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Home › Forums › All Things LEGO! › First-Time Builder, So Many Questions
Nancy Flury Carlson.I found a perfect LDD design for the nuclear power plant I want to build. Downloaded LDD. Exported BOM list. Couldn’t figure out how to isolate a submodel so downloaded Studio. Defined a submodel in Studio of just the Containment building. Exported parts list for that submodel. Trying to work with both lists to estimate the parts I need for the submodel. I was thinking I could do this in preparation for LUGBULK this year but it’s looking like I will need another year to just figure this list out! I’ve been reading through various LUG threads and found much useful info. So here are a few initial questions as I am wondering whether I should really continue this project, which is definitely going to take a lot of resources.
Will Krista be doing the Studio course at CCAC again in the future?
The LDD model specs 48×48 base plates – 8 of them – is that size compatible with our MILS setup or should I plan to build on 32×32 MILS bases?
Kudos to everyone who participated in the Color thread, I’m really happy to have the resources outlined there especially the Ryan Howerter chart. Although the whole idea of color is killing me, as I’m going through my parts spreadsheets and looking on Bricklink, and many of the parts are not available in the colors from the design plans.
>> The LDD model specs 48×48 base plates – 8 of them – is that size compatible with our MILS setup or should I plan to build on 32×32 MILS bases?
8 of them arranged how? In a 2×4 footprint? Can you post the Studio file here?
You should be able to get 48×48 plates to connect, and I’ve even considered doing it, but you’d need to consider the bigger picture of what it’s being combined with. Mathematically, a 2×2 square of 48×48 baseplates is the same footprint as a 3×3 square of 32×32 baseplates. So if you’re doing a 2×4 arrangement of 48×48 baseplates on LUG tables or banquet tables, you’ll be able to fill in the rest of the space using 32×32 baseplates.
But it only works if your footprint is essentially a combination of 2×2 sections of baseplates. If you put just one or two or three 48×48 baseplates on a LUG table, there’s no way to fill in the rest of the space on the table using only 32×32 baseplates; you will need to add in 32×16 and possibly 16×16 baseplates to fully cover the table. Such plates may or may not be available, I think you’d have to ask Phil if that’s part of the MILS plan as currently being implemented.
A bonus consideration is transport and storage. If you’re planning on store-bought plastic storage containers, such as Sterilite, for your build, and you want the build to sit flat in the bottom of the container, your options become extremely limited once you move up to 48×48, although they do exist.
@bengood921 – thanks. Based on what you said I believe I will need to figure this out for 32×32. It’s probably best if I post the link to the place where I originally found this design. At the bottom he provides the link to the LDD: https://imgur.com/gallery/2ae1nKw if you need to see it. You might get enough info from the images he posts.
I probably should have picked something smaller to start with!!
Okay, thanks, I should be able to look at it sometime over the weekend.
For me, a bigger concern was your mention that the build uses a lot of parts in colors for which they’re not actually available. There’s not really much we can give in the way of advice though, you’ll have to use your judgement on what colors to use instead, based on what’s available. Depending on how extensive the issue is, dealing with it could become pretty tedious, and may result in an unsatisfying final product.
@carlsonf is this a particular plant that you are building? it sounds gigantic!
LDD is basically dead, but I heard you can import the .xlf files into stud.io
I hope this will give you a laugh. I just this minute realized, after looking at this design and messing around with the parts lists for a week — that this kid DID NOT BUILD THIS PLANT IN REAL LIFE. He just built it in LDD. Duh. It occurred to me while I was looking at his picture of the containment building, which showed the completely closed core containment in one view, but a cutaway of the reactor, steam generators, pressurizer and piping. I asked myself, why would you build the whole nuclear steam supply system and then cover it up with the containment so nobody could see it? So now I realize that what I really want to build is various subsets of this design. Ideally I need to figure out how to build the external view from one side and the cutaway view with all the cool details from the other side. This should help in reducing the number of parts needed.
