[MOC REVIEW] Dirk Klijn's Mclaren MP4-12C

[Rishab N]

Some of you avid Top Gear fans out there may remember the episode in which Jeremy Clarkson tested the Alfa Romeo 8C while answering the question “Can a car ever be considered art?”His definition of art was that it must serve no other purpose other than to look good. He ended the episode by saying that yes a car can be art as the Alfa Romeo 8C looks absolutely stunning, yet it isn’t the best car out there. So the question is, can a Lego Technic car be considered art? Yes, it can. Meet Dirk Klijn’s Mclaren MP4 12C, a model designed with looks as a priority over functions.

(larger versions of pictures can be found on my Bricksafe)

When I first saw this car I was immediately amazed by it. All the gaps were filled in and the model looked incredibly realistic. As soon as the instructions were released I had to start gathering parts. It took me several months to gather all the parts, but I finally finished it and decided to write a review of this amazing model.

The Build

An interesting feature of this model is that it is built in a modular fashion. This means the model is built in sections and in theory should be easy to put together and take apart. More about that later. The build starts, as with most models, with the chassis. The chassis is one of the best I have seen. It is built starting with the middle section and then moves onto the axles. Other details are added and you have a complete chassis. Honestly I think I could just display the chassis by itself, as it looks stellar with a lot of details such as the engine bay and exhaust system. The model has working suspension, steering, and a working 4 speed gearbox with a linkage system. The gear box doesn’t work a lot of the time as the linkages cannot transfer enough force to engage a gear. I also had to add a half stud of length to one of my linkages in order for it to reach the gearbox lever properly. It’s a 3+R gearbox, but it’s not of much use in this model as the view to the engine pistons is obscured and the aforementioned linkage problems make it difficult to shift. Aside from that, the steering and suspension work flawlessly. Steering is transferred by CV joints to the dashboard, where a 14T gear connects to it and is geared to the steering wheel. The steering module is an absolute pain to connect to the front axle as one has to connect the CV joints to the dashboard while mounting it at the same time. It took me a good 20 minutes along with a few select words, for this module to finally get attached properly. I recommend partially disassembling the dashboard and attaching it to the chassis one part at a time as it makes it easier for the axles to connect to the dashboard. Also off topic, but check if your CV joints have a strong connection. Mine had weakened over time, and once I finally attached the dashboard, I tried to steer and the light gray part of the joint completely popped out of the model, and I had to replace it. The model’s suspension requires you to disassemble some 7.5L hard shock absorbers, which can be a bit difficult at first. Along with the shock absorbers, the model uses many other illegal techniques, which I will also cover later. Overall, one of the best chassis designs that I’ve seen in terms of looks, but a few parts can be a bit tricky, the shock absorbers must be disassembled, and the gearbox is not very good due to the linkage system.

The build then moves onto the body, which is far more difficult compared to the chassis due to it not being fully strengthened until the whole module is almost done. I personally recommend adding a couple beams here and there to keep it stable while building, and then take them off when you’re finished. The body starts with the rear end and moves to the front. I won’t spoil too much about the building process, but there are some very interesting connections used to get all these angles. Many parts are mounted on only one pin or stud, which sacrifices rigidity for a better angle. The doors are opened using ball joints, which I always considered Bionicle type pieces, but it is quite a nice mechanism ; however, they don’t sit perfectly flush with the body unless they are forced a bit. Also they are quite heavy and are prone to breaking if not opened properly. Once the main body is finished the build moves on to the front fascia. This is possibly the most delicate area of the model and many illegal and weak connections are used to keep it together. The front grille is entirely made up of tiles attached to clips. This technique is now legal only with 1x1 tiles, but with other parts it doesn’t work. One of my 1x1 clip pieces actually broke after repeatedly reattaching the tile to it. Despite all this, I think the front looks absolutely beautiful. The grille is one of my favorite parts of this car and it really just looks absolutely fantastic. The rest of the front looks great and I especially like the panels behind the headlights as they are slightly angled outwards.

Finally, the front is attached to the chassis and with a few more pieces here and there, the car is complete; however, when I attached the front of the car, the front suspension promptly collapsed. Dirk recommended adding a half bush to it to make it stiffer, but I didn’t implement this change as I didn’t want to disassemble part of the model; however, I recommend that anyone building this model implement this change while building the front axle in order to avoid this problem later. Also my doors collided with the front area, so I moved a couple pieces back one stud.

