Grand Prix Rejects

So, I'm thinking of taking on a new ridiculous project - building F1 cars using only Lego.

Still not sure of all the details, but I'm thinking maybe of 1/4 scale. I have a mate with a ridiculous collection of Lego so getting the bricks shouldn't be the issue, now I just need to plan the cars.

Ideally I'd love to get my hands on technical drawings of cars with dimensions etc. but I kinda doubt teams would give these out. Next best would be high quality photographs, from which I should be able to work out the dimensions of at least the major elements.

Does anyone have any suggested resources?

Also, I'm not sure what car to start with, so if anyone wants to make suggestions that'd be great. Otherwise I'll probably just go for something like James Hunt's McLaren M23 from 1976 just to jump on board the Rush bandwagon.

I don't have any suggestions as of yet, but regarding getting blueprints, if that doesn't work, try to find a copy of the rule book for that year and base it off that

You can of course go ahead and build whichever model you like, but I would love to see a lego model of either the 1994 MTV Simtek or the 1997 MasterCard Lola T97/30.

A good place for inspiration is http://www.flickr.com
Here is a link I have found...
https://www.flickr.com/search/?q=f1+lego

For a beginner, a very basic design would be a good starting point. The best thing would be picking a car that is very 'standard' for its era.

I think a good starting point would be a car from the early years, most of them being simple, but elegant. Case in point, the Eagle Mk1, Maserati 250F or Mercedes W196. Or, if you want to go for a reject angle, the ATS 100, Aston Martin DBR4 or ENB (essentially a poor man's Ferrari 156, just make sure it's yellow instead of red).

Other simple designs would be the cars from the early days of aerodynamics, such as the Lotus 49C or Matra MS80. Or, again for the reject alternative, the Bellasi or De Tomaso 505.

Simtek wrote:I think a good starting point would be a car from the early years, most of them being simple, but elegant. Case in point, the Eagle Mk1, Maserati 250F or Mercedes W196. Or, if you want to go for a reject angle, the ATS 100, Aston Martin DBR4 or ENB (essentially a poor man's Ferrari 156, just make sure it's yellow instead of red).

Other simple designs would be the cars from the early days of aerodynamics, such as the Lotus 49C or Matra MS80. Or, again for the reject alternative, the Bellasi or De Tomaso 505.

That fifties/sixties era is more difficult actually, because these cars have rather elegant curves. Addtional problem with sixties cars is that they don't have engine covers, so if you're going to have to model the engines too, it's getting really advanced. I suggest seventies cars, as they don't look too elegant anyway. I think Marches or McLarens will do fine for a beginner. Also the boxy ground effect era cars should be easier to build, because of the boxy nature of Lego. You can go curvy with lego technic peaces, but again, that is more advanced modelling. Lego modelling requires a lot of planning and a lot of trail and error. But once you get the hang of it, it will be impressive.

Thanks guys, yep I originally thought of starting with the oldest cars but I agree that 70s cars lend themselves to Lego best. When I do things I like to do them properly, so don't expect to see updates on this very often - it will probably be weeks before I've even finished the planning stage let alone started building!

I've found a few decent drawings just by searching McLaren M23 blueprints, they don't include dimensions but spec sheets will be easy enough to attain and you can work out all the dimensions once you have the wheelbase or total car length.

Sorry for the resurrection and for going slightly off-subject...

...but I built all of these!