The LEGO Group releases heaps of cars. Especially in recent years, there is a plethora of cars available in LEGO® form, and some Technic fans have been complaining about this. The LEGO Group gifted us a set of three new LEGO Technic cars that will be released on the 1st of August 2026 (and a Batmobile, which also counts as a car… of sorts – that review will be coming soon).

If we have a look at some history of Technic sets that can be qualified as ‘car’ or ‘construction vehicle’ we can kind of see why old-fashioned Technic fans may complain. Over the last 10 years, an ever-increasing portion of Technic sets are cars, although we see a little variation from year to year. On the other side, the percentage of ‘construction vehicles’ (excavators, wheel loaders, etc.) has been declining a bit. The trendlines show a clear trend, but if you just look at the bar charts, it’s not entirely convincing.

Join me to explore a bit further what is behind these trends, while I will also have a look at these three cars so you can make up your mind if any of them are your idea of fun. Let’s be clear, this is about *your* idea of fun, since these kind of vehicles lost their lustre for me a while ago. The build experience is almost identical for all of them, except for the outside shape, and that shape in Technic just doesn’t quite do it for me.

Data doesn’t lie, but it certainly stretches the truth

If we have a look at the relative distribution of Technic sets since 2016 we can see that Cars make up a significant portion and, more importantly, ‘other’ sets represent a decreasing portion. It is worth noting that in 2026 LEGO released the Mighty Machines which are 8 fantastic tiny sets, but I think it messes with the data a bit.

So let’s have a different look at the data. Let’s look at the total number of sets in the categories Car and Construction and we see there is nothing to complain at all! Over the years, LEGO has been releasing ever more sets in each of these categories so fans of both should rejoice!

I mentioned that 8 of the recent construction sets are tiny, so this picture may be deceiving. Indeed, when we look at the total pieces in all sets for these categories we do see a decline in the size of construction sets versus car sets.

For me this means we cannot draw any sensible conclusion from the data other than that there do indeed seem to be more Technic cars on the market now than there were a decade ago. And that explains why we have three of them in one review today.

The Cars

Introducing a Dodge, a Ferrari and a Ford.

The Boxes do a good job of showing what you’re getting, a white, a red and a… colourful car?

Two of the cars are roughly the same size, the Dodge and the Ferrari, with the Ford a little different because it offers some customisation options. This is also noticeable in the size of the boxes and the associated prices. You can get the cars from the 1st of August from LEGO:

• 42234 Dodge Viper GTS-R (white), 805 pieces for AU$99.99 / £59.99 / US$64.99 / €64.99
• 42235 Ferrari 488 Pista (red), 882 pieces for AU$99.99 / £59.99 / US$64.99 / €64.99
• 42236 Custom Garage Ford GT Mustang, 973 pieces for AU$149.99 / £79.99 / $99.99 / €89.99

The build process for each of these cars is much the same as other, previously reviewed, cars so if you are new to this please read one of those articles. The appeal for these new releases lies much in their appearance.

42234 Dodge Viper GTS-R

The dodge viper is white with blue racing stripes. This is a very difficult car to model because the real thing is round in pretty much every direction. As a result, this model has gaps all over the place and just looks messy. The blue stripe is achieved through blue parts near the rear spoilers, which I love, but for most of the model the stripes are achieved with stickers. There are 26 stickers for 805parts giving us a sticker ratio of 3.2%, pretty decent.

and here’s what it should have looked like:

42235 Ferrari 488 Pista Car

The Ferrari has a slightly better time because there are somewhat straight lines on the real car. Still, the gaps (e.g. the wheel arches) are unsightly and I find the Technic model nowhere near as nice as the real car. I enjoy that quite a few of the stripes have been achieved with bricks (roof, spoiler and bonnet) with the remainder covered by stickers. 17 stickers are included for 882 parts, giving us a sticker ratio of 1.9% very nice!

Here’s what it should have looked like:

42236 Custom Garage Ford GT Mustang

The name of this set already suggests there is a bit more happening than just a Ford GT. This set comes with a set of customisations you can optionally put on the car. See below the options to replace, bumpers, bonnet, spoiler, hubcaps, wheel arches, side trim and doors. Putting these parts onto the car is quite straightforward, but taking them off to replace can be a little bit frustrating, as parts stay on the car that should come off or parts come off that should stay on the car. But this is LEGO so it’s always easy to fix.

The base car looks a bit barren, but I kind of like it, it reminds me a bit of a demolition derby car.

From there you can decide either the purple or yellow variant: (drag slider to compare)

The yellow certainly has presence, but I’m not much of a fan of excessive spoilers.

The purple works a bit better for me. This car also has fewer garish gaps and seems more complete, surely because the source material is a lot more ‘boxy’ than the previous two cars, so it’s naturally a better fit.

The purple works a bit better for me. This car also has fewer garish gaps and seems more complete, surely because the source material is a lot more ‘boxy’ than the previous two cars, so it’s naturally a better fit.

I would have liked the ability to build the car half/half but that would require cutting some stickers, at the very least, and it probably would look decidedly strange. Speaking of stickers, notice they are everywhere! This set has 80 stickers with 973 parts, giving us a sticker ratio of 8.2%! So every 12 parts you can put a sticker on. If ever there was a set you could use to practice your snickering, this is it.

Our Technic driver fits quite well into this car (and the others) but with a small caveat.

He cannot have legs when in the car, which is a bit problematic when driving, typically. For display, it looks good though.

Finally here’s what it should have looked like

Stack of cars

See all cars in comparison and decide for yourself if any of these tickle your fancy.

Summary

There we have it. Three (four?) new Technic midsized cars. They are not very complicated to build, but also just don’t look very good. Speed Champions and Creator Icons offer better-looking cars, but the selection is far more limited. I suspect if you are specifically attracted to any of the cars presented here, you will look past any shortcomings and enjoy having these on display.

For me, this is just a bit too much car; I prefer it in smaller doses. I give these car 3 out of 5 arbitrary praise units, but a commendation to the Custom Garage Ford GT Mustang, for looking the best out of the three, but that is relative.

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Until Next Time,

Play Well!