Set Review: Mork 031063 Ecological Park (Lego Compatible)

 

Good day brick fans!  We are back, and this time we are looking at another Mork/XMork branded set.  This one is called the Ecological Park, and it is my second Mork building set.  The other Mork set I built was the Tooncity Flower Shop and if you missed it, you can find my review of it 👉  here.

This post is brought to you by Afobrick.com who have provided this cool little building for me to review.  Thanks, Afobrick!

👉 Please check out the latest seasonal promo from Afobrick.  They are a new store on the building block scene and if you could support them, that would be great!

Here are the details of today's set review:

Brand: Mork/Xmork

Set number: 031063

Theme: Block Module

Number of Pieces: 1506 pieces

Stickers: No

Minifigures: No

Extra parts: Yes

Deformed or missing parts: No

Brick clutch and finish: Excellent

Age Rating: 6+

Size: 21cm W x 20.5 cm H

Lighting: Yes!

Unboxing

Here's the colourful box which describes all the details on the front.  The box has seen better days, but that's ok because I don't collect cardboard. 

Although branded as Mork, the box logos say Xmork.  I'm so confused.  On the back of the box is a picture of the Ecological Park lit up.  Yes, it comes with a very nice LED light brick.

Unboxings are always fun!  Let's see what we got.

The building block set includes a glossy 74 page instruction booklet, a red brick separator, a light brick, a sprue of pink flowers, and 28 numbered parts bags broken down as follows:

Section 1: 10 bags

Section 2: 9 bags

Section 3: 9 bags

Each of the numbers correspond to the respective section in the manual.  

The Build

Section 1

The 10 bags for section 1 build one side of the Ecological Park.  There are quite a few masonry bricks in this set as well as a lot of windows.  The window glass was just a tad milky but that's to be expected from the Chinese brands.  No scratches or deformities encountered with the bricks so far, that's a good sign.

The building is quite tall and houses some tropical plants and also serves as an animal sanctuary.  There are a good number of printed parts as you will see.  The interior has a rack of plants that are being grown in the corner.  Above them are 4 bird houses with perches.  There are three tropical birds roosting there.  In the lower corner near the entrance is a tank where several frogs live.  I like how there appears to be a waterline in the tank.  We will take a closer look later.

Section 2

Section 2 builds the glass enclosure which is like a solarium.  It also makes the roof line even taller with the slanted roof.  There are some hanging vines that come down inside.  On the solarium side, we find a tropical palm tree and a pond with more frogs and some more plants.  I should mention that there is a narrow gray path that winds around the base, but I don't think it's minifig scale.  

The two sections are hinged at one end and the Ecological Park building can be displayed either opened or closed.  The hinge piece is a tad loose and doesn't really hold up very well.

Section 3

Section 3 adds the slanted roof and lots of foliage.

Like I mean a lot of foliage!  I'm guess a good third of this set is attributed to plant leaves and stems. Oh and the roof tiles too.  I chose not to use any of the pink parts on the sprue.

Entrance to the building is at the side.  You can pretty much put the trees and foliage where ever you want.

Here's the back of the building complete with plants and vines.  The chain is supposed to hang a printed sign that says plants, but I thought that was pretty redundant so I didn't use it.

There are four more birds perched outside.  Can you find them all?  

So the set doesn't come with any minifigures, but I added a few so you could see how big the set relative to the figure.  Based on the scale of the minifig, this building would probably be about 25 to 30 feet tall in real life or approx 8 or 9 meters tall.

Here's a closer look inside the interior.

There are three roof panels, two of which are tiled and one is comprised of windows. They can all come off by lifting.

Brick clutch was good and they needed to be, because there were a lot of 1x2 plates used.  They could have been replaced by longer 1x4 or 1x6 plates to give more structural rigidity.  I found the area with the black tile under the roof line to be the trickiest to put together.  Try not to press too hard here or it will fall off.  This is more a design issue, than a brick clutch problem.  I will probably modify it later to remedy the problematic area.

Here's a closer look at the pond and plants area.

Oh man, every day someone has to go and clean up all of the bird doo-doo!  Be careful they don't poop on your head!  (Bird poop and minifigure, accessories not included).

Hey, but what is included in the set are the following animals:

7 tropical birds pooping

3 cats pouncing

2 dogs sitting

and 5 froggies croaking

(custom stand not included)

But wait, there's more!  The Mork Ecological Park also comes with a light brick and attached LED light string.

The instruction manual pretty much tells you to put the led lights however you want but they do provide a picture of the recommended location.  

Summary

So if you are a fan of plants and animals, you will probably like this set.  It's got a lot of nice details and best of all printed parts and no stickers.  The bonus light brick really makes this building shine! (excuse the pun).  I thought that the build quality was ok except for the area under the roof and the hinge that connects the two parts of the building together.  For a display set, you need to turn on the light or open it up so you can see the interior.  Oh and add a few minifigures for more fun.

For those of you up to the challenge, this would make a nice full sized modular building. I'd expand the footprint and provide more space on the inside so minifigures could take a tour.  I'd also provide a second floor viewing platform with ladder or stairs so that the birds could be better viewed by the minifigures.

I'd give this set a 4 out of 5.  Decent little set overall.

👉 Here's the link to the Ecological Park set on Afobrick's website.  Don't forget to use my code itsnotlego to get an extra 5% off your entire purchase.

Thanks for looking!  And don't forget to check out 👉 Afobrick's latest promo!

