Lego Carbon Racers: VIP Van

Behold, a model I probably put way too much thought into: the VIP Van! It has a bit of a nonstandard wheel construction, but for my money, it's a nice setup.

The great thing about this model--aside from everything about it, obviously--is the fact that it gives you a use for those star pieces you may have lying around. Heck, you could also use flowers or whatever. I don't know what theme you're shooting for here.

The back doesn't look half bad either. Why is there that lump on the roof? Well, same as the Blue Boombox, it feels like there should be some sort of equipment at that point of the van, especially if it's a celebrity's ride.

Here's the 360 view. I really appreciate those two frames where the headlights DON'T look like they're filled with shadow.

Here's the model the VIP Van was based on: this one from Lego Racers set 8154, "Brick Street Customs." This is another set I've never actually owned...evidenced by the fact that, while I was looking at this picture, I just noticed those little flared pieces between the wheels. How did I miss that??? I stared at the catalog picture for ages while making this model! I'm not even that old and I'm already going blind!

This model also gives me an excuse to use those wheel chassis pieces you see in the above steps. They weren't used much for Tiny Turbos, but they seem to be all over the place nowadays.

If you're a complete brick nerd (I think I'm 90% of the way there), you'll notice that, in previous blueprints, I didn't use wheel arches with those holes in the middle. That's because the Tiny Turbos back in the day didn't have those holes, but they do today. I made this model with the updated bricks; for some reason, I try to keep these blueprints as faithful as possible to my models. Where did those arches come from? That's a story for another day.

I'm pretty sure the Tiny Turbo this model is based on didn't have exhausts like this. Who cares? They look cool.

I love it when three steps can fit comfortably on one page.

The YouTube music I'm listening to as I'm making this blueprint just went to an ad. I hate ads! Just shut up and let me listen to--wait, can I make YouTube ads for Not Enough Bricks? Hmm...

I think the term I'm thinking of for this model is "solid." It's a block with wheels. At least you don't have to worry about dropping it (unless it lands on somebody). Oh, another note: Those two bricks toward the back of the van--the yellow 2x4 brick and the yellow 1x4 brick--could also be replaced with two 2x3 yellow bricks. In fact, I recommend it. I just didn't use them in this blueprint because I don't have them in real life; again, I keep these models fairly close to the ones I've made. Um...wait, I just realized I think I used four 1x2 arched bricks for the back instead of that one 2x4 arch. *sigh* Whatever.

OK, fine, here's one of the songs I'm listening to while I'm making this: The Android Hell Blues. It's a good song even if you haven't played the game Portal 2, in my opinion.

Took me forever to refine the front of this model. It's built so weird because the wheel chassis pieces threw everything off. More on that in a minute.

Did I mention how it feels so good when I can fit three steps on one page? You can imagine, then, how I feel about pages like this.

Here we are with the infamous wheels. I started this model with the standard Tiny Turbos chassis and wheels, but then my eyes fell upon the star pieces I had. From then on, it was a simple matter of completely rebuilding the van to suit these wheels. The other chassis pieces made the wheels' stars stick out too much.

I basically had to trick the Bricklink Studio program to get these wheels in place. In real life, though, they seem to stay where they're set just fine.

There's the completed VIP Van! Want to built it with regular Tiny Turbos-style wheels? Go ahead; shouldn't be too hard. Come back next week to see....

Um...

OH BOY, IT'S THAT ONE!