FattyMatty

It's the old 'Flange of Baboons' observation http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Talk:flange

That looks like a fun, quick, cheap build. perfect!

You've been busy since christmas. You've definitely right about time consuming, and as much as I wanted to find the cheapest parts from the least amount of stores I had to compromise a bit just so I didn't go crazy. I ended up listing all the parts by total price, finding the cheapest store for the most expensive part on the list and then sourcing as much as possible from that one store, I figure that the bulk cost of the set is in the top 10% of the parts and so getting them the cheapest negates that extra cent I paid on each of the cheaper items.

That's a beautiful ship, I might just have to add that to the ever growing list. That was a great call on swapping out the mast you can't even see it in the first photo, I wouldn't have been able to tell the difference. That's awesome work getting it under $200 as well, it definitely puts it in the 'worth bricklinking' category since you saved around $200 from buying it used. And as for getting your CC under $300, that's awesome and at that price, well worth doing. That's a great way of putting it "It's enjoyable, but thankfully not terribly addictive." I'm at the stage where parts have started arriving and it's taking everything I've got to hold off building until everything arrives just so that I can build it over a weekend rather than spurts. What do you think you're next set will be?

I'd love to see a multi coloured tumbler when you get round to doing it. Personally I think i'd like it to at least look similar to the original.

Thanks for the pic, I'm thinking I might start on the modulars after I've done a few more SW sets and I think you're right about knowing how many subs you're conscience will allow you. Do you mind if I ask how much the CC and flagship ended up costing each, total? How long did each one take to complete? If you had of seen that CC on ebay or craigslist with the same subs for the same price you paid, would you have rather bought it or do you enjoy finding and ordering everything on Bricklink?

As tempting as that may be, I don't think my conscience would allow me to sell it at least without informing them that a few bricks had been swapped out. But as you say unless they were a collector they wouldn't probably care.

I'm guessing that most people share your view about wanting all exact pieces. With a little one on the way I'm just glad I can still have fun building, maybe I'll try and keep them for when he grows older

That would be awesome if you could. Thank you

I'm liking these midi size x-wings and tie fighters, anyone know if these are actual sets or if they're custom? Is there any chance you might have more close-up photos of these Alpinemaps?

That's the problem, on some of these sets I can't justify the cost of buying the correct pieces, it raises the price of the set way to much, even if I do it knowing I'll sell it on after . If there were other people out there that didn't mind changing the colours to keep the cost down then we could get an exchanging thing going but If I'm the only person that's willing to do it then I have to face the fact that I won't be able to sell these on.

I completely respect that. I think i'm more looking at just being able to afford the set to build than being able to have it perfect so that I can re-sell it.

I'm fairly new to my adult reintroduction of Lego, and this has meant i've had my beady little eyes on more of the larger more advanced sets to build, which inevitably has lead me to drool over some of the EOL more expensive sets available. And like a lot of people out there I can't justify paying (read: my wife won't let me pay) hundreds sometimes thousands on a set just to build it and break it down again (maybe display it if she thinks it's pretty and there's room). So with budget in mind I started bricklinking 10221 Super Star Destroyer. Now, apart from a few of the more expensive parts (I'm not bothering with minifigs) I've actually stayed fairly true to the original colours, but as I'm looking at the instructions (printed at work to keep the price down) and browsing bricklink, I'm realising that I could have substituted a lot more of the colours (for the bricks that aren't even visible) and kept the price down even further. Not only because a different colour would have been cheaper but also because I could have reduced the amount of stores I purchased from and thus reduced shipping costs. I still have a few things to purchase but they're all very common cheap pieces but all-in-all I've managed to keep this build well under $400 ($200 when I tell the wife). If I had of read the instructions earlier and figured out which bricks don't show and could have been a different colour I think I could have got it down close to $300, when you compare this to the $550 I would have to pay for a used set on Ebay I'm pretty happy with the outcome (obviously this could change when everything arrives, I build it and get OCD about everything not being the exact right colour). All this leads nicely into the inevitable question. How many of you, that actually read this far down, would sacrifice targeted brick colours for the sole purpose of keeping the price of a set down just so that you can have the fun of building it? And I'm not talking about just buying the black masts for 10179, I'm thinking more along the lines of having the whole insides of it black if you knew that you couldn't tell by looking at the outside of it and it saving you half the buy price. P.s. Since I doubt my wife will find this build very pretty, and she'll inevitably find out exactly how much I spent, I'm going to have a little foresight and ask if anyone would be interested in buying this after I'm done building it?

That's done the trick for me, Cheers

I'm also getting directed to aliexpress when trying to click on any of the brickfolio links. I'm using Chrome on OSX

First off wanted to say how awesome the tracker is, helps out soooo much. But just went to a local target that the tracker said had 3 Benny's at $35 (I got very excited), got there and they'd already been changed to salvage, a nice lady that worked there looked them up and even double checked out the back for me. She even showed me her handheld device which showed three in stock but price $0.00.

Did a google image search on a few of the photos and a couple of them are being used on asian websites.

I don't think they'd be stolen if he has some from 2007. I've seen people who have bought bulk stock like this from old stores closing down or from buying storage lockers and finding old boxes full of them. Although none of this would account for the 13 Admiral Yularen.

I'm fairly sure that 6022155 comes in Tower Bridge, but you're right about 4221749. I think you're right about "If a set continues to sell well, it stays in production" but if there's not many unique parts the amount it has to sell to qualify as "selling well" could be lower.

Erm... Yeah... Sorry about that folks. I feel about as popular as a fart in a lift right now.

I had a thought about why DS has lasted so long, to my knowledge (and a quick look on BrickLink) there isn't really any custom pieces to the set (i'm talking about actual pieces rather than common pieces but with original graphics on them) , apart from some of the minifigs. So if TLG are creating all the parts for the DS anyway for other sets why not keep churning more DS's out? I could be completely wrong here and I'm sure someone will point it out but until one or more of the bricks stop getting made for other sets as well then I can't see the DS going anywhere. thoughts?

I've just finished putting together a Cafe corner from bricklink, but it's more about the fun of actually building it for me so I really didn't mind changing big sets of colours to get the price down as much as I could. I changed the dark blue bricks on the first floor to red and the dark red roof tiles to black along with the other smaller dark red bricks that make up the roof. I'm curious to know if any of you guys would actually be willing to buy sets like this with different colours if they were much cheaper so you could actually build it, or is not having the original colours too much of a deal breaker. I think my cafe corner came to approx $350-$400 which is much less than the $600-$700 they're going for used.