My slow start notwithstanding, I completed the Phantom in just a few hours, experiencing some mind-bending LEGO geometry and advanced techniques along the way. Looking at the interior without the sides attached, this would appear incredibly fragile, but once it’s sandwiched by the skin, it’s very sturdy.Īlthough the jet’s exterior markings are all added using stickers, Brickmania did produce two unique printed pieces for the backs of the ejector seats. The cockpit and nose are no less complex, with a two-wide section with studs facing out serving as the base for the sides. Techniques you’d never see in an official LEGO set include the 2×8 section behind the jet intakes, which is only attached to the fuselage with two studs at the rear of the segment, while the front section simply “floats,” enabling a very subtle angle out toward the front. Sub-assemblies with complex geometries slot into each other and attach to brackets, resulting in a smooth surface with gorgeous curves. Custom kits from companies like Brickmania have no such restrictions, and this is reflected in the techniques used to construct the jet’s nose and fuselage. ![]() The wings are fairly straightforward, simply layering tiles in a camouflage pattern on top of white plates.ĭespite the great strides that LEGO has made in hiring fan designers and improving the techniques demonstrated in official LEGO sets over the past 10 years, designers at LEGO headquarters in Billund are still restricted to “legal” techniques that allow the finished model to withstand vigorous play by the average 9-year-old. I also recommend working in a well-lit room, since the difference between olive green, dark tan, and dark gray can be surprisingly deceiving under poor lighting conditions (this is not an issue with Brickmania’s printed instructions, which are generally easier to follow than some LEGO sets). ![]() But because the steps can use dozens of parts, creating the first two layers of the delta-wing took me a good half an hour. You apply all stickers at the end of the build process, so there’s a single spread with callouts indicating where to place the numbered stickers.īecause none of the bags are numbered, I placed all the parts in a large tray with compartments, which made finding the parts much easier than simply dumping them all out. Like “premium” LEGO sets from the LEGO Star Wars Ultimate Collectors Series, LEGO Ideas, or LEGO Architecture, the booklet includes details about the real-life source material, with a page dedicated to the history and service of the F-4 Phantom.īrickmania prints their decal sheets in-house, with all of the markings to reflect the real-life aircraft accurately. The instruction booklet is relatively thin for a model built from over a thousand pieces, but the pages are large and most steps add many more pieces than the handful of pieces you add on any given step in an official LEGO set. This custom kit follows the standard Brickmania pattern, with unnumbered bags on top of the spiral-bound instruction booklet. ![]() Most Brickmania kits come in folded cardboard boxes with the custom kit’s details printed on the front and back, and unnumbered bags with the parts. Small-batch custom LEGO kits do not, of course, come in the same kind of mass-produced packaging as official LEGO kits. The packaging, instructions, and sticker sheet While Dan is best known for tanks, Cody has designed most of Brickmania’s airplane models, including the F-4C Phantom II we’ll be reviewing today. ![]() Most notably, Dan himself is no longer the sole or even primary designer - great LEGO builders like Cody Osell now contribute many of the custom designs to the company’s products. We’ve featured custom LEGO kits by Brickmania many times over the years, but Dan Siskind‘s small business has grown considerably since the last time we reviewed one of the company’s kits.
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