It’s time for some good old fashioned LEGO engineering tonight.
The teams arrive to a big sign saying “KEEP IT UP” which begins to violently shake. The challenge is “A bridge too far”.
Teams will have to build a bridge between to points which just happen to be shaky platforms. It’s two classic challenges combined.
The bridges need to be at least 50 bricks high and if there are two or more bridges that survive the same “shake factor” the judging will come down to aesthetics.
This is NOT an elimination. It’s all about who will win the Platinum Brick today. Teams have 7 hours for their bridges.
Joss and Henry are doing a fire and ice bridge. They are doing a lot of internal technic framing of their two towers. Technic is going to be essential today.
Gene and Nick are attempting to over power the shake plates through sheer mass. They have obviously watched the show before because the shake plates have been defeated before by heavy solid builds.
Lexi and Rachael are also using their knowledge of previous seasons. A combination of triangles for strength and solid towers for weight. Their build is going to be chess inspired. The connection between their bridge and the towers could be a weak spot.
Branko has a great shirt. Oh yeah he’s also an engineer so probably knows how to build a strong bridge. I love the dynamic between these too. It’s so cute.
Trent and Paul are doing an industrial railway bridge. They are doing a floating bridge not attached to their pillars. This is an interesting approach.
With 5 hours to go the clock stops and Nick and Gene get to take their advantage. Hamish wheels in a giant crate that glows. Inside is the Necklace of Nuisance. They get to give it to another team and that team will have to complete an annoying task before they can keep building. Nick and Gene pick Branko and Max as the biggest threat.
Branko and Max have two choices. Removing cheese slopes from inside 2×4 bricks OR eating four bananas. That first option is just cruel. Max picks the four bananas. The clock is back on and Max is working through the bananas. It only takes a couple of minutes. Because they’re bananas.
Kirsti and Dan are doing a suspension bridge. They are using LEGO strings to suspend their bridge. It could work but those LEGO strings are not super strong.
Alex and Caleb are doing a medieval style bridge. Neither are very engineer-y so they might not have this one.
Nick and Gene’s bridge uses a lot of plates which don’t have a heap of flex.
Dan and Kirsti decide to check if their strings will actually hold the weight of their bridge. This seems like a good thing to test because they are pretty screwed if it doesn’t work. Thankfully the strings appear to hold in the test. That is going to absorb a lot of the shaking.
Branko and Max are filling their pillars with loose elements. The theory is that this will absorb the shaking. I trust Branko because he has a cool shirt (and also is an engineer).
But then Hamish comes along with their second nuisance. They have to pick between finding a blank LEGO head in a container of LEGO heads OR eat another 4 bananas. Max picks the bananas again. He only gets through two before Hamish realises 8 bananas was probably a terrible idea.
Nick and Gene did not plan out their connection very well and also have a very ugly bridge.
Dan and Kirsti connect their bridge to the pillars and realise that their bridge is not 50 bricks high. It has to be 50 bricks high to the bottom of the bridge not the top. They shorten their strings to lift their bridge. Hopefully there is still enough length to function the way they intended.
Lexi and Rachael are just using stud connections for their bridge. This is challenge where technic is pretty essential.
Unless of course you are Trent and Paul who aren’t connecting their bridge to the pillars.
Let’s shake some bridges!
Branko and Max
Their bridge does not look particularly pretty and sideways movement could be an issue. They only make it to level 3 before catastrophic failure. Branko still has a great shirt though.
Lexi and Rachael
They’ve got triangles! But the connection to the pillars could be the weak point. Their bridge gets to level 6 before failing.
Nick and Gene
This is an ugly mess. Somehow, against all odds the bridge outlasts the shake. I honestly don’t understand what just happened?! The bridge wasn’t even attached to the pillar by the end. I really hope no other team gets that far because they won’t win it on aesthetics. I want this dumb ugly bridge to win so bad.
Joss and Henry
Their bridge wins it on aesthetic but they fall short at level 9.
Trent and Paul
After seeing Nick and Gene’s success the floating unattached bridge design could be a winner. Unfortunately they only get to 8 and the bridge itself fails.
Alex and Caleb
This doesn’t seem to be the most “engineered” design. They fail at level 5.
Dan and Kirsti
A really interesting design. If they hit 12 they will win it. Can the strings survive? The pillars could be the weak point. They fail at level 5. It looks like the strings kind of worked but the bridge itself failed.
Somehow Nick and Gene won it with the worst looking bridge that wasn’t even connected to the pillars. What an outcome. That was a fun episode.
Knowing it wasn’t an elimination made this episode a lot of fun. Thoroughly enjoyed watching all the bridges and Nick and Gene just fluke it in.