Whoa, this one went up a bit early. 9pm is the normal time, excluding mismatches in Daylight Saving Time clock shifts. I saw this had been posted at 8:52pm, while yesterday I was repeatedly refreshing at 8:59.

Late '80s Classic Space is missing just a bit from the sets that came in the years before.

I do love the new pieces we got, though. The small trans-red radar dish, the flexible tubes, the 1x2 brick with studs all around it. A rare SNOT piece, that one.

I love Classic Space and this one, which I don't yet own, gets an 'A' grade from me. It's a slight step down from the true greats. But only slight.

I got this, and remember being really excited about getting it...and really disappointed in the actual model. As I recall, the center structure is just an open frame with a canopy shielding it from above. The sides and bottom are partly open. The side pods are more like prison cells than cockpits. If I compiled a list of the Space sets that I ended up being most disappointed by, this might very well top the list.

A nice, sleek, futuristic vessel bristling with weapons and sensors. Definitely one of the best spaceships that LEGO has made! As mentioned, its design was essentially copied for 6981, but the astronauts here can actually sit inside the main ship unlike its Blacktron clone (well actually one can sit and the other kind of reclines in front). However, the controls are a little sparse (2 1x1 tiles mounted in an odd position inside the main ship and nothing for the two side pods), although some additional computer tiles and control levels are easy enough to add. The UK name for the vessel "Plasma Drive Starship" may also suggest that the two side pods (which can dock with each other) are actually engines/drives or plasma storage units rather than cockpits. The dinky little rover is also one of the simplest that LEGO has produced (only beaten by the even simpler one in 6884).

Oh, that's pretty.

Hmmm..."Stardefender 200"...guess they couldn't afford another zero...:)

One thing always wondered with the 'transition' from "Classic" Space to Futuron (I know, I know: "brick_r, their the same thing"...well, no: New Coke, Coke Classic...); what was the 'thought process'?

The only thing I guess is: Streamlining. Switching from three-color vehicles to ones of only two-colors, would have probably shaved a few dollars off the costs. And it's not like Lego didn't try it before (I own a few Classic Space vehicles and crafts that are old Light Grey and sometimes Trans-Green).

Love the shaping of this one. The massive cockpit and the side pods, feels more modern than it is.

In all my time of getting LEGO lots, I never came across this set. However, in buying a 6985 in box, it also appears to have the parts for the 6932 as well.

Glorious set.

@brick_r:
I’ve said repeatedly that Classic Space can be divided into four basic color scheme categories. One is the blue color scheme that is commonly given all the credit for doing slightly less than 25% of the work. The grey/trans-green color scheme is another. A third is “miscellaneous”, covering anything that slightly deviates from one of the main three (slipping some white into the blue color scheme, for instance), or which has zero relation to any standard color scheme. And the fourth...is what they kept for Futuron. 6980 Galaxy Commander from four years earlier looks like a Futuron set, but the astronauts are clearly from the Classic Space era. Futuron appears to be an attempt to redefine Classic Space as a distinct faction prior to the introduction of Blacktron.

Classic Castle had about eight different tabards, but there wasn’t any faction that really spread across multiple sets until the Lion Knights and Black Falcons were introduced in 1984. Likewise, Classic Space appeared to be one cohesive whole until 1987 when Futuron and Blacktron were pitted against each other. For about a decade prior, there was no defined faction, the color schemes were semi-random, and there was nothing to explain why all these astronauts were heavily armed. But if you’re going to introduce Blacktron, they really need some faction to face off against besides the Association of Independent Spacemen Who Pick Starship Paint Colors That Are On Clearance.

I’m just not sure why they picked this color scheme to keep. Maybe it’s because it was the most common at the moment they were developing Futuron, maybe it was just someone’s favorite color scheme at the time, or maybe they decided trans-yellow made it look too much like Blacktron.

I wanted this set so badly - my Grandma and I drove all over town looking for it, because she always took me shopping to pick out my birthday present. By the time we found it, I'd already seen the Space Police sets at a different store, and we ended up going back and picking up one of those, instead. I'm getting old and sentimental...

I bought one of these, used, on Bricklink several years ago. It's still intact, without any modifications. I'll change it up at some point, because it did turn out to be a goofy little ship. It looks awesome, but in reality it had some strange design choices like weak connections, big gaps, lots of weight hanging off of 2x8 plates up front, and jet engines stuck to the back of the canopy.

Does the rover look like a duck from that angle, or is it just me?

I wanted this one so badly as a kid. Didn't get it then, but some years ago I bought the central canopy and some other parts on Bricklink and finished it off with pieces from my own collection. As others have said, some odd design choices, but still a fun ship.

Was the 200 on top really necessary? It looks bad.

