Brick Crash Test: Smash Your Brick Car into a Wall (Free 3D Simulator)

Free 3D crash test for building-brick cars: build your own car or pick a flimsy, sturdy, race car or truck, choose 2 to 40 km/h and crash it into a concrete wall, a brick wall, a foam wall or another car. Watch in slow motion which studs let go and how many pieces fly off.

Loading the 3D engine…

Show stress colours fine working hard breaks Stuck to the baseplate Stud grip Weight tool puts g

Breaking test

Click a brick with the ⚖ Weight tool (or pick one below), then find out how much it can hold.

How is the strength worked out?

Every part's weight (and any weight you add) flows down through the parts under it to the baseplate. Two things can go wrong:

Overhang: when the weight carried by a part sits past the edge of what it rests on, the studs have to pull to stop it tipping. Each stud grips with about 1.5 newtons; more studs further from the edge hold more.
Bending: a part that spans a gap bends like a beam. Parts stacked on top over the gap bend with it, so a deck three plates thick is far stiffer than one plate. If it sags more than 1/40 of the span, the studs pop off.

Smooth tiles and the sloped faces have no studs, so nothing on them is held. It is a simple model for learning, not an engineering tool: real bricks also stretch, twist and wear out.

Crash test your brick builds

Build a car from virtual bricks (or pick a ready-made one), choose a speed and smash it into a concrete wall, a brick wall, a foam wall or another car head-on. Watch it in slow motion and see which studs let go and how many pieces fly off. It all runs in your browser, with nothing to install.

How to run a crash test

Pick a vehicle: the flimsy car, the sturdy car, the race car, the dump truck, or My build (whatever is on your baseplate).
Choose what it crashes into and how fast (2 to 40 km/h).
Press 💥 Go! (or the space bar). Slow motion is on by default; switch the camera to follow the car, look from the side or from above.
Press ↺ Put it back, change one thing and crash it again.

Why do some builds smash and others survive?

At the moment of impact every part has to be stopped almost at once, and the force to stop it has to come from the wall through the bricks in front of it or through the studs that hold it. Pushing on the brick in front never breaks anything, but each stud joint only grips with about a newton or two. A tall stack of bricks held by one or two studs lets go easily; parts locked in by overlapping plates and bricks are held by many studs and stay on. That is the same idea as a real car's strong passenger cell.

Questions

Can I crash my own build?: Yes: build it in the Build tab, then choose "My build" as the vehicle. If it drives sideways, press "Turn the vehicle".
What does "like a drop from" mean?: Crashing at that speed hits as hard as dropping the car from that height (h = v² / 2g). 15 km/h is like a drop of almost 90 cm.
Is it real physics?: It is a simple model for fun and learning: the parts are stopped in 1.5 to 20 thousandths of a second depending on the wall, stud joints let go above their grip, and the loose pieces fly, bounce and spin. Real bricks also bend and crack, which is not shown.
Is this the official LEGO app?: No. MES Brick Builder is an independent, free project and is not made, sponsored or endorsed by the LEGO Group. LEGO® is a trademark of the LEGO Group.

Comments