crystal sweeper review

[Andi]

Thanks to the this year's April Fool's Joke of FBTB I discovered a Lego Theme I didn't know before: Power Miners.
I browsed through the current Lego catalog and somehow I liked it. Sure, it has very uncommon colors and the combination lime green/orange might not be everyone's taste, but this theme has something, some kind of charme.
Of course there are smaller (and cheaper) sets than the Crystal Sweeper, but it was for sale with 15 Euro less.

The set came in numbered bags and with two instruction booklets. And a sticker sheet.
The build was very entertaining, not repetitive at all and very straightforward. I needed several hours, but I opened all bags at once and ignored the numbers. So I had 474 parts in the box for looking through.
The special pieces for this sweeper look very interesting, like the driller or the cargo bed.
And there was one special part included, which I loved at once: a laptop

Most of the parts are lime green, but there's some orange, dark and light grey, black and white as well.

There are 4 Minifigs included. 2 Power Miners (Duke and Brains, both with two-sides-printed head for changing the emotions) and 2 Rock Monsters (Glaciator and Meltrox).
http://www.flickr.com/photos/hansolo401/3418266890/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/hansolo401/3418265710/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/hansolo401/3418233486/

The result is a great looking, sturdy vehicle which has a lot to play with. There is a driller which can be put up and down, there is the cool sweeping function, which transfers crystals (or other things) from the floor into the cargo bed, and a bike.
Oh, and there is a banana!



Besides the vehicle there is a little rock catapult, which fits two Power Miners which then can be catapulted into trash from a Rock Monster.


Final Rating:
It does not really fit into a Star Wars Collection, but I like it! So I give it a 8/10

Some extra for the fun:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/hansolo401/3421667888/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/hansolo401/3421667826/

[Puddleglum]

Wow, I had no idea the set came with a banana and a laptop, those are a couple of nice bonuses there.

[jedi_master_sal]

So I got my Crystal Sweeper set on Wednesday night in the mail. When I got home I was eagerly anticipating building it.

To my surprise my wife actually wanted to build it with me. I didn't know how to react. Seriously.
Part of me was happy that she wanted to have anything to do with any of my collecting hobbies and this was a first for LEGO. However part of me was also a bit concerned. Would she lose a part, miss a step in the instructions, etc.

IN the end, I let her build one of the 4 bags of bricks in the set. The simplest bag. And later there was another section that was repetitive building that I had her help me on. It was actually nice to have her there building next to me. She made the little monster flip canon contraption. I even let her be the first to use it to shoot the monsters about. She had fun, I had fun. Really was surprising.

She really wasn't thrilled with buying LEGOs again, and more so when it wasn't SW. But I think she's finally bought into the fact that these little lime, bright orange and black brick make me happy. Now I look forward to the next set so she and I can build together.

You may think this is corny, but for those of you with wives, you may better understand where I'm coming from.

Okay, so now to the set itself.

The Crystal Sweeper is a decent sized set. Comes with two minifigs of the miners and two small rock monsters. The set has the most of any for jewels and crystals. All told about a dozen. It also has a nifty laptop that you can snap open/close.

Additional features include a rotating crane, motorcycle and a "sweeper" worked from gears attached to the wheels, that sweeps up the crystals you put in front of it and roll over. At the moment it's hard for me to say where this ranks for my favorite to least favorite. I'll be honest to say I bought this set more to complete my collection of PM and not for the look of it. BUt once I had it completely built, my opinion of it changed completely and I really dig (pun intended) this set.

I had to buy it from eBay and ended up actually SAVING money on it. It normally retails for $70. I won it for $55 shipped. The box had some damage to it, but otherwise this was a complete set. This savings offset the $10 more I paid for the Cave Crusher, in fact still saving $5 more in the process.

The set comes with 474 pieces and some random ones of course. I think it's a good value for what you get. I can't wait to display all of these together. The only set I don't have currently of what has been released is the Titanium Command Rig. It's expensive at $100. So I'm not in a rush to get it. Then again, I have the same opinion of the Rig as I used to have for the Sweeper. It doesn't look like much, but hopefully it's got it where it counts. (<--see what I did there? lol)

I know this is mostly a SW LEGO site, but I can't help but praise LEGO for such a fun original themed line. Heh, and I have my little nephew to thank for showing these to me last year.

Respectfully,
-Sal