Review: 42169 NEOM McLaren Formula E Team
Posted by benbacardi,LEGO have been representing Mclaren vehicles in brick form for almost a decade, and have released a handful of sets featuring cars from last year's 60th anniversary line up. Two join LEGO's growing collection of pull-back Technic race vehicles, and I've taken a look at 42169 NEOM McLaren Formula E Team.
With just over 450 pieces, the set produces a vehicle of decent scale that is roughly a foot long, powered by not one but two pull-back motors.
Summary
42169 NEOM McLaren Formula E Team, 452 pieces.
£46.99 / $49.99 / €52.99 | 10.4p/11.1c/11.7c per piece.
Buy at LEGO.com »
A great mid-sized set that both looks good on display and is fun to race around the floor.
- Accurate design and livery
- Fun to race with the pull-back motors
- Looks good on display
- Lots of stickers
The set was provided for review by LEGO. All opinions expressed are those of the author.
The model is based on last year's Season 9 Formula E racecar, the first year to use the updated Gen3 vehicles (or so my Formula E expert tells me!) Although the set is ostensibly related to the 60th anniversary of the company's racing history, this isn't mentioned anywhere on the box, instruction manual, or in the marketing materials. However, the car is given the driver number 60 on its livery, which doesn't correspond to a real driver, and is the only nod to the anniversary. The rear of the box and LEGO's website provide a comparison photo between the set and the real vehicle:
As is to be expected for a vehicle with such distinctive livery, the set is pretty sticker heavy, with over 30 to be applied, printed on a metallic material that is difficult to photograph! The majority of the stickers feature the racing team's primary sponsor, NEOM, and other sponsor decals.
There are three bags in the set, the paper variety as we've now become used to, and the build commences with the main structure of the chassis. It's built in a very symmetrical manner, and incorporates the two pull-back motors near the back, ready for the rear axle. A series of axles runs down the centre of the chassis, the beginnings of the steering mechanism.
The first stickers are attached as the rear spoiler is constructed, and some bodywork panels either side of the driver's seat start to bring in the bright orange of the livery. The front axles are connected to the central steering mechanism, which allows the front wheels to turn roughly 30 degrees in either direction.
The final bag completes the vehicle. It took some time to position the stickers with as much care as I could, but the car wouldn't look anywhere near as realistic without them. The wide variety of shapes available in modern Technic panels definitely adds a lot to the accurate representation of the sleek lines of a real Formula E vehicle.
The gear on the top of the chassis controls the steering mechanism. Luckily, it can be removed along with the top of the axle below it should you wish, as it does detract somewhat from the design of the car.
A sticker on the seat provides the detailing of the driver's harness, and a flexible rod encloses the area. Although the scale is wrong, a minifigure can sit comfortably in the seat, and mine is currently being driven by the orange classic spaceman.
The two pull-back motors between the rear wheels provide a surprising amount of thrust when engaged to their full extent. The wheels are both connected through them on a single axle, so they cannot run out of sync with each other and push the car off course, but given that a steering mechanism is included it's actually pretty difficult to keep to a straight line!
Conclusion
42169 NEOM McLaren Formula E Team is a great build. It comes together quickly, even for Technic, and LEGO have become very good at accurately representing the unique shape of these racecars in model form. There are some unfortunate gaps between a few of the panels, but that's to be expected. The steering mechanism, although an unnecessary part of the set, adds a little more playability; but the pull-back motors are what kept my two children interested, shooting the car back and forth to each other across the kitchen floor.
With the steering gear removed and all the stickers applied, it looks great, and will happily sit on the shelf above my desk as a display model until one of the kids gets it down again to race, perhaps against a different LEGO pull-back set.
42169 NEOM McLaren Formula E Team is available on LEGO.com for £46.99 / $49.99 / €52.99.
71 likes
42 comments on this article
“Neom,” also the sound a race car makes when it drives past you.
As far as Technic sets go, this looks pretty good to me.
This thing is more sticker than LEGO.
@Ridgeheart said:
"Proudly sponsored by NEOM, the sustainable face of journalist-murdering.
I wish I could hate this set out of existence."
The tarnished smell of sports-washing!!! Fully agree with you.
I appreciate that this review includes the stickers. I doubt it would have looked complete without them! The picture of the sheet is informative too, as I couldn't have guessed this would have been a holographic sticker sheet!
As for the set itself... imagine getting a 50 euro technic set and it's a pullback motor one. On the one hand it at least has steering... but on the other hand it's a Pullback Motor set with steering! There's a reason sets with this feature usually don't include it! Unless the steering can be locked in place in some way I think it might actually detract from the pullback motor!
Yeah... for every Technic Space set there are a dozen of these kinds of technic set I suppose. At least there's choice! As long as you want a vehicle. Or maybe the solar system model.