Final Model

After 3 days of building I was finally done. At this point I’ll let the pictures do the talking.

This car's looks never cease to amaze me . I gotta say, Dirk absolutely nailed the looks on this model, especially the rear area

Impressions (taking a leaf out of Sariel's reviews here, all credit for this idea goes to him)

The model is a little bigger than a 1:10 Technic supercar, due to its body shape and building style.

The model itself is absolutely stunning, but the illegal and weak connections quickly catch up as it is one of the most delicate models I've ever built. You think UCS, sculptures, and other display models are delicate? Forget them all. If you hold this model the wrong way, a few pieces are guaranteed to fall off. It took me a few tries and many pieces falling to find the right way to hold this model. Another problem is that you have to be very careful reassembling it as a little too much force and bam another piece from somewhere else falls out. Heck just during my photoshoot, I tried to shift the model around, and this happened

I already discussed the door problems, but the wheels on this model are a massive problem.

Here's the problem:

Every single wheel is connected with a 3 axle connected to a Technic disc. The disc is connected to the wheel with a couple pins. The main problem is that the 3 axle simply cannot support the weight this wheel very well. Most Technic models use 8070 or 42000 hubs so this isn't really a problem for them. When you hold this model in the air, the wheels actually sag downward like this (its a bit exaggerated, but this is the best pic I could find)

But that's ok as this model should not be held in the air, its a car not a plane. The problem with the wheel is that since the connection is so weak if you shift the models weight to the side to fix something, the wheels will slightly bend and can easily pop off. These are a pain to fix.

Because of its delicacy I'm afraid to use the technical features of this model as I'm afraid I'll break something. Instead I leave it on my shelf and simply admire it like it is a fine piece of art. To answer our earlier question, yes a Technic car can be art as evidenced by this model. It looks wonderful, yet should be admired from a distance due to its fragility. Thus it only serves the purpose of looking good and I am absolutely ok with that

Conclusion

Build- 9.5/10 Very entertaining/frustrating build, and it is definitely not for a novice builder or for the faint of heart due to its illegal connections and fragility. Also the spring disassembly might be frowned upon by other builders

Looks- 10/10 This car honestly looks like nothing else I've ever seen. I've been on this forum for almost 3 years and this car has to be one of the best looking creations that I've ever seen. Even the chassis has amazing attention to detail and looks just like the real thing.

Parts Availability- 8.5/10 This MOC has about 2550 pieces and most are relatively easy to get; however, there are a few that are a bit of a pain and I'll list them for any other builders wanting to build this car: 3 16L red flex axles, 2 11L red flex axles(These aren't visible so could be replaced), 2 toggle joint connectors in red(Not rare but very uncommon nowadays), Steering rack(This isn't visible so could be replaced), Steering arms(These aren't visible so could be replaced I used light grey instead of black), and wheel covers( i replaced mine with brickbuilt ones and those look fine to me). I started off with 800 of the pieces and it cost me a little under $200 so not bad for a MOC of this size.

Playability- 5/10 Sorry,but this has to be the weakest point of this MOC. Illegal and weak connections make this a very delicate model and I'm honestly afraid to touch it. The doors work well mostly, the steering feels very nice, it has a nice engine access hatch, and if you're daring you can try disassembling it into its modular components. Due to its delicacy I'm very afraid to even try disassembling it, and even though the modularity is nice, it isn't that easy to disassemble it. The gearbox linkages also aren't the best

Instructions- 10/10 The instructions look great and are very well done. The steps are clear and some text reminders are given along the way to help you out. $15 is also a reasonable price

Overall 43/50

It lost points for rigidity and parts availability, but it is honestly one of the best things I've ever seen and built. Honestly after i built it I was considering disassembling it and building some other supercar as I didn't like the spring dis-assembly and weakness, but every time I looked at it.....

I forgave it for all its flaws. Its as good as any real piece of art out there IMO and is definitely going to be a permanent member of my collection. I highly recommend all of you build this model or just look through the instructions as it is so interesting. I would also like to nominate this MOC for the Hall of Fame as it truly deserves it

Thanks for reading this review and please give me feedback so I can improve for my next review

Edited July 8, 2015 by Rishab N

[legolijntje]

Very nice review, Rishab

The text has actual content (and is not just filler text) and your images look very nice.

I personally have never built this model, but while I was working on the instructions, I was already expecting some weak spots. Nevertheless, the looks of this thing make up a lot, it looks amazing

Also, after reading your review, I was actually expecting a lower score. This may sound strange (because I've made the instructions and really like the model), but I maybe even would've given it a little lower score because of the instability.

