Jakub Korab

Random musings of a restless mind.

  • Lego Space Shuttle Mega-Build

    Earlier this year, I received a NASA Space Shuttle Discovery Lego kit from my mum and sister as a birthday present. It’s BIG – 2354 pieces! I thought this would be an awesome thing to spend a bit of time with my son on – it’s 17 bags of bricks, so a bag each weekