Creator

Twin-Rotor Helicopter

A chunky twin-rotor Chinook with a gear you can actually spin, and it happily becomes two other things.

Brick Rated Score

4.1/5

Set 31096 · 2019

Pieces569

Minifigs1

Year2019

Set number31096

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The verdict

The twin rotors are the whole reason to own this one, and they earned it with me.

Turn one little gear wheel on top and both rotors spin in sync, which sounds like a small thing until you sit there doing it far longer than you meant to. As a Creator 3-in-1 it also rebuilds into a jet and a hovercraft, though like most sets in this line the helicopter is clearly the star and the other two feel like polite bonuses. If you want a mid-size set with a genuinely satisfying working function and a bright, cheerful colour scheme, this is an easy yes.

Best for: Builders who love a working mechanism and want three models out of one box

The full review

What it is

This is LEGO's take on a heavy twin-rotor transport helicopter, the tandem Chinook shape with a rotor at each end, and the first time I got the drive gear working I grinned like a kid. You spin one small wheel sitting up top and both rotors turn together in sync, which is exactly the kind of mechanical payoff that makes a mid-size set feel bigger than its 569 pieces. There is a tinted two-seat cockpit, a sliding side door, a rear cargo bay that opens, and a working winch that lowers a tiny ROV submarine down on a line. It is playable in a way a lot of display sets never bother to be, and the dark-azure and white colour scheme kept me smiling from the first bag to the last. The pilot minifigure is exclusive to this set, so if you care about completing figure collections, that is a small bonus tucked in the box.

The catch

I will be straight with you about the 3-in-1 part, because it is where these sets always ask for a little honesty. The helicopter is the model LEGO clearly poured its energy into, and the jet and the hovercraft are the tag-along alternates. They are fine. They will keep a younger builder busy for an afternoon. But nobody is putting the hovercraft on a shelf and calling it the reason they bought the box. The other thing worth flagging is value now: this set retired at the end of 2020, so it is off shelves, and sealed copies have drifted up past the original 59.99 dollar price. At retail it was a genuinely good deal at roughly eleven cents a part. Chasing it secondhand at inflated prices is a different calculation, and one minifigure for a set this size is on the stingy side.

Who it's for

Get this if you love a working function more than you love a display piece, or if you want one box that gives a 9-year-old three different things to build and rebuild. The spinning rotors alone make it worth the shelf space, and the play features hold up to actual play, not just careful posing. I would steer away if you are strictly a display builder who wants a scale-accurate aircraft, because the proportions are toy-chunky by design, or if the current retired-market price has climbed past what feels comfortable to you. At the right price, though, this is one of the more quietly satisfying Creator sets of its year.

The parts story

What the build is actually like, and the pieces worth knowing about.

Building this is a smooth, confidence-building few hours rather than a marathon, which suits the 9-plus age mark it was made for. The real fun is watching the gear train come together, because you assemble the drive linkage that connects the front and rear rotor heads and then get that little moment of turning the wheel and seeing both mast assemblies respond. It never gets fiddly enough to frustrate, but the mechanism gives it just enough engineering interest to keep an adult builder engaged too. The winch and the opening cargo bay add small sub-assemblies that break up the fuselage work nicely.

There are no exotic new molds here, this is a set built from strong, useful, everyday parts, and that is honestly part of the appeal for anyone who buys sets partly for the brick pile. You get a generous run of dark-azure elements, curved slopes and wedge plates that are lovely for anyone building in that colour, plus the Technic gears and the connecting axle work that drive the rotors. The rotor blades themselves are handy pieces, and the small ROV submarine is a cute little vignette build. At its original roughly eleven-cents-per-part price it was solid parts value, with a colour selection that punches above what the price suggests.

Fun facts

01The real-world inspiration is the tandem-rotor transport helicopter, the same front-and-rear rotor layout as the military Chinook, where the two rotors turn in opposite directions so the aircraft needs no tail rotor.
02It launched in June 2019 and retired at the end of December 2020, a fairly short retail life of about 18 months.
03The set carries a Brick Insights aggregate score of 90 and a 4.2 out of 5 on Brickset, putting it among the better-liked Creator 3-in-1 sets of its year.
04As a 3-in-1 the single box officially rebuilds into three vehicles: the twin-rotor helicopter, a jet, and a hovercraft, and the pilot minifigure is exclusive to this set.