I loved this set back in the day, and do so now that I had rebuilt it after decades.

Oddly enough the figure in the white suit has different arms than the ones in the box art manual and set lists I find on the web.

I guess the factory worker was half asleep when he put the black arms on or the blue ones were missing at their workstation. Or a bad bad robot.

It was probably summer '86 when i got this set and i was less than 10 years. I remember it was in Munich, Germany and actually 1 piece was missing in it. So we went back to the toy store and they provided the missing piece right there for free. Of course there was no internet or missing pieces online service etc :)

For me as kid, the build was very interesting. This was my 1st Technic set and i loved the figures in it (i think this is the 1st set where they appeared in actually). The design was already that time very appealing to me and of course the playability. Putting it together for me as kid was kind of like learning some mechanics with all those gears and that was the best fun. Jumping from normal city sets to Technics was a big deal of course. I remember clearly I build the B model as well, but i liked more the A one. Later i had few more Technics set, but this always was "my 1st best Technic set" :) I know also i sold some of the sets when i grew up, i was not sure what happened to this one.

32 years later after i got it, i found it some weeks ago at my parent's place. The only missing pieces are the red snow-sticks.

Now after playing with it for some weeks again with my almost 10 years old daughter, i decided to write this review about my good old set :) I already described the view on it when i was a kid, so now i will talk about the functions.

It's great that after 32 years, all works as expected. It has a big HOG steering wheel on the top compared to today's usually smaller ones. What is a bit clunky is to put the 2 figures to sit in the car. But one get's used to it.

All the gears turn nicely, the steering mechanism is working perfectly also for the steering wheel in the cabin.

None of the parts would get stuck after such a long time(!). The front as well as back wheels are steered. On the left side it has a gear which is linked via the snail mechanical gear to open the back of the car, so that the small snowplough can go in/out of the car. It has enough room to nicely fit in, there is not need to apply strength to push it in.

The snowplough is fulfilling it's main idea, the tracks are turning well on carpet grounds, a bit less on wooden floors. The set has no stickers, only 2 blue "snowflake" prints on 2 panels.

Strange thing is that after 32 years some of the white bricks are getting yellowish but some not, see the pictures. I'm happy that my kid can enjoy the same set in the same age as i did ;)

Box/Instructions

I don't remember the box, but the instuctions were clear enough for me as an 8 year old to build this set without problems.

Parts

This set had tonnes of great parts - including 6 wheels, those little tracks, loads of gears and that worm gear, as well as 4 wheel steering on the truck.

Minifigures

This came with 2 of the Technic poseable action figures, and 2 of the seats to fit them in. This definately improved the playability of the set considerably and I thought they were a neat addition. Putting the figures in your own models helped you think about scale.

The build

I remember this being a really fun build, I built it time and time again. THe chassis was nicely and the wind up and down rear door was cool using the worm gear. Note that it still had a working steering wheel from the driver seat as well as hand of god steering!

The completed model

This was a really nice set which gave me tonnes of options for my own creations along with other sets. The second model was also really nicely done, although the 'drill' didn't drop low enough to actually drill!

Overall opinion

This is one of my favorite memories of lego as a kid. I think it was my first 'big' set, and It set me on the path to loving Technic Lego.

Since I wrote my first review, I managed to acquire an empty box. This set is awesome. It introduced the Technic Figures, and the worm gear which is now common in technic sets. The way the small snow-plough can fit in the back is awesome. The small ATV (8620) can fit, too! It's too bad they never continued the "action" theme - the closest thing to it was the 8286 set.

I got this set for my 9th or 10th birthday. I remember it very well because my mom let me pick it in the shop and that year I really wanted one of those sets with the new technic action figures. Quite nice set, loved the plough because of it's red color (my favourite at the time..)