A few weeks back the boys built the LEGO Technic Fire Plane and although it did take them a lot longer to build, it didn't deter them from attempting something bigger. There has been some pretty amazing Tecnic kits released this year and Seth really wanted to get stuck in to one with electric functions. The Crawler Crane is a huge build and when you see pictures of it online or see the box in a toy store the images really don't do it justice. I honestly didn't think that the boys would attempt something like this and I thought they would lose interest early on.
The instruction manual is HUGE, in fact I think it is the thickest one we have owned. I thought alone would put the boys off straight away, but no! they were adamant that they would complete it no matter how long it took. It did take the boys a long time to complete but a bit was built at every spare moment and it was really interesting to watch. Apart from the LEGO trains (which I love), we've not owned any kits with power functions so building this was definitely something different.
Although I definitely favour the more classic LEGO, one thing I do love about Technic is that because the parts are generally larger the builds can start to look quite beefy early on and the LEGO Technic Crawler Crane is a great kit for this. After the first two bags it was starting to look pretty big but I wasn't prepared to the final piece.
The kit comes with a pretty big bag of crawler tread pieces which was the first clue to just how big the finished Crane was going to be.
A few bags in and the Crane was starting to look enormous. Ive got to admit that I was getting more and more impressed as the build went on. The thought that has gone in to the the design of this kit is amazing and the huge series of different cogs used to make everything move is fascinating. Looking at it I started to think how I could include the power functions in to the custom things that we build.
The boys were awesome putting it together but I couldn't help but think that they had made a mistake some where down the line as there was no movement in the two reels that pulled in the two seperate strings used in the build. I was really hoping that I was wrong but I couldn't see how it was going to work. When they did complete the kit we couldn't get it working at all. There was no power coming from the battery pack until I realised it was my fault and I had only put in three batteries not 6 (I shouldn't have got involved).
Eventually that magical green light came on...
All but one function worked perfectly but we worked out that one of the pieces had come loose that was stopping the crawler from crawling. I am starting to see why LEGO Technic is so popular. When that light went on and we starting moving those levers around we were hooked. As you are building it, it is like any other LEGO kit in a way but when you see that what you have built can move around, the claw can be raised, lowered, opened and closed and the cab can spin it really adds to the fun. This for the boys really made the build and it was clear how impressed they were by what they had achieved.
The LEGO Technic Crawler Crane has changed the way I look at LEGO Technic now and I think the power functions are something that Seth will be wanting to look in to more. The Mercedes-Benz Arocs 3245 is now starting to look quite appealing, could keep us quiet over the Christmas holiday.
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