@MCLegoboy said:
"So... what collects the solar power on this thing?"

Maybe its a sci-fi "star eater" like Starkiller Base and not a traditional "soak up the sunlight" like a solar panel.

@tmtomh said:
" @TheOtherMike said:
"The price per piece isn't too far off of what you'll see today, but the minifigs per piece has definitely gone down in the last forty years."

$36.50 in 1985 is equivalent to $107 today. That's 34 cents per piece, way higher than today.

Or if you prefer, it's 10 cents per part ($32) plus $15 per minifigure (5x15=75) for that $107 total."

I meant without taking inflation into account.

Kinda funny to show up, I just mentioned this set to someone yesterday.

I've wanted to make something based on this for forever, I'd probably add more functionality like the top parts becoming walker legs and a more meaty middle section. It's such a cool set though, they kinda had the same idea of a "four wheel rover becomes two flyers. with the twinfector from nexo knights.

This was one of the last 3 Classic Space sets that I had as a child (before I started on Technic). I seem to remember that it had lots of play value, the little spacecraft were very swoosh-able!

I really didn't know about this set until I discovered Brickset or Bricklink, but it's definitely one of the more memorable Classic Space sets.

There was some advertisement from 1985 that highluighted the brick-build robots found in many sets as the first "Lego aliens", which is rather interesting... Btw, the robot from this set is called "Zero the Message Robot".

That almost full grey and trans-green color scheme looks rather nice. SP2 kind of tried this as well, but the added red and black makes it look way messier than it should it be.

Really liked the blue jetpack and trans-green canopies...

I still have this set from my childhood. I use to use the 4 Light Gray Panel Corner Convex Ribbed parts to make a grenade to annoy my brother. I rebuilt it a few years ago. Such a cool space vehicle.

Certainly had this as a child - the robot got a lot of play (in our headcanon it was a malfunctioning repair robot that caused havoc wherever it went) as did the jetpack. The vehicle not so much; even when configured as two spaceships, it came over as rather clunky compared to 6891.

One of those bizarre contraptions that didn't make much sense but nevetheless looked very cool doing so. Wasn't that what classic space was all about? And those weird corner pieces....never had any but those surely are among the coolest pieces Lego ever made!

Would love to see a remake of this.....but then again, so many more great Space sets from this era...

Icons remake please!

The droid from this set is mentioned in the instruction for the new Renegade

@JasonBall34 said:
"This got passed down to me by my dad. Lovely thing"

I also had sets from my dad, but slightly different sets. From Space: 6940, 6927, 6820 and 6702. I completed them after years and bought damaged parts.

This set is great and is still in my collection. only downside is the center part has become very fragile over the years.

Perfect rsotd, especially on a dark and rainy day like today. Brings lots of warmth and nostalgia. Thx Huwbot.

Those ribbed corner panel parts were only available in light grey in this set - that's how I know I had this set as a kid.

@Binnekamp said:
"An absolutely bonkers set. Which was what Classic Space was about. Not your regular sci-fi vehicles that would function perfectlt IRL with no flaws if they would be made in real life by NASA (as some people now tend to MOC), but sets bursting with creativity with play and rebuilding potential galore. The rule of cool at the forefront. The set is a toy, but a really cool one you can do endless stuff with as long as you have imagination.

And as stated above, this is an excellent example of a CS set that is not gray-blue-trans.yellow. I think it would have actually looked less unique if it had insisted on using those colors, as it now gets to use black to balance texture, and the cockpits pop out far more yet are dark enough that they don't draw attention as the only sections that should be manned.
It also pairs well with sets like the Gamma V Lasercraft."

I am still looking for this SPT, but of those in this color scheme I have 6891 Gamma V and 6940.

This is one of the best christmas presents I had ever gotten back in die 80s! I did not wish for it and was not overly enjoyed to see it after unwrapping. But, oh my, it was so versatile! I did not do anything but play with this thing during the holidays.

This set has an interesting connection to the new upcoming Blacktron renegade for me. How you may ask? Simple. The new Blacktron Renegade is based on the original Renegade. I owned this set for a few months (Got it from a coworker. Not too used, some collectors clutch, still with the box!) But I ended up trading this, and some other spacey parts to get a Renegade from a member of my local LUG.

It was an interesting set, but a bit fragile. I kinda miss it. But I much prefer my Renegade.

I love how the white astronaut with the jetpack looks like a fairy flying around with the antennae on the jetpack and brandishing a 'magic wand' tool.

@paulvdb said:
" @PurpleDave said:
" @iwybs said:
"This thing is going to be blown to bits by the Renegade."
...

But price per piece doesn't take into account that modern sets have more very small pieces than sets from the 1980s. It would be better to compare price per gram if you want to know which set has the better value for your money."

"
Still. Compare this to the current rover from City-Space for 80€ and tell me that this thing would be the better deal?

I always thought this one was a little weird but a lot of fun. Very modular, tons of play value.

One of my favorite space sets from my childhood. What the main photo doesn't show is that the two cockpit areas can be detached and joined together to form a separate land vehicle, and there are "landing gear" on the middle part so it becomes a base. Also the struts at the top of the base (with the missiles pointing in) also detach and slot into the cockpits to form 2 identical flying vehicles (with the missiles pointing the right way....). Pretty cool.

I had Cosmic Fleet Voyager as well which also had a detachable base section, and loved that play value of forming a base somewhere and then still having the ships to "explore" more.

One of things I love about Classic Space is that you get large interiors for relatively low piece counts (at the cost of a little fragility but not too bad).

@AllenSmith said:
"They already stole the robot and painted it black!"

Or they just took the robot from 6931 which was already the right colour.

@paulvdb said:
"But price per piece doesn't take into account that modern sets have more very small pieces than sets from the 1980s. It would be better to compare price per gram if you want to know which set has the better value for your money."

Polycarbonate (used primarily for trans colors) costs about twice as much as ABS, but they’re switching most of their production over to MABS. MABS costs even more than PC, so material costs will nearly double going forward, but it doesn’t really matter. Weight is a terrible metric because material cost is such a small portion of the overall expense of bringing a product like this to market. Transportation is a big one. The US outsources a lot of labor to China, but I once read this is only beneficial if US labor is at least 4x the cost of Chinese labor. Once it drops to 3x, all the savings get eaten up by transportation.

And labor is _also_ costly, though this can be reduced through increased automation. Except, machine time is somewhat equivalent to labor. The longer it takes between eject one part and the next, the more “labor” cost you have baked into the automation. Those machines and systems aren’t free, after all.

Tooling is expensive, and was a large part of what led to two years with massive losses. Now, they factor in the expected life of the tool, and the anticipated usage, when figuring out how much an element should cost. So parts that are less likely to run their mold into the ground are going to have to cost more to cover their tooling costs and still yield a profit (compare the online PAB cost of a 1x5 plate vs 1x4, 1x6, and 1x8).

Then they’re making much more complex parts, with dual-molding becoming a regular means of adding deco. These parts will require twice as much time per shot, because you have to mold one portion, cycle out the undermold tool for the overmold tool, and run a second shot before you can eject the part you formed in the first step (then the under and over tools need to switch back before you start the next shot). They’ll also probably also yield less parts per shot, because the complex tooling design will require clearance in more than one direction. Tooling those is at least 50% more costly, just because each one requires an extra half mold vs a standard part.

And weight does nothing to account for any of this. Plus, it’s not printed on the box, so any online listing will probably include the weight of the box, instructions, inner packaging, and sticker sheets, because Bricklink sellers have to pay to ship those when they sell MISB sets.

@peterlmorris:
It’s not even just this color scheme. The white/trans-blue proto-Futuron Classic Space also gets ignored in favor of only making the blue/light-grey/trans-yellow stuff. All three color schemes had pretty similar quantities of sets produced, but people only seem to acknowledge the one that came first. My brother and I never had a single set in that color scheme, but we had a bunch in this one, and the proto-Futuron one. I really prefer the latter, because the Galaxy Commander was the biggest Space set either of us got in those days, but I’d be cool with this one making a comeback just for historical equity.

@pazza_inter:
Monorail also had electronic stuff that I believe TLG was losing money on. But yes, extra large parts like baseplates skew things. So do large molded animals, bigfigs, and even large quantities of minifigs. Printed parts cost more, without a significant increase in weight. Overmolded parts and minifigs don’t really account for their expense by either metric. Short of getting your hands on the price schedule for set designers (which I suspect would depress many commenters here), there’s no perfect metric that works for all sets. And even then, it still won’t factor in the cost of set design. It’s always going to cost more to have someone design a $500 model vs picking the contents of a bulk Creator box, so the latter can conceivably turn a profit at $0.05/pc. They have in the past, but you rarely see a blown out comment section full of AFOLs gushing over those bulk packs. The parts are chunky, which is exactly what it sounds like the weight metric crowd wants, until that’s all they get.

“Price per stuff” is the other one that used to get hurled around here like there’s no tomorrow, but nobody has come up with an objective way to measure “stuff”, so it basically just devolved into, “If I don’t like the model, I’m absolutely going to complain that it’s overpriced.”

@Ridgeheart:
Blacktron doesn’t steal anything. They liberate your stuff from you, and give it to someone who wants it more. Which is them.

@PurpleDave : I always find your insights into the intricacies of plastic molding fascinating.
Thank you very much for sharing.

Nevertheless, as far as LEGO is concerned I much prefer the products of old (and their value for money) to modern ones.
All those itty bitty 1x1 pieces do nothing for me. I hate building with them, aligning them properly is what I dislike most about modern sets (from any manufacturer actually).
I hate MABS with a vengeance, the fugly modern milky trans pieces I find horrible compared to the crystal clear trans pieces that old Space sets in particular had in abundance. The new ones might be more environmentally friendly, but even though I usually try to be eco-friendly as much as possible, in this particular case I don't give a smeg.

I finally hate the colour inconsistencies that current production techniques bring with them, compared to the perfectly consistent pieces I have in my collection from my childhood. I have recently rebuilt so many of my old sets plus plenty of those I bought on ebay over the past months from that era, and the material quality from back then blows every modern set out of the water. Especially if you build an old set and then a new one immediately afterwards, the difference becomes mind bogglingly apparent.

@AustinPowers:
Oh, the old Space sets used acrylic, not polycarbonate. Acrylic will scratch, crack, break, and yellow with a vengeance. The trans colors from my early childhood were straight garbage. And MABS is just ABS with an extra ingredient. It’s no more eco-friendly than ABS, though the switch was made with an eye towards being so. With MABS, they don’t have to make two molds every time they want to produce an opaque part in a transparent color. The ultimate goal is to find a plastic that _is_ eco-friendly, and will work for both opaque and trans colors, while retaining the qualities that made ABS so desirable in the first place.