I don't really care for the set as it's too small and basic for me, but I just must say this: What a great review. Kudos to the reviewer as this was good and fun to read.
Not as many stickers as this set we got this month... 76922 So much pain...
@Ridgeheart said:
"Proudly sponsored by NEOM, the sustainable face of journalist-murdering.
I wish I could hate this set out of existence."
Yeah, including a link to the NEOM Wikipedia article probably wasn't the best advertisement...
@Ridgeheart said:
"Proudly sponsored by NEOM, the sustainable face of journalist-murdering.
I wish I could hate this set out of existence."
I assume this is some laundering out of the house of Saud?
That explains the number 60 on the McLaren F1 Speed Champions set.
At least the Speed Champs version doesn't appear to have that? So I feel OK about getting that.
@lost_scotsman said:
" @Ridgeheart said:
"Proudly sponsored by NEOM, the sustainable face of journalist-murdering.
I wish I could hate this set out of existence."
The tarnished smell of sports-washing!!! Fully agree with you."
As the long-suffering supporters of one of their recently-acquired football clubs, I hear you.
@Ridgeheart said:
"Proudly sponsored by NEOM, the sustainable face of journalist-murdering.
I wish I could hate this set out of existence."
You say that like it's the set's fault lol.
That official comparison photo is...not good. +1 to everyone mentioning the sports washing. Crazy that Lego refuses to put Marlboro logos anywhere, but a dictatorship that murders journalists and activists openly is just hunky dory to advertise.
Looks good but too many stickers
I hope you like some Lego with your stickers.
Along with the price per piece ratio, reviews should now cite the sticker per piece ratio too for crappy sets like this one or Speed Champions sets. At 0.07 stickers per piece, this doesn't look very good.
It seems like a fairly reasonably improvement over the Porsche model from a few years ago, the steering mechanism is interesting but I feel like that wouldn't work too well with the pull-back motors.
I don't think they did a particularly good job of the nose, however, it's too curved for a start and the area with the struts, endplanes, etc. is far too busy and blocky.
I’ll much rather have the $20 unlicensed pull backs over this $50 licensed one any day. It doesn’t look like $50 too.
I should wonder about TLG's morals, since they cancel the Boeing Osprey but see no problem in selling several NEOM licensed sets, despite the backstory.
Then again, since they apparently don't have any morals anymore, as long as there's loads of money to be made, I am not really surprised.
I any case, there's no way in hell this set or anything even remotely connected to NEOM is ever going to find a way into my home.
Perhaps if I got one as a gift I would keep the parts and burn the stickers (since in this case thankfully there's no prints).
One should really write a complaint to LEGO about the subject, because their oh so high and mighty "brand values" are in direct opposition to everything the NEOM project stands for, from ethnic cleansing, murders, censorship of the press, oppression, forced relocation to inhumane work conditions every major construction project in the region has been guilty of in recent years.
It so utterly disgusting.
Disgusting license. No thank you.
@AustinPowers said:
"I should wonder about TLG's morals, since they cancel the Boeing Osprey but see no problem in selling several NEOM licensed sets, despite the backstory.
Then again, since they apparently don't have any morals anymore, as long as there's loads of money to be made, I am not really surprised.
I any case, there's no way in hell this set or anything even remotely connected to NEOM is ever going to find a way into my home.
Perhaps if I got one as a gift I would keep the parts and burn the stickers (since in this case thankfully there's no prints).
One should really write a complaint to LEGO about the subject, because their oh so high and mighty "brand values" are in direct opposition to everything the NEOM project stands for, from ethnic cleansing, murders, censorship of the press, oppression, forced relocation to inhumane work conditions every major construction project in the region has been guilty of in recent years.
It so utterly disgusting. "
Corporations do not have morals. They just have marketing positions, which is all "brand values" really are. What image do we want to convey to ultimately maximize our revenue? etc.
I hope that this NEOM license / partnership blows up in their face. For that to happen, they need to receive a lot of complaints. I am planning to send one. I hope others do too. The problem is I don't know if mainstream parents who buy these 7+ and 9+ sets for their kids will know what NEOM is or care. Those are probably the only complaints that LEGO cares about. But still, worth a shot. It's just such a gross association to have.
@illennium: for what it's worth, I am definitely going to write a complaint as well.
It might not lead to anything, but it's something I simply think needs to be done by anyone with even remotely a conscience.
Not a cent of my money goes to these people.
"Actually, I don't mind stickers all that muc-"
*Sees the NEOM branding*
"Never mind."
Out of all the companies to use the logo for, they went with the (extremely) pie-in-the-sky Saudi pipe dream of a linear city that will never be finished and be a blight on the landscape. On that note, thanks for linking to the wiki article so I could point this out more easily!
Shame on LEGO for letting this happen.
@johleth said:
"This thing is more sticker than LEGO."
