... 

The F8 Tributo looks excellent - one of the best Speed Champions designs to date IMHO.

daewoo

For all the reasons already mentioned, I'm not thrilled with 8 wide.  2020 isn't looking good at all so far.

bpk2300

The Quattro is a must buy for me. I think they nailed it. The 8-wide will obviously be new to me so I’m curious as to how it will display with my other speed champions 

flord

Love the new Ferrari. 

MaffyD

Am I right in thinking that the change to the scale affects people in 3 primary ways:

1. They have a city layout, and the 8 stud wide cars won't fit (garages/roads/etc)
2. They have been collecting the range or adding to existing display of even older vehicles, and the difference from old to new is disconcerting and messes up the look
3. They have a preference for narrower cars based on looks alone - 4 & 6 stud wide are 'right' for minifig scale, and 8 is too wide.

Are there any other reasons? Because I can get behind all of those reasons, it's a very personal thing. I won't be happy to shelve all my narrower cars in favour of these new ones, and I'll both hate it and love it if they update any of them to the wider studs. I'm grateful that I don't have a city, and don't have an extensive vehicle collection.

This must've happened before though, right? Changes to scale..?

MaffyD

Mr_Cross said:

#76895, that is a lovely looking model. Definitely buying two of that as soon as I see it. Then after I've built it, I'm going to mod/moc a Lamborghini Countach* with that windscreen.

*my favourite car as a child.

Mine too. I got a Countach telephone for a birthday or Christmas present that I demanded my parents use instead of their old rotary phone. It was utterly incongruous in their living room, but I loved it.
Lots of posters on my walls too, and BBurago models. Seeing the brand in Lego form (when I can actually buy it - don't get me started on #8169 ) is a dream come true (except for the nightmare green pile of junk they've put with it).
I am all but certain that an official Countach will be released. It would just fit beautifully into the range for all sorts of reasons (heritage, styling, AFOL appeal). I'm sure they've done their research though...

TheOriginalSimonB

From that list I'm kind of 2 with regard to the Quattro - although the only rally cars I have are the Fiesta and Minis so I would be OK with keeping the new set and any future rally cars from the same era separate in display terms.

I agree that this particular car does look great in 8-wide and would be worse at the old size, I'm just picky about things changing during a run.  Don't get me started on book covers changing during a series...

Th1nDiesel

This is purely conjecture on my part, but I can imagine that the largest demographic for Speed Champions is car fans, including people buying gifts for car fans. Not AFOLs but maybe with a passing interest in Lego, they might have an affection for a particular brand or model of car. Therefore, making the models larger and more realistic is a shrewd move on Lego's behalf as it makes the sets more appealing to this group of buyers and they sell more sets to the 'car people', offsetting the lost sales to those they have alienated.

I've got a handful of SC sets which I've used in my city layout, but I wouldn't buy the new sets for the same purpose. I'd only buy a new set now if it were a particularly appealing vehicle/build.

Speedman29

I shared the new Quattro set to a GpB rally page I'm on, they've gone wild for it, with the only negative being no co-driver or the driver minifig not being a woman. Michèle Mouton, a French lady was a very talented rally driver in the 80s and ran the Audi's a lot