NASA Mars InSight Lander An approx 1:11 scale model of the NASA Mars InSight Lander, built in Sep 2018. Album for more pics: flic.kr/s/aHsmwubUSQ Update: Seeing as I\’m primarily a landscape builder, I decided in early 2019 to build a terrain base for the lander. Based on NASA photos I chose dark orange as the closest colour match for the \’red\’ Martian soil. I decided I wanted to use plates (not tiles) for this build to give the landscape some texture, as the landing site had many small rocks and rubble. Unfortunately dark orange is very hard to come by, the largest plates you can readily acquire are 2×6 and 2×4, and the only place to get them in (limited) quantity is directly from LEGO. My order did not arrive in time to build the base for the BrickCan 2019 show, so the base\’s first event was Brickspo in Jul 2019. It splits into 2 sections to fit in a suitcase. I also had custom nameplates printed on LEGO tiles as I wanted to do a LEGO Architecture-style frame for the base. This spacecraft was launched on May 5, 2018 on an Atlas V-401 from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. It landed on Mars on Nov 26, 2018 at Elysium Planitia. Its mission is to gather seismic and interior structure data from Mars. The mission will last a little over 1 Mars year or 708 Mars days (~2 Earth years, or 728 Earth days) More mission details here: mars.nasa.gov/insight/mission/overview/ I was asked to create this by an acquaintance who works at the NASA Jet Propulsion Lab. I am a big space geek and closely follow NASA and especially the various Mars missions. This was very different than the types of things I normally design/build, but it was a great experience to work on this project, and I even got to take a private tour of JPL! This build has traveled to many different events: – Skaerbaek Fan Weekend 2018 (Skaerbaek, Denmark) – Westgate Community Show 2018 (Calgary, AB) – BrickCan 2019 (Richmond, BC) – Brickspo 2019 (Moose Jaw, SK) – The LEGO Store 2019 (Calgary, AB) – Calgary Toy Show 2019 (Calgary, AB) – FLL Jr Expo 2019 (Calgary, AB) – Bricks LA 2020 (Los Angeles, CA)