You can build the car only with stickers
Graphic design of the stickers is a lot more pleasing when you learn that they could have gone with the AI-generated livery this car also sports in real life: https://web.archive.org/web/20230728163626/https://english.alarabiya.net/News/saudi-arabia/2023/07/28/NEOM-McLaren-Formula-E-Team-unveils-world-first-AI-designed-racing-car
Looks pretty decent, except for those exposed pull-back motors. A few more stickers to camouflage those wouldn't have hurt....
Even when this seems like a step up from the Porsche and Green Donkey that came before, I still have trouble seeing the target audience for these. I mean, every 9+ kid I know wouldn't be interested in a pull-back vehicle. And for younger kids I think the smaller sets are perfectly fine. And then there's the steering, that while nice, doesn't really serve a purpose. Maybe if you could lock it in a certain position? But still.
The combination of a pull-back motor and steering does make me think though. Decades ago, in one of the Technic Idea books, there was some sort of machine that you could "program" by putting gear racks on a plate that you then would feed through the thing. Now how cool would it be to make a pull-back vehicle with steering that in a similar way could be "programmed" to drive a certain path?
@AustinPowers said:
" @illennium: for what it's worth, I am definitely going to write a complaint as well.
It might not lead to anything, but it's something I simply think needs to be done by anyone with even remotely a conscience. "
I've sent a message. It didn't take long. I agree it may not make any difference, but you have to try.
What's this? Dictators can no longer repress/kill people? Leaders are not allowed any more to lie and plunder the coffers of the state for their own benefits? Politicians at all levels cannot hide behind dubious loopholes for all the wrongs they commit on a daily basis? Unionised people are not entitled any more to a full pay for only half the poor work done by twice as many people as required in a quadrupled time frame? What kind of world are we living in? This is shocking. I say shocking.
We have some kind of a running joke in Canada (it's not a joke at all - in fact it is quite sad.) and it goes like this:
(Such and such did something apparently bad): Oh this angers me. Oh this angers me a lot. I am so freaking angry now. You know what? I am so god damn angry at the moment, I will write a letter. (crickets...)
Might have a better chance with a tweet(X) or a facebook like: "Lego sponsors journalist murdering" - pass along...
@Ridgeheart said:
"Proudly sponsored by NEOM, the sustainable face of journalist-murdering."
I am glad I checked out the comments on this one... pass.
nice
I'm not planning to get this set, but if I did find myself in possession of it I'd find a way to lock the steering. Not so that it would go straight ahead, but so that it would do doughnuts.
@EtudeTheBadger said:
" @Ridgeheart said:
"Proudly sponsored by NEOM, the sustainable face of journalist-murdering.
I wish I could hate this set out of existence."
Yeah, including a link to the NEOM Wikipedia article probably wasn't the best advertisement..."
Maybe that was intentional. Wheels within wheels...
looks good however i think on the next ones they should add a lock mechanism that locks the steering so that the pull back works better. but you would also have the option to unlock it and steer it around
@Ridgeheart said:
"Proudly sponsored by NEOM, the sustainable face of journalist-murdering.
I wish I could hate this set out of existence."
Not knowing who or what Neom is, I just googled it. First hit is a company that makes scented candles, reed diffusers and body oils. I’m not a big fan of scented candles and the like, but the comments seem a bit harsh…
I think they captured the design very well, but what bothers me is the scale difference between this and the Dakar car. It should have been made the other way around, but this way the Dakar might have resembled the Audi one too much in size.
@MonsterFighter said:
" @Ridgeheart said:
"Proudly sponsored by NEOM, the sustainable face of journalist-murdering.
I wish I could hate this set out of existence."
Not knowing who or what Neom is, I just googled it. First hit is a company that makes scented candles, reed diffusers and body oils. I’m not a big fan of scented candles and the like, but the comments seem a bit harsh…
"
There's a link in the article to the Wikipedia page for the Neom under discussion here.
@TheOtherMike said:
There's a link in the article to the Wikipedia page for the Neom under discussion here.]]
Sarcastic? Me?
I’m glad at least three people understood!
@MonsterFighter said:
[[ @TheOtherMike said:
There's a link in the article to the Wikipedia page for the Neom under discussion here.]]
Sarcastic? Me?
I’m glad at least three people understood!
]]
Hey, given how many people apparently comment without having read much or any of the article, one can't be to sure.
Supporting the sportswashing of a murderous and misogynistic regime that uses the proceeds of vast deposits of fossil fuel to advance its agenda. Good look, LEGO.... NOT!
Even a military livery version of 42113 would have been infinitely more ethical than this.
NO TO NEOM! No. No. No. No. No.
So we have McLaren 30657, 42141, 42169, 10330, and 76919 all in The Formula Series for sale this year. Add on 76918 still on shelves along with 42166 newly released. Seven McLaren sets simultaneously. Now the rumor is the new Technic 1:8 will be McLaren?!? Lets get some diversity here people!