Introduction
First thing In the morning I’ll walk my dog Nike so she can do her business, make a pot of coffee, look over my favorite online news sources and then glance over YouTube to see what’s what according the my algorithm. It was on one of those routine mornings when I stumbled across a review of a Lego kit designed for adult builders, which I did not know existed. This line of Lego kits is referred to as the Technics, and the kit being reviewed was, as I recollect, a Lamborghini.
Over the years, I’d purchased piles of Lego kits ranging from the small to the grand for my children and grandchildren, and I often helped with the construction, but I was totally caught off guard when I learned of the adult oriented kits. At once, I thought that perhaps my grown-up youngest son Parker, who visits us from Chicago, might be interested in building a Lamborghini with me, so the next time I was on FaceTime with him I brought up the idea, and he was all over it. I was prepared for his response either way, but was pleasantly surprised that he was so Gung Ho about working on a build with me.
After my conversation with Parker, I started researching the LEGO Technic Ultimate Car Concept Series kits and found out quickly that they were all very expensive. Given the expense, I dug in a little deeper to make a good purchase decision by watching several reviews on YouTube, where there was a wealth of information. What I discovered was that the total of number of kits designed to date by the Lego engineers was five, and that they were progressively more sophisticated as each was introduced every two years. This meant that the most technically refined kit was the latest entry into the marketplace, and it was the McLaren P1 hypercar. I concluded that getting the latest kit was the wise decision and Parker readily agreed. In fact, he was delighted. He knew far more about the McLaren than I did. Here’s a review of the actual, real life McLaren PI that Parker sent me:
With Thanksgiving and Parker’s visit scheduled in a few weeks, I ordered the McLaren PI kit through Amazon and it arrived two days later in a massive box. When Parker arrived in town we photographed the unboxing.
When you open the box, there’s some nifty P1 artwork and within are three large boxes containing 23 cellophane bags with over 3800 Lego parts, as well as two instruction manuals that Parker said looked like the book Dune!
The Build
After unboxing, Parker and I set to work building the McLaren. We set up on the dining room table, knowing that at some point we’d have to tear down our arrangement for the Thanksgiving meal. Further my daughter Jessica’s family would be arriving in a few days, so we’d have limited time to build what we could. Below is the basic set-up. My job was to pull, organize and feed the pieces to Parker for erection and then to follow-up with a quality analysis to ensure what we had done was correct. Given that I was recovering from eye surgery, this was the best way to tackle the project.
As I said earlier, there were three boxes containing cellophane bags or parts. The bags were labelled to correspond to the instructions. Parker used the hard copy booklets and I had a downloaded PDF version on my iPad. What was nice was you could expand the PDF version for a tighter look as the assembly area we were working on. As with all Lego kits there were little to no written instructions, but instead illustrations.
The build began with the rear end, wishbone suspension, differential, and air foil assembly, then proceeded to the mid-section where the P1’s internal combustion and additional electronic, battery powered engines, as well as a very complex gear box were located. Afterwards, the front suspension and working steering assembly were constructed, along with the vehicle’s cockpit, and finally the exterior, which included the spring loaded doors and storage trunk.
In the image above you can see Parker holding the early stage of the differential assembly. The differential in an automobile allows the rear wheels to rotate at different surface speeds to facilitate turning. It’s actually the first time I ever really understood how a differential functions, so building the P1 was an educational experience. Below you can see a brief video of the completed differential assembly in action. The kit contains gear assemblies throughout that, pretty much, all connect with each other from the engines through a working gear box, through a drive train, completing at the transmission and differential. It was a wonder to build, but required a great deal of concentration and care to ensure all the spinning and control elements linked and interacted properly. We made the occasional mistake, but caught them early and rectified them in very short order.
Below you can the the completed rear suspension and differential. The fun of any Lego kit is to see it slowly develops overtime. This kit was so monumental, it required a fair amount of patience to see it take shape.
The P1 build, from a mechanical engineering perspective was quite educational. For example, below you can see a worm gear which will be used to raise and lower the rear air foil. In the actual car, the air foil moved automatically as it responds to the vehicles velocity and adjusts itself to create the proper downward air pressure to ensure best possible traction.
After the rear assembly was completed, the next phase involved the construction of the two engines and the transmission, which will be controlled by paddles on the steering column in the cockpit. The transmission, which really worked, was an amazing array of intermeshing gears, which you can see in action below:
One of the most fun assemblies was the internal combustion, eight cylinder engine, which demonstrated the motion of the pistons and cranks:
Below you can see Parker doing a quality analysis on the completed rear assembly of the P1, which included the rear suspension, differential, engines and massive gear box. Right afterwards, we had to stow the kit away to make space for his sister Jessica’s family arrival for Thanksgiving.
With Jessica’s arrival we suspended operations for a few days.
After the holiday, Parker and I had a few hours to work on the kit before he had to return to Chicago. We’d have to wait a few weeks before he would return for winter holiday, when we hoped to finish out the P1’s build. Below you can see that we managed to add a bit of the vehicle’s cockpit and front end under-frame before Parker’s departure. You can also see the two sets of instructions that we used.
When Parker returned in late December, we stepped up P1 production again and he was the driving force to get it to completion before he had to leave again.
Below you can see that kit started taking shape much more quickly than I thought it would and there were times I wondered if we could get it done before Parker left for Chicago again; however, he was relentless and pushed our production rate.
Before you know it, the incredibly complex doors were mounted and the outer yellow frame was to be applied as the final step. The tires, which can be seen in the upper left were the last step.
Below are some videos showing various mechanical features of the P1 that actually work:
As you can see from the above videos we did finish the project during Parker’s visit and with days to spare. Here’s some final shots of the process:
Final Thoughts
Building the Lego Technics McLaren P1 was a great success. We managed to build it correctly and all the mechanisms work. It’s a good looking Lego kit, and while it still looks like a Lego, it meets the spirit of the real P1! The kit design engineers did a great job.
You can see by the photo above that it has a huge footprint, and our home does not have much room for it, so I doubt very seriously that I would build another. Parker has little room for it too in his Chicago rental and, it would be very difficult to get it there unharmed. I’d consider giving it to one on my grandchildren, but I’m afraid it would end up in a “parts” box and the kit was way too expensive for that outcome. It resides now on a shelf in one of our spare bedrooms.
Was the kit worth the expense? Yes, indeed. Besides the actual experience of being involved in successfully putting together such an elaborate and mechanically complex kit, the time spent with Parker talking about all manner of subjects was worth every penny.
