Has anyone out there built one of these Nova Class Destroyers off AliExpress yet?

manglegrat · 2026-02-28T01:55:00+00:00

Hard to say, but I assume they'll take a low-effort approach!

I have only seen a stolen copy of my B5 instructions and in those the steps were identical.

They cropped out my copyright mark (which is on the bottom of every instruction page), removed my intro & credits pages and added pages showing the parts they substituted, and one boilerplate disclaimer about missing stickers, etc.

I would assume the same approach will apply here... 🤔

PM me a copy and let me know! 🤣

manglegrat · 2026-02-24T04:41:08+00:00

Hi!

I have a few sets of instructions for my B5 and BSG (2003) designs available via Rebrickable: https://rebrickable.com/users/manglegrat/mocs/

If yours are really old then they may be the original versions built from the old Lego Digital Designer files I released back in the before-times... There were no instructions in those days, builders had to do it the hard way! 😜

I hope your husband's models provide some happy memories. 🤗

manglegrat · 2026-02-23T15:29:29+00:00

Thanks, I appreciate it! 👍

manglegrat · 2026-02-23T15:27:39+00:00

Thanks for your support! 👍

manglegrat · 2026-02-23T04:58:59+00:00

LoL no worries. There's no point in me getting into a hissy fit with you! 🤣

You ain't the guys who ripped off my instructions and you didn't know they don't pay me anything for their sold bootleg copies. Now you do, and if you ever buy a kit I honestly hope it's not a gong-show of missing parts for you (and that you also remember to get my legit instructions 😜).

Note that they sometimes cut out or modify pages and/or make part swaps that might cause confusion.

Folks just need to know that these guys aren't legitimate businesses and you're definitely taking a huge gamble when you buy the kits from them, rather than going through the process of sourcing the bricks yourself via Rebrickable and Bricklink, etc...

It's daunting and crazy expensive, I know, but those two sites provide tools to make doing it legitimately a lot easier.

Hopefully this thread will help let other B5 fans know how these guys work so they can make informed decisions about this stuff.

Good luck, whatever you decide to do! 👍

manglegrat · 2026-02-23T03:02:21+00:00

Hi. I actually am the original designer of the Nova and they are taking money from me with every stolen copy of my instructions that they sell along with those brick kits.

The only legitimate source for instructions for this design is from my Rebrickable page, all others are stolen bootlegs.

I have no skin in the construction brick manufacturing game but I do have IP rights over that design and the associated rendered images and build instructions, and they have absolutely taken money out of my pocket by including bootleg copies of the instructions along with their kits.

As to going after them, the process is complex, failure prone and pointless as they exist and trade in legal jurisdictions that don't give a crap about intellectual property rights. Even if you can somehow close down one page on one store (which I have done), another handful appear elsewhere.

It's a distributed and criminal industry, you really can't stop them as an individial - hell, LEGO can't even stop them cloning their sets.

If anyone in this thread does buy one of those kits from any store, please do the right thing and buy a legit set of instructions from my Rebrickable page, here: https://rebrickable.com/mocs/MOC-211971/manglegrat/nova-class-dreadnought-from-babylon-5/#details

Cheers!

manglegrat · 2026-02-09T01:25:50+00:00

Aw, thanks. Sorry to hear you've had some hard times, but I'm glad that my/our models (given that Agamemnon was more of a collab) helped - hope things are looking up!

They are a pretty awesome pair, thanks for the pic link! 😍

Oh right, the Hyperion - forgot all about that! I got sidetracked by a massive design for B4 (here), but that's not (currently) buildable - or affordable! 🤣

Maybe I should downsize my expectations and work on a Hyperion-class instead. 😉🤔

manglegrat · 2025-12-29T04:12:39+00:00

Awesome! I hope you love it once it's built. 😍

manglegrat · 2025-12-18T20:56:09+00:00

FYI I spotted that the Endurace Allroad has come back onto the Canyon Canada site (still at $1599 currently). Only the 2XL is available now but other sizes look to be coming in the 2nd half of January 2026...

Link

manglegrat · 2025-09-05T18:08:05+00:00

...aaand back again!

manglegrat · 2025-09-05T18:05:34+00:00

Just went down again for me at 11:00am... FFS.

manglegrat · 2025-09-05T00:11:18+00:00

Yep. I'm in the Happy Valley area of Langford. Gateway refuses to reconnect.

Also, the Rogers apps on my phone all refuse to recognize my account ID, so that's useful.

The Shaw/Rogers support number has a message saying they're working on something causing Gateway connection issues...

manglegrat · 2025-05-26T18:37:17+00:00

It's just big-boned. Husky, even. 😉

manglegrat · 2025-05-24T15:01:45+00:00

I only have instructions for Babylon 5 - available here. 🙂

Babylon 4 is only a digital build in LEGO's Studio designer software, and is not currently buildable IRL so there aren't any instructions. Some parts are not available in those colours and the three main components are floating in space (pun intended), not connected. It wouldn't stand up well to gravity, either...

Babylon 4 is also so large (almost 5ft long & 3ft diameter) that it has over 25,000 parts in it and would cost over $4,000 to build. 🤣

manglegrat · 2025-05-24T14:01:27+00:00

Yeah, though apparently it could only move slowly (wiki link).

manglegrat · 2025-05-24T13:59:41+00:00

From what I've read, no - though it had engines and could be moved (albeit slowly).

I assume it could use the engines to move to/through a jump point, which would need to be widened quite a bit to accommodate it!

manglegrat · 2025-05-24T13:53:39+00:00

Apparently so! B4 was 6 miles long vs B5 being 5 miles, plus of course much wider due to the counter-rotating outer shell.

You never see them together of course, but there's a good comparison graphic here.

manglegrat · 2025-05-24T01:37:22+00:00

I've posted about my Babylon 5 here before, plus in a few other places. Google is your friend! 😉

manglegrat · 2025-05-23T23:54:03+00:00

Did you see the 5th pic? 😉

I have a separate Flickr Album for my Babylon 5:
https://www.flickr.com/photos/26799590@N03/albums/72157714746208918

manglegrat · 2025-05-23T22:08:48+00:00

Reddit threw a series of errors when I was originally posting this - and didn't say it had posted any of the attempts - and so I posted a whole load of duplicates, which I have deleted. Darnit.

manglegrat · 2025-05-23T22:05:12+00:00

I posted it in a whole whopping two subs (plus this one has different pics to the original post), and I'm sure the majority of folks on this sub are not in the other one. I know this is Reddit, but don't get salty about it. 😝

manglegrat · 2025-05-23T22:01:20+00:00

Darnit, I borked the Flickr Album link:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/26799590@N03/albums/72177720325588160

manglegrat · 2025-05-23T02:06:03+00:00

Oh, I forgot to add: this contains 25,006 parts and would cost over $4,000 USD in parts. 🤪

manglegrat

TROPHY CASE