@PurpleDave -
Part of what made up the Futuron 'look' was black and white vehicles with trans-blue windscreens and trans-red antennae, sensor dishes, etc. But part of it was rounded-off shapes in several sets like the domes on the side pods here and the canopy on the 6850 Auxiliary Patroller. Big window panels created the same roundish feel, like this set and 6884 Aero-Module, or smaller ones like 6830 Space Patroller or 6875 Hovercraft.

What's always been cool to me is that the 1499 Twin Starfire makes a good Futuron ship, with a little bit of color-swapping, and the 6886 Peace Keeper looks like it has Futuron roots with the covers for the wing "cameras."

(...I really need to go back to school...I have way too much time on my hands and way too much geekthusiasm about stuff like this!)

@PurpleDave said:
"One is the blue color scheme that is commonly given all the credit for doing slightly less than 25% of the work."

You may be right about the vast majority of sets not being blue (and trans yellow), however, of the 10 sets that survived from my childhood, 9 of them are blue. I have collected 15 more sets since, and all the larger ones feature blue, although most of these are light gray. I believe that since these larger sets relying on blue so much is why so many of us associate Classic Space with the color.

I also wonder if it isn’t possible that blue sets were more popular and had better sales. Maybe someone can do an analysis on what is owned by Brickset members.

Regardless, blue and trans yellow define what I call Classic Space, although I do enjoy all the light gray and white sets as well.

This was the last System set I got as a child and unlike @PurpleDave I loved it then and I still love it now. I admit the inside of the middle section is very large and kind of empty, and yes the pods are rather blocky and dark inside, and I always did wish there was some way of getting the buggy to the ground other than tipping the entire ship backwards. Despite all of that, though, there’s something about this I just adore. The simplicity of the black and white colour scheme? The dark blue canopies? The 45° slopes on the pods and their octagonal windows? The astronauts with their beautiful new zipper torso designs and actual closing visors? Whatever the combination, I still just lap it up.

Excellent choice! You can never go wrong with space, and especially Futuron :)

Great looking ship!

@Harmonious_Building said:
"do you wanna build a SPACESHIP"

Oooooh I can just hear Elsa singing that..... Wait, what?

I wonder if there's Stardefender 100 and Stardefender 300.

My most-played-with set as a kid - so happy to see it receiving some love here! The fact that the pods on the sides could detach blew my mind at the time!

Looks kinda like it’s a precursor to 6981. Like the Blacktron dudes stole the idea and made one of their own which, to be fair, is very Blacktron

@MCLegoboy said:
"Look at all those "radar dishes" on this Stardefender. I wonder what "transmissions" they send."

They just send light at a very specific frequency, think of it as a very red flashlight.

I love the diagonal zipper uniform torso design for the minifigure.

@Sparky_Ham said:
"My most-played-with set as a kid - so happy to see it receiving some love here! The fact that the pods on the sides could detach blew my mind at the time!"
Detachable wing-tip vehicles weren’t original to LEGO. In ‘78 to ‘81, Milton Bradley produced a toy spaceship called the Star Bird with that feature (as well as a pod that could be removed from the top). I don’t know if any toy companies had detachable wing-tip vehicles before MB, but it wouldn’t surprise me if one did.

Found this with its box intact from my childhood. Good times.

Republic Gunship avant la lettre…:)

@PurpleDave said:
" @brick_r:
I’ve said repeatedly that Classic Space can be divided into four basic color scheme categories. One is the blue color scheme that is commonly given all the credit for doing slightly less than 25% of the work. The grey/trans-green color scheme is another. A third is “miscellaneous”, covering anything that slightly deviates from one of the main three (slipping some white into the blue color scheme, for instance), or which has zero relation to any standard color scheme. And the fourth...is what they kept for Futuron. 6980 Galaxy Commander from four years earlier looks like a Futuron set, but the astronauts are clearly from the Classic Space era. ..."

There were definitely some transitional sets between Classic Space blue and trans-yellow and the later white and trans-blue scheme. One was my favorite set as a kid, 6927 All-Terrain Vehicle, which featured both color schemes in the same set. I always assumed that the colors were just colors, given that there was such a variety in the early days. But then I had fallen into my Dark Age by the time this set came out.

Absolutely love this set. One of my favourites as a child. Sure there are design issues but as a kid the swoosh-ability, internal space, detachable and combinable pods were all superb.

Have never understood the love for the Blue/Yellow classic space colour scheme, it’s fugly. Grey/green is good, have gone back and collected all of those sets. The white/black with trans blue of some classic space and then futuron is the best. Clean and simple colouring, that actually looks futuristic. Couple that with the black/yellow of Blacktron and you have perfection.

Ah, Futuron--like Classic Space (and all pre-1991 themes) too early for my own real childhood knowledge of it and lacking the same revered status as the early Classic Space theme once I hit the internet circa 2003-2004 and discovered the History.

You could convince me the Futuron are superior to the Classic Space on the minifig front: they still have beautiful colour variants with those perfect smiley heads, only now with enclosed helmets and some of the sharpest torso printing this side of the Rishi Maze.

