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Comment by kozak | Hacker News Reader

There is a PDF "fact sheet" explanation here: https://www.lego.com/r/www/r/portals/-/media/themes/technic/...

It says that the car is not built entirely from LEGO parts: there is a steel frame, axles, and many other non-LEGO things in it.

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Also, "LEGO Technic" is an ill-defined term. The various kits contain an repertoire of custom pupose-designed pieces whose category appears to be open-ended. It seems that almost any conceivable chunk of plastic whatsoever (or perhaps another material) could be included a "LEGO Technic" kit. Thus if something is built out of "LEGO Technic", what exactly does that mean? It needs to be qualified, like built only with the pieces available in a particular kit available to consumers (as many instances of that kit as required).

Not sure if you are a specialist who is nitpicking or simply not well informed, but lego technic is pretty much well-defined (mostly as "every part present in a set branded as `LEGO Technic`"). See [1] for part lists. The afol community has nerdy tendencies (no judgement, i like it) and everything is pretty much well-defined, even more for crucial questions such as "what parts are valid to use" or "how can we combine them". For the second question see [2] for a presentation on illegal builds.

[1] https://www.brickowl.com/catalog/lego-parts/technic [2] http://bramlambrecht.com/tmp/jamieberard-brickstress-bf06.pd...

How does this address the unique parts that LEGO created for this specific build? For example, they created interesting screw-adjustable beams to mount the curving outer skin.

It's highly probable they'll re-use the custom piece designs in future sets.

The part you are referring has been introduced in 2008 and is very standard. It's a linear actuator (large version), ref: https://www.brickowl.com/catalog/lego-linear-actuator-10-15-.... It is indeed a very interesting thing, much more reliable than a pneumatic cylinder and much more compact than a "homemade" linear actuator (screw + gear rack).

The team said they did create new parts, which might seem like cheating, but later they say they were "existing shapes in new colors". To be more precise, they needed semi-transparent version of some parts for the light system, and it's unsurprising that they needed to make them because semi-transparent lego parts are quite rare (since they are used for specific details in lego sets, not for bulk construction). I'm pretty forgiving on such a small sidestep from full purism given the scale and the result of the project.

Well, of course.

Building anything strong out of Lego is an interesting challenge. I built a speaker stand that's basically a suspension bridge (using fishing line). A piece of wood would have done the job better.

Intersting! Got any pics?

https://plus.google.com/+BrianSlesinsky/posts/8cxBEMcWk4V

You could go pure lego by replacing the string with technic pieces. Those can be made pretty strong against tension.

> It says that the car is not built entirely from LEGO parts: there is a steel frame, axles, and many other non-LEGO things in it.

So, it's look like correct title for this news should be:

LEGO built a life-size, drivable Bugatti that consist on less than 95% from over a million Technic pieces[0]

[0] https://www.lego.com/en-us/aboutus/news-room/2018/august/tec...

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