@greg, yes this is the Westinghouse AP (Advanced Passive) 1000 megawatt nuclear power plant. I used to work at Westinghouse in the nuclear business. I got the idea to build a nuclear plant when I staffed the LUG table at the Home Show this year, and sat next to the windmill. I thought we needed a nuclear plant too.
Wow and someone else already designed the plans for it? That’s pretty cool.
I got to work on portable nuke plants for a few years. 🙂 I took a photo of my office in northern Germany in the late 80’s …
Greg Schubert.
Greg Schubert.
Will Krista be doing the Studio course at CCAC again in the future?
Unfortunately, they didn’t pick it up again. I am hosting the Learn from a LUG Member on Studio on Sunday. You’re welcome to join us either in person or virtually. I’m also looking for another outlet to run the Studio course. I’ll keep you posted if I find one in the near future.
I just took a look at that file. WOAH that’s a beast! 7300 parts!
sat next to the windmill. I thought we needed a nuclear plant too.
@carlsonf I agree completely and am looking forward to seeing your MOC.
Greg, cool photo. Is that a carrier?
Is that a carrier?
CGN, a guided missile, nuclear cruiser … a body guard for a nuclear powered aircraft carrier; the cruiser had two General Electric D2G reactors but is now decommissioned
This seems like a gigantic build. Once you get your parts list finalized, you might be able to find a lot of what you need from LUG members and save a bunch on shipping.
This might be a little late to the game but the biggest advice I can give is to import this file into studio and keep working from there for the sake of verifying whether parts exist in the colors you need.
I worked on a nuclear flask car in L-gauge View Here and the biggest pain I had was finding out how few parts were made in olive green, compared to other verdant hues. So running that check on Studio will save you frustration in ordering parts and helping you decide to substitute a similar color for your model. Most people won’t mind if you do a different shade of blue or grey to account for what’s really available as parts. As for me, I was stubborn so it took a while and a lot to get those olive green parts. LOLOL
That nuclear flask car is unique, designed for transporting waste to Yucca Mountain. I doubt vehicles were ever used except for crash tests. These cars would make a cool addition to a display with a nuclear power plant.
Below are some photos of a power plant that was at Brickfest, Viriginia in 2006 made by Brickfrenzy.
Thanks. Yeah, they’re meant to haul stuff to Yucca but red tape keeps delaying that storage site. You can still see some of them rolling around in a few different iterations. Built mine from photos on the web from enthusiasts watching their local train lines. I want to say this DODX version is from the 1960’s perhaps. Maybe if everything goes well, I can bring it to the sci center this Jan. XD
Yes regarding Yucca Mountain – Harry Reid gladly advocated for billions in development money but then once the industry was ready to start sending spent fuel he was suddenly against it. Imagine. But I digress. I can report that I have used Studio to isolate the Containment building and then started removing outer containment elements to show a nice cutaway that displays the reactor, steam generator, pressurizer etc inside containment. I also then used the Stability button and most of the model lit up! I don’t think what I ended up will really collapse though, so my next step is figuring out which parts I already have and planning how to get the rest.
Can you share an image showing either your current progress or the instructions for the finished project? I’m really curious to see how elaborate this is going to be.
@greg, I have not started anything in real life yet. For a good array of images from the LDD design, see https://imgur.com/gallery/2ae1nKw.
I haven’t forgotten about this one, and I am also curious as to how it’s been going. I have looked at the Imgur page a few times, and I downloaded the LDD file and it does open right up in Studio without issue. At some point I had part of a post typed up, and then changed my mind about it.
At first glance, it looks like this guy never really intended for this thing to be actually built, and did the digital design simply because it was a subject that interested him and he thought it would be fun to do. But the fact that he threw in an estimated cost… well, I’m still not sure what to think about that. For one thing, I’m very skeptical of his dollar amount and his methodology for coming up with it, it sounds like he spent about five seconds thinking about it.
