7 Incredible and Functional Lego Designs

As kids, we all loved playing with Legos.  There was something about creating our own works of art that completely captivated us.  But as we got older, we all lost that feeling, and as our lives filled up with school, work, and the dreaded jury duty, Legos fell by the wayside.

But who says we have to lose those building blocks forever?  The Taliban probably, and we refuse to listen to them.  Here are some masterpieces created by adults who decided never to grow up, and are almost certainly way less depressed than us these days as a result.

Printer

Recently, a Youtube poster by the name of horseattack (his real name is Adam) put up a video which gained roughly 1,000,000 views within the first week.  Why so many views?  Because Adam created – from scratch – a fully functional LEGO printer that works perfectly on OS X.

The printer uses a felt-tipped pen, running at 75 DPI (dots per inch), to print out any image or Ltext, although it has to be monochromatic, as he ran out of LEGO motors. Everything was made/coded from scratch, and uses analog motors, sensors and printer driver, and wiring board for the USB interface.  For those of you that have enough free time not to know what all that means, suffice to say it’s ridiculously cool.

Air Conditioner

During the 2006 Carrier Air Conditioning Convention, Lego artist extraordinaire Nathan Sawaya created a fully functioning replica of Carrier’s latest model made with LEGOs.  The air conditioner contains its own valves and compressor, not to mention a fan.  According to Sawaya, the project took every single hour of both days of the convention.  While it most likely isn’t capable of cooling your entire home, with the working fan in place, the unit does create quite a breeze.  This sort of puts that “lego brick” that the Designcrave staff spent last weekend toiling over to shame.

Musical Instruments

So you’re young, and you’ve decided you want to learn how to play an instrument.  But not just any sissy instrument, you want one that will make you stand out.  Well you’re in luck.  World famous Lego constructer Nathan Sawaya has the perfect instrument for you.  He has created a cello made completely out of Lego (excluding the wires of course).  Amazingly, it does make music like any instrument, although it does sound a little different than a regular cello.

If cello doesn’t strike you, how about a Lego harpsichord?  The instrument is unique enough on its own, never mind it being made out of children’s building blocks.  Once again, with the exception of wires, this instrument is solely made of Lego blocks (about 100,000), is 6 ft x 3 ft, and weighs approximately 150 lbs.  And yes, all 61 of its notes play perfectly.

Difference Engine

What does a man do when he is both a highly skilled mathematician, as well as a beast of a LEGO builder?  Why, build a difference engine, of course!  Andy Carroll decided to build a functional computer out of LEGOs, modeled after Charles Babbage’s machine way back in the nineteenth century.  Considered a precursor to modern day computers, Carroll’s machine can perform a myriad of math problems.  But this is not some simple calculator; it is capable of solving second and third order polynomials, which are common in basic physics and trigonometry/advanced algebra.

Pinball Machine

A few years ago, Gerrit Bronsveld and Mrtijn Boogaarts of the Netherlands decided to put their two favorite things, LEGOs and pinball, together and create the forever awesome LEGO pinball machine.  Of course, the ball itself could not be made of Lego blocks, but barring that, the entire machine is completely Lego (in case you were wondering about the scoring, Lego does in fact make its own sensors , control boards, and even has its own programming language).

And this is not just some kiddie-machine – this creation takes coins, gives the opportunity to gain extra balls after a certain amount of points are gained, and even has a special bonus round if you can light up all seven letters in the word “Pinball.”  The machine took over 300 hours to assemble, and consists of 18 touch sensors, 24 motors, 100 meters of wire, and over 20,000 Lego blocks.  We respectfully submit they take the title of “Pinball Wizard” away from The Who.

Car

Sure, most of this stuff is awesome, but let’s face it.  Unless you’re entertaining at your house and have some excuse for people to visit your basement, most people are never going to see any of it.  Oh if only there was something that you could have with you at all times; something to show that boss of yours that you have something cooler than that perpetual motion machine on his desk!  Well now there is.

Two years ago, in a ridiculously cool attempt to promote Lego World, an annual event in The Netherlands, a team of Lego constructors and engineers created a DRIVEABLE Ferrari F1 Car out of about 80,000 bricks.  Excluding the wheels and certain parts of the frame, this masterpiece is completely Lego – it runs on an actual Lego engine.  The car was driven by a popular TV representative through Amsterdam prior to the event.

House

So you’ve fallen in love with all of the Lego merchandise we’ve shown you.  Your credit cards were all maxed out, but that’s okay, you just opened a new one.  You’ll be in crippling debt, but until they come to collect, you’ll be happy.  But now another problem presents itself:  where do you put all of this stuff?  How about a house made entirely out of Legos?

UK native James May decided that this was the best course of action, and using about 816 million Lego pieces, built his own two-story Lego house.  And it’s not just the outside of the house.  Dressers, beds, lamps, clocks…everything is made of Lego blocks.  Even the toilet and sinks are made of Lego, and they actually work.  He has recently put it up for sale, as the vineyard on which it was built needs the land back.  Legoland wouldn’t take it (what is wrong with them?!), and so he ultimately decided to give it to the first person who could find a place for it, abso-freaking-lutely free.  Too bad you didn’t jump on the chance sooner; now the debt generated by your purchase of the next Lego house will completely and unmercifully drown you.