Adam Woodworth, AKA ajw61185, the man behind amazing creations like NERF ball-blasting RC A-10 Warthog, giant flying LEGO plane and helicopter, and more recently, a fully functional LEGO submarine, is at it again. This time he made the LEGO Creator Expert 10266 NASA Apollo 11 Lunar Lander flies and playing out the landing sequence. Believe me, watching the 10266 making the descent was pretty surreal. It was like 1969 all over again.
Unlike the giant LEGO plane and helicopter, this so-called flying LEGO NASA Apollo 11 Lunar Lander is the actual set like the submarine project. In other words, it is a real flying LEGO set. Though, granted, no rockets and jet fuel were involved. Instead, Woodworth uses four T-Motor F-40, each paired to a 4-inch prop. In order to keep the quad rotor setup within the confine of the landing legs, the motors had to be staggered to avoid the rotors from clashing into each other.
In addition, part of the inside have to be hollowed out to accommodate the battery pack, as well as the flight controller. No glue or fasteners of any kind was use to hold the LEGO elements together, save for the screws used to secure the motors to the underside of the vehicle. The result was, as I said, surreal. It was no easy task to get a set over 3 lbs to fly and maintain stability with those motors.
There is a caveat though; while it does fly, it can only do so for 90-second increments. But hey, it is good to replica the sequence and that’s all it matters.
Images: imgur (Adam Woodworth)/YouTube (ajw61185).
Source: The Verge.