Anyway, nice review and nice model!

[Rishab N]

Thank you! I thought this was a fair score to give as the model wasn't really designed to be a functional/playable model. Also I would like to commend you on the instruction quality. Everything is quite clear and I like how the watermark of the car is on every page

[Block_Smarts Lego Technic]

Really nice review, cant wait to see more of them!

[Meatman]

This is only my opinion, but $15 for instructions seems just a bit much for the amount of issues with the model's design that you mentioned.

[sm1995]

Amazing review, Rishab! I really like how it read like a piece of literature rather than a wall of text with a bunch of facts thrown in there.

As for the car, it is my favorite Lego supercar ( no disrespect to anyone else) and in my opinion the best looking as well ( I like gapless bodywork). Shame about the weak connections, but it really does make up for it with it's phenomenal looks.

Edited July 8, 2015 by sm1995

[Blakbird]

Thanks for the excellent review. I have been on the fence about this model for a long time for exactly the reasons you mentioned. It is a beautifully sculpted model, but I can tell just from looking at the grille that it is held together by wisps of air. I've been frustrated by fragile models in the past, so thus far I have no built this one. With that being said, my mind keeps coming back to it. It is just so pretty .....

Sometimes it makes sense to date the pretty but crazy girl for just a little while.

[Paul B Technic]

Great review, very interesting read.

[jorgeopesi]

NIce review, I didn´t know it was a delicate MOC, for me the robustness always goes before beauty.

[Rishab N]

Thank you all!

This is only my opinion, but $15 for instructions seems just a bit much for the amount of issues with the model's design that you mentioned.

Think of the 15 dollars as an admission ticket to see this piece of art thoroughly . Actually though, the instructions are very good and with all these odd connections/angles, I imagine they took a lot of effort so I'd say its worth it. There are also many interesting techniques to be learned from this.

Thanks for the excellent review. I have been on the fence about this model for a long time for exactly the reasons you mentioned. It is a beautifully sculpted model, but I can tell just from looking at the grille that it is held together by wisps of air. I've been frustrated by fragile models in the past, so thus far I have no built this one. With that being said, my mind keeps coming back to it. It is just so pretty .....

Sometimes it makes sense to date the pretty but crazy girl for just a little while.

Thanks! Means a lot from someone who's done many great reviews in the past. I promise it will be a very frustrating build, but it is so worth it. I actually thought of the same pretty/crazy girl analogy when I finished building it

Really nice review, cant wait to see more of them!

Not sure if there will be another one anytime soon. Gotta stay within budget and most MOCs/sets I wanna build will be a bit more expensive, but you never know I'm bad at resisting .

Edited July 8, 2015 by Rishab N

[Lipko]

Thank you for the review, one can learn a lot from these.

For example I learned that I am too strict with myself and maybe I shouldn't have given up the sequential-gearbox supercar project just because it failed to switch gears properly in 10% of the time.

[Anio]

for me the robustness always goes before beauty.

We are on the same boat. :p

I consider the building experience as important as the model itself. If a technique is weak, I always look for a build that is strong enough to make the final model stable.

So far, I never got stuck by such a building standard. Moreover, sometimes it forces me to find new ways / approaches to build the model, and that is very interesting.

[dikkie klijn]

Thanks for the open and honest review! I really enjoyed reading it, and especially like the black rims

[2LegoOrNot2Lego...]

Great and honest review of an amazing build of an amazing builder!!! Thanks...

[Bricksonwheels]

Dirk did a good job on this one, good review as well.

[CollinsLegoTechnicDen]

Yeah it does look absolutely stunning , does anyone know what other colors you could build this in ?

[Rishab N]

Yeah it does look absolutely stunning , does anyone know what other colors you could build this in ?

The only alternative I can think of is black. If the parts were available, I'd love to see one in orange.

Any chance someone (Blakbird )could make a render in orange?

[Askan]

Great review! I had similar experience when building this model. It is so beautiful and clever, but also fragile and weak in some areas. Building really tested my patience but was also rewarding and fun :) It made me want to build more of mr Klijn's creations.

Edited July 26, 2015 by Askan

[CollinsLegoTechnicDen]

The only alternative I can think of is black. If the parts were available, I'd love to see one in orange.

Any chance someone (Blakbird )could make a render in orange?

personally i would love to see one in white :)