What is clear is that he gave literally zero consideration to whether a part is actually available in the colors he used, and he really did you no favors in doing so. In Studio, you can bring up the parts list, and it will flag everything that isn’t a real choice, and I scrolled through the list and it’s extensive.
Studio also gives you a cost estimate in the parts list. Their cost estimate tends to be high, despite the fact that they don’t include things like taxes and shipping that can really add up, because they use the average price on BrickLink, even though when people shop, they do so by lowest price. But it’s still probably worth noting that Studio’s estimate is, as I recall, twice that of the guy who did the design, despite the fact that for all the parts that don’t exist in the chosen color, BrickLink does not enter a price for them.
Btw, this album came up in my Flickr feed yesterday. I’m posting it because you can see their plan for the layout in the first pic, and they combine 32×32 and 48×48 baseplates, with a few 16x32s added where needed, so you can see how they did it, in case that’s still useful or helpful for you.
I’d still suggest using 32x32s if you can. Their main motivation here would have been that a significant part of the display is Moonbase, which has used 48×48 as their standard going back maybe 20 years at this point, and you can see how they did it in big chunks. If you used 48×48 for a City context, you most likely would be the only person doing so in any display you were part of, and it would be more difficult to work around.
Thanks for your thoughtful notes and observations, @bengood921. I have not done anything on this project since sometime in November. I was sick for most of December, not Covid but some other very horrible virus that involved a ton of coughing and lasted weeks. Anyway I will try to get back to this project soon. All I’ve done so far is isolate the containment building and generate a parts list for that, using Studio. I did take advantage of the Studio feature that (I hope) generated the list using available colors.
I don’t know why this young man decided to design this plant – other than the fact that he lives pretty close to where one was going to built, so maybe he was friends with someone who worked for the utility, or with Westinghouse, the engineering company that designed it. But this guy is really interested in history, especially the Battle of the Catalaunian Fields in AD 451. In fact he wrote a book about it, which of course I bought.
Also thanks for your comments on the base plate size – I definitely plan to use the standard dimensions that will work with group installations.
the nuclear power plant I want to build
@carlsonf, somewhere I recall that you had light bluish grey 1×1 bricks on your wish list. I think I have a thousand. I sent you a PM via SteelCityLUG.
I saw a LEGO IDEAS nuclear power plant design in a post from the American Nuclear Society. It’s not the design that I’m planning to build but I wanted to support it. Thought that maybe some in the LUG would also want to support it. https://ideas.lego.com/projects/f57b13e6-146d-4f29-b500-decc0ca11f34/
I’m making some progress building my nuclear power plant. I’ve been buying up LEGO elements needed to make the components within the containment building first. I have come to my first major problem and I’m hoping someone has an idea for me. The Steam Generators and the Reactor have a purple Dragon Egg bottom (Container, Faceted, 4x4x 1 2/3, item 24130). According to the Studio design file, this Dragon Egg attaches directly to the bottoms of the Steam Generators and Reactor, to part number 60474 (Plate, Round 4×4 with Hole). I love the idea of the trans purple Dragon Egg bottoms, along with the trans purple Umbrellas at the tops of the Steam Generators.
Unfortunately the two pieces (component bottom plate and Dragon Egg bottom) do not connect. They are the same circumference but they will not snap together. I believe it should be possible to construct a connecting pin but I’m not figuring it out with pieces that I have in my LEGO boxes. The Plate at the bottom of the components has a center hole that fits a Technic axle. The Dragon Egg has a hole that fits something the size of a car antenna (3957). The distance between the plate and the bottom of the Dragon Egg is in the neighborhood of 3/4 of an inch.
Thanks in advance for any ideas.
Wow, it looks like the pieces should fit, I guess you already tried twisting them. Maybe it only works in STUDIO virtually. I’ll give it a try with pieces I have … meanwhile, trans purple instead of trans-green for a nuke plant? 😀
