Once described as the most intricate flying machine ever built, consisting of more than 2.5 million moving parts, you can now assemble your own model of NASA spacecraft with just 2,354 pieces.
LEGO unveiled its new NASA Space Shuttle Discovery Series on Monday (March 22), which not only repeats its full-size counterpart in amazing detail, but also does so as it is set for one of its most famous and historic missions: launch of the Hubble Space Telescope.
“I’ve always liked the combination of very compact, almost miniature, but very elegantly detailed, and I think that’s exactly what the Hubble model in this series reminded me of,” astronaut Kathy Sullivan said in an interview with collectSPACE .
And she will know. Sullivan flew as a mission specialist on Discovery’s STS-31 mission in 1990, giving her a front seat for the observatory’s deployment.
“I did not know what to expect in terms of how big Discovery would be,” Sullivan said of her first time seeing the new LEGO set. “It’s about two meters long. It’s really very impressively large.”
The LEGO NASA Space Shuttle Discovery is designed for mature builders and contains a lot of detail in the two-foot (0.5 m) package. The landing gear deploys, the operating surfaces on the wings (lifts) move and the boot doors open to expose the reflective radiators, the Canadarm robot manipulator, the Ku-band antenna and even video cameras for the “crew” to monitor the activities outside.
“It was an exciting challenge to translate it into LEGO,” said Milan Madge, who led the design of the set for the Denmark-based toy company, in a statement. “In the right vehicle, every inch of space is used in inventive ways. In general, in a LEGO model we can rely on the size to accommodate the structure that holds the whole set together, but with the Discovery Space Shuttle we had to ‘ a smooth exterior and an interior that can hold the payload. ‘
It’s not just the boot that opens. The crew cabinet opens to reveal the flight deck with the runway panels and crew seats. Below that, the center pack contains the crew’s equipment cabinets and the airlock leading to the payload.
‘And for all I know, Bruce [McCandless] and I’m introduced in the airlock, that’s where we were stuck when Hubble was deployed, “Sullivan said laughing. I then leave it to the intrepid model to determine if there were only two spaces suitable figures locked up in the airlock on Discovery on the day of deployment. ‘
Sullivan was also surprised to discover that the model includes not only the vertical stabilizer or tail-mounted speed brake, but also the elevators, the control surfaces on the wings of the track.
“A lot of people look at the back edge of the shuttle’s fly and consider it the traditional elevator as you see at the back of the wing of an airplane,” she said. “With the spacecraft, it’s a combination of an elevator and a roller coaster, called ‘elevon.’ And so I thought, let’s see if they get the heights right – they work opposite each other.
“And you don’t just have to handle the elevators. In a very clever turn. You can turn the middle main clock of the engine and it will shake the hills back and forth,” Sullivan said.
The same attention to detail has been given to LEGO’s model of the Hubble Space Telescope, which can either be placed in Discovery’s boot or appear on its own standard.
‘Although it’s a bit anachronistic [detail]Sullivan, whose book “Handprints on Hubble” explains the history of the space telescope, as well as her own story, they say. can also see that they have represented the lens if you look at the front. It’s just really super. ‘
The LEGO NASA Space Shuttle Discovery Series, produced to celebrate the upcoming fortieth anniversary of the first spacecraft mission, will go on sale for $ 199.99 when it goes on sale on April 1 in LEGO Stores and on LEGO.com.
In addition to the range, members of the LEGO VIP loyalty program can also redeem 1800 points to receive a LEGO model set based on another of Discovery’s payloads: the space probe Ulysses. Ulysses’ primary mission was also deployed in 1990 to study the sun.
In addition, from April 18, LEGO stores nationwide will display real images taken by the Hubble Space Telescope and translated into LEGO form.