Sunday, 30 October 2011
Saturday, 29 October 2011
nanoblock Tokyo Skytree Review
Difficulty: Level 5
Time to Complete: 120 mins
No of Blocks: 490+
Item Code: NBH-022
Price: Not Available
The Tokyo Sky Tree is a broadcasting, restaurant and observation tower under construction in Sumida, Tokyo, Japan. It has been the tallest artificial structure in Japan since 2010. The nanoblock Tokyo Skytree set comes in a medium sized box packaging, with over 550+ pieces of building blocks, and a large sheet of instruction paper to show you how to build it.
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| The blocks and instruction paper. That's over 490+ blocks. |
This is a "Level 5" nanoblock set, making it the hardest nanoblock set I have build so far. It took me around two hours to put it all together. There are several challenging factors in building this set. The first one would be the fact that the main part of the structure is really quite flimsy, so adding more pieces on top of it is a delicate operation. If you use too much strength, you will bring the whole structure crashing down. The second factor is the fact that you need to angle the bricks at certain angles as you are building the Skytree upwards, and there are no indicators on how much you need to angle them, so it all comes down to rough estimations. If you keep making slightly wrong estimations as you add each level, you end up with a tower that does not look right. Here are some pics of the build process.
And here is the fully assembled Tokyo Skytree. It stands at about 27cm tall, making it one of the tallest nanoblock set currently available.
If you have the nanoblock LED base plate (separate purchase), you can light up the Tokyo Skytree.
This nanoblock Tokyo Skytree set is only officially available in Japan, though some parallel importers in some countries may import it. I bought mine online from Plamoya (Links: Tokyo Skytree, LED Base Plate). You can also find it in my Amazon.com store.
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Friday, 28 October 2011
Thursday, 27 October 2011
Tuesday, 25 October 2011
nanoblock Big Draft Beer Review
Difficulty: Not Specified
Time to Complete: 10 mins
No of Blocks: 130+
Item Code: NBC-033
The nanoblock Big Draft Beer set comes in a small plastic container with over 130+ pieces of building blocks, a human figure, and a sheet of instruction paper to show you how to build it.
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| The packets of blocks and instruction paper. |
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| That's over 130+ blocks. |
This nanoblock set did not have any specified difficulty rating, probably because it is really easy to build. I was able to build this mug of beer in around 10 minutes. Here are some pics of the build process.
And here is the final result. It stands at just under 5cm tall. The human figure that comes with this set is surprisingly flexible, with hands that attaches to the body with a small ball-joint for more freedoms of movement, and the feet has bendable knees too.
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| Beer on nanoblock LED base |
This nanoblock Big Draft Beer set is only officially available in Japan, though some parallel importers in some countries may import it. I bought mine online from Plamoya. You can also find it in my Amazon.com store.
nanoblock LED Base Plate Review
Item Code: NB-011
Price: Not Available in Malaysia
The nanoblock LED Base plate is a 20 x 20 clear plate with 3 LEDs positioned near the center of the plate, powered by 3 AAA batteries. The three LEDs are in red, green and blue, and it slowly transitions between the three LEDs when turned on.
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| Contents of the box |
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| The base plate is 20 x 20 |
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| Unscrew to open the battery compartment |
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| 3 AAA batteries needed |
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| This is what it looks like when turned on |
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| The switch for turning it on or off |
There is only one switch on the side that lets you turn it on or off. Unfortunately, you have no control over which particular colour LED to turn on. Here is a video of how it looks like when it is on.
This base plate was originally designed to be used with the Tokyo Skytree nanoblock set, but you can find other creative uses for it. In the photo below, I removed the bottom of the nanoblock Jack-O-Lantern and placed it on the LED base plate.
This nanoblock LED Base plate is only officially available in Japan, though some parallel importers in some countries may import it. I bought mine online from Plamoya. You can also find it in my Amazon.com store.
nanoblock Jack-O-Lantern Review
Difficulty: Level 1
Time to Complete: 20 mins
No of Blocks: 130+
Item Code: NBC-040
The nanoblock Jack-O-Lantern set comes in a zip-lock bag packaging, with over 130+ pieces of building blocks, and a sheet of instruction paper to show you how to build a cute halloween Jack-O-Lantern.
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| The packets of blocks and instruction paper. |
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| That's over 130+ blocks. |
This is a "Level 1" nanoblock set, but I would actually rate it a "Level 2" because some parts of the build process is a little tricky, but nothing too difficult. I was able to build this jack-o-lantern in about 20 minutes. Here are some pics of the build process.
And here is the final result. It stands at just over 5cm tall.
If you have the nanoblock LED base plate (NB-011), you can do this by removing some of the bottom pieces of the jack-o-lantern.
This nanoblock Jack-o-Lantern is a limited edition that is only officially available in Japan, though some parallel importers in some countries may import it. I bought mine online from Plamoya. You can also find it in my Amazon.com store.