Lego compatible JMBricklayer Vintage Car K500 Set 50101 Set Review

 

Hello and welcome back to Its-not-Lego, my blog about the latest Lego alternative interlocking brick sets.  

Today we will be doing a deep dive into another  JMBricklayer set.  They have so kindly provided this set for me to review.

If you are looking for Lego compatible sets at competitive prices, please check out the latest offerings on the JMBricklayer.com website.  They offer free and fast worldwide shipping and free replacement of missing parts.   And save an extra 15% off selected purchases using my code ITSNOTLEGO15%.

This just in, the JMBricklayer December promo now on until Dec 20.  Applies to their Amazon.com store and their website.

Full details here.

Now, here are the details of the set:

Brand: JMBricklayer - updated version of Mould King

Set number: 50101

Theme: Civilization -  Industrial Times

Number of Pieces: 868 pieces

Stickers: No

Minifigures: No

Extra parts: Yes

Deformed or missing parts: Yes (see review below)

Brick clutch and finish: Excellent

Age Rating: 14+

Background

The JMBricklayer 50101 version of the 1936 Mercedes 500K Special Roadster is based on Mould King 10003 set.  This set can also be found as the Nifeliz Retro Car.  I believe the originally designer of this model is Firas Abu Jaber, and he has done a splendid job of recreating the Mercedes in brick form.

This model has been out for well over 2 years now, initially marketed by Mould King and now sold under several other names as well.

Unboxing the K500

My set came with the box, but it was slightly mangled upon receipt.  No matter, here are pictures of the box and it's contents.

There are parts bags numbered 1 thru 4 with the accompanying manual.  I was surprised to find that the bags are actually from Mould King.  

The instruction booklet is 45 pages long with a total of 162 steps and is straightforward enough to follow. 

 The are four sections in the manual correspond directly to the bag numbers.

Section 1 starts on page 1 (steps 1 thru 30)

Section 2 starts on page 11 (steps 31 thru 75)

Section 3 starts on page 22 (steps 76 thru 109)

Section 4 starts on page 34 (steps 110 thru 162)

What immediately struck me was all of the gold plated parts, they were very shiny and for the most part not scratched.  I'm sure it was a cost cutting measure but only the surface areas of the parts were plated and not the underside.  Unfortunately there are some parts where the underside is exposed and therefore they show white instead of gold.

Assembly Pictures

I took pictures of the vintage car build at regular intervals so that you can see the progress.  

The large bag for Section 1 breaks down into 5 smaller bags of parts.

Section 1 builds the chassis and trunk.

There are three smaller parts bag in the larger Section 2 bag.

Section 2 builds the rumble seat and interior.  On to section 3.  Here there are only two parts bags.

Section 3 builds the engine compartment and front grill.  Moving on to section 4 where there are only 2  bags of parts.

There were no major issues during the build such as deformed parts but I did have two small missing pieces.

The tube arm that holds up the windshield divider was missing, as was one of the angled grill pieces, both gold plated.  I decided to forego the windshield divider.

Regarding the missing angled grill, I used some of the extra gold plated clip pieces to replace the lower angled grill.

 The new fix did not affect the overall look of the 500K Roadster, so I did not feel it was necessary to contact JMBricklayer to replace the trivial pieces, but they assured me they would replace any missing pieces.

Overall, I found the brick clutch to be excellent and bricks to be very high quality.  The completed model was very sturdy.

There were a handful of parts leftover from the build and I discovered that two of the pieces were actually new and not mentioned in the manual.  

These parts pertain to the cars horns and replace the white pieces with gold plated pieces.  I'm wondering if this is what differentiates the JMBricklayer version of the set to the Mould King/Nifelix sets.  

I youtubed the videos for Mould King / Nifelix and watched many of the reviews.  From what I could discern, all of those models did not come with the extra gold plated horns.  Or at least the reviewers didn't install them.

Here's the completed K500 Vintage Car (Mercedes 500K).  I love the classic design of this car and that it's so well built.  This model would look so nice on someone's office desk.  It's a definite must have for any classic car buff.

Our special presenter Danbo, will now give you a detailed look at the car and point out all of the special features of this special Mercedes.   

Please note that both driver and passenger doors can open wide.

The engine compartment can also be accessed but the engine is rather small.

But the side exhaust pipes look very classy.

The new fully plated horns have been installed and Danbo says that they look very nice.

The front wheels, which are connected to the steering wheel can actually turn side to side.

A very lux interior.

Danbo noted that every one of the Youtubers who reviewed the Mould King version of this car opened the trunk incorrectly.  This is the proper way.

Fancy chrome tipped exhaust pipes.

Removable full sized spare tire attaches to the trunk deck and doesn't take up any of the trunk space.

Nobody on Youtube mentioned the fact that this car has a foldable rumble seat. When opened, it allows for extra seating in the back. Great for carrying small children and/or pets.  So that makes this Roadster a 2+2!

Summary

I thank JMBricklayer for giving me the opportunity to review this model.  It's not a set I would normally add to my collection, but now that I have it, I have to say it displays beautifully.  And all of doors open and close nicely without falling off, so the clutch is excellent.  I would have given this model 5 out of 5, except because of the two small missing pieces, I can only give it a 4.75 out of 5.  But, in my books it still looks like a 5!

The K500 can be found on the JMBricklayer Amazon store and also on their website.

Use code ITSNOTLEGO15% on the website (sorry, cannot be combined with promotional items).

Danbo and I thank you for visiting, see you next time!