“Two Space Rover sets available priced at AUD49.99/USD34.99” was not on my 2024 Bingo Card! Personally, I was pretty satisfied when 60431 Space Rover and Alien Life came out in January. It gave us a couple of minifigures, some aliens and a really zoomable Rover. Fast forward two months, and I seem to be looking at another Rover – This time, it’s a Technic set, with a similar (give or take connector mins) number of pieces and a similar price. How does 42178: Surface Space Loader LT78 compare with 60431? Do we have interesting mechanisms and playfeatures? Will it still seat a minidoll or minifigure? Join us while we take a look.

The Knoller-in-Chief succeeded in laying out all 435 of the elements, except for the tyres and windscreen on the one tray. While it looks busy, there are a few things that are apparent.There are lots of straight elements and framed in black, white and medium stone grey. The set features some panels as well as the docking linkage elements all in reddish orange. There are a few system elements to be found here, but only a few. The 10x6x3 windscreen element appears in transparent black, having missed any chance to appear in the City range. Unlike the City space sets we have looked at this year, Sand blue is absent. Minifigures are conspicuous in their absence, but there is a single chair element present.

A few elements of interest for me: the medium stone grey tires, and the linear actuator. The tires are self-evident. I’m sure we will see the purpose of the linear actuator as the build progresses.

The Primary question I found myself asking as I build this set was “Will it hold a minifigure? Or even a minidoll?” I suspect we must wait and see.

The Build

We start by building a central core for the vehicle. in the middle, are some gears that cause the upper horizontal surface to move. We also see the beginnings of a steering mechanism at the rear of the car. At the front, we attach a panel – back to front such as to serve as a seat: it is slightly bigger than we are used to for a minifigure, it has the pattern of a 5 point restraint on a sticker. The seat is able to accomodate a minifigure, who then has access to the steering wheel and diplay mounted next to the seat. Unlike the city sets, with a printed transparent element, this is simply a sticker going onto a tile. There are a couple of small arms inder the front of the rover: one with a ‘metal detector’ accessory, and the other with a more simple claw.

I’ll take a look at trying to fit a minifigure or minidoll into this seat a little later.

There are two rods protruding from the tail end of the model at this point: the upper one shifts the steering mechanism, while the lower one, at this point, raises up the rear end of the vehicle.and points the front end downwards.

We add control knobs to the rods at the rear. The steering wheel is obvious, while the lower one is simply a red connector.

We add a pantograph type mechanism to the rear: lift the white lever with the red knob and it swings up and over to the left. a firther mechanism is added to the end of the boom, allowing a hook to be raised and lowered.

We add forks to hold the front wheels to the circular brick in the middle of the chassis. They are attached to a linear actuator, which is lined to the mechanism which adjusts the angle of the cabin and aft of the vehicle relative to the chassis. The final effect is one of lifting up the cabin, improving both ground clearance and the view from the cabin.

We cover over the upper part of the vehicle with panels, and further labels indicate a bar that we are supposed to lift: do this and you have a convenient carrying handle. We add the wheels as well as the windscreen, and we are done. For the record, the tires are medium stone grey.

The rear hubcaps are covered by discs decorated with stickers, while the front wheels are covered by a panel.

Finally, we build the load – ever so important when the set is named as a Surface Space Loader. With panels closing over the docking ring elements, this crate carries some specimens: microscopic organisms, as well as some moss or other early plant life.

Lets look at the model in full:

Figuring it out/Does a figure fit?

One of the things I found myself wondering was ‘Can I put a spaceman in this model?’ So I found a pilot from the 2024 City Space Rance, as wel as Andrea from the LEGO Friends Mars Mission set. As you can see, the steering wheel can be held by a minidoll in both hands at its widest point, while a minifigure must hold it towards the bottom of the handlebars.

That said, a minifigure is able to fit on the ‘seat’ part of the chair, while holding onto the steering wheel, while the legs of the minidoll are just a little too long to comfortably fit in place. Any attempts to get the minidoll sitting well may well involve inadvertently articulating the knees with a naked flame.

So… simply put, the minifigure can fit in the drivers seat a little easier than the minidoll, which feels as though it is distorting the seat slightly. The vehicle feels a little over sized for a craft carrying only one figure, but it has a job to do. A new project to go onto the ‘to do list’ is a seat designed to accomodate two minidolls or minifigures, to make the vehicle more accomodating.

Lifting the load

As I said, this set is called a Space Surface Lifter. Let’s see how we go lifting the load….

Once the load has been lifted off the ground, it starts to clash with the crane – meaning it doesn’t hang neatly – the best solution is to limit just how far you choose to lift the specimen container in the air.

In Conclusion

Overall, this is a fun set to build, watching the mechanisms come together as the build progresses. I feel the averarching cross-theme tent-pole of Space is ambitious, and it will always be tough to make technic models that feel appropriately ‘In Universe” with those designed as LEGO City Play sets.

This set is about the right price – $AUD49.99/$USD34.99/€24.99/£29.99/CAD44.99 – and could be an alternative purchase for someone who was otherwise looking at the LEGO City Space Rover at a similar price. This is certainly the more interesting vehicle to build, but I did find it difficult to accomodate minifigures or minidolls in the cabin. It is a problem to solve, but probably not too difficult as to be impossible for kids familiar with making System and Technic elements work together.

Otherwise, the steering works well, while the cabin raising feature is impressive in execution, and provides a good example of the linear actuator at work. Finally, the crane does its job, as it says on the box: it lifts a load. The trick is not to lift the load too high, lest it get caught in the mechanism, or to try to retract the crane while it is carrying a load, as it will probably clash with the rear wheel.

That said, its fun to zoom around and play with. I am more than happy to give it 3.5 out of 5 arbitrary praise units. It’s a tough call between this and the similarly priced LEGO City 60431 Space Rover and Alien Life – for some, the minifigures and aliens might sell it completely. As might the overall design of the rover. I probably prefer the design of this one, particularly once it has been modified to hold a mini’ or two.

Which of the two rovers do you prefer?

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Until Next Time,

Play Well!