But the actual set design? It's fine. The Star Defender 200 might the only one I could pick out of a line-up of real sets and plausible MOCs imitating the theme, and it's good, not great. It doesn't have the excuse of Classic Space of being the first theme ever doing it with barely enough specialised parts, and the Blacktron/Space Police I designs that are contemporary are generally more memorable (which is a less-objective way of saying "better").

Don't get me wrong though--I'd snap this up in a heartbeat. It's a solid A-grade.

@tjarrett said:
"One was my favorite set as a kid, 6927 All-Terrain Vehicle, which featured both color schemes in the same set. I always assumed that the colors were just colors, given that there was such a variety in the early days. But then I had fallen into my Dark Age by the time this set came out."
6927 was also among my favourites. While my original had long since been donated to a family that couldn’t afford LEGO, I recreated it in 2014 from parts I had plus new and used ones I got on the secondary market:
https://brickshelf.com/gallery/AmperZand/Fantasy/atv_a_full.jpg
https://brickshelf.com/gallery/AmperZand/Fantasy/atv_b_lab.jpg
https://brickshelf.com/gallery/AmperZand/Fantasy/atv_c_transporter.jpg
https://brickshelf.com/gallery/AmperZand/Fantasy/atv_d_minifigs.jpg

Aka the Plasma Drive Starship in the UK
One of my very favourite sets from childhood, swooshed about loads. Managed to rebuild it last year after getting all the old Lego out again for the kids to play with.

Ah, one of my favorite childhood sets. Everything about it appealed to me. The colour scheme, the modularity, the interesting parts, the swooshability. Plus, all prints, no stickers.

@PurpleDave said:
" 6980 Galaxy Commander from four years earlier looks like a Futuron set."

I strongly disagree: Futuron doesn't use trans yellow, nor blue as a basecolour. If anything 6972 could actually go for a futuron set if you leave out the figures.

Anyway: Amazing set, simply amazing!

Omg! One of my ultimate childhood memories as a little kid! -Out shopping groceries with my mum and got this <3

@sid3windr:
Isn't Anna the one singing that (to Elsa)?

@brick_r:
There was some "streamlining" but I think this also involves parts usage - the Futuron sets generally look cleaner and more sleek than later Classic Space sets, partially due to sparser greebling as well as the absence of finned rocket engine elements.

As per the Classic Space/Futuron transition, Futuron sets use a primarily white color scheme with black highlights (and the occasional light grey element), along with trans-blue windows and trans-red greebling (along with the occasional trans-blue and rarely trans-green (there is also a bit of yellow in the form of arrow tiles)). The absence of solid blue as a primary/secondary color is what distinguishes this color scheme from that of Classic Space sets such as 6980. As has been mentioned, there are some Classic space sets with the exact same color scheme and almost the same parts usage as Futuron sets (6972 and 6808, released the same year as the first Futuron sets), also well as the light-and-sound sets from 1985 (6750, 6780, and 6783) which are very close save for some greebling and parts usage (e.g., older style computer slopes). Interestingly, the vehicle portion of 6927 already has this color scheme back in 1981.

this is one of my favorite childhood kits right after space light & sound , more details on playability and functions can be found on YT: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ByxE69M9uQ&t=70s

Blacktron liked the design so much, they stole it, and modified it to make the 6981 Aerial Intruder.

It's probably half the reason I got this set early on in my bricklinking days. IT's a pretty good set, but I found it didn't have a good swoosh handle. It was tricky to pick it up and swoosh nicely. Unlike 6981. that has a perfect swoosh handle at the back.

I always wanted this one but never got it. I don’t remember seeing it in stores, so it might’ve only been in limited quantities where I lived.

THIS! One of the best spaceships Lego ever made. Super versatile in play, so much interior space for, well, spacemen. Back in the day I wished, I had two of them.

@ @alfred_the_buttler:
I looked back as far as the Galaxy Explorer, and checked the comments of any Classic Space RSotD, and couldn’t find my original breakdown, so maybe I posted it on a different Space sub-theme. So I’m thinking of making a new, more interactive list. I’ve been playing around with it, but the numbers are way off from what I remember, so I’m wondering if I’ve changed my mind on how to classify several sets.

On a guess, though, I suspect it has to do with timing. I noticed that the blue Classic Space color scheme was common from 1978-1980, and again from 1983-1985. The white color scheme looks like it kicked off in 1983 with 6980, and then was pretty much only from 1986-1987. With Futuron running from 1987-1989, that’s a pretty significant chunk of overlap for the white Classic Space color scheme. Misc color schemes also seem to have started after the first wave of blue sets concluded, and really hit heaviest in 1986, which makes me wonder if they were played by around with potential color schemes for a more defined faction, or if they’d just given up on trying to adhere to any single color scheme for a bit.

@Huw:
Ooh, you traveled back three minutes in time!

@ElephantKnight:
And they hated it so much they made the Super B Cadet/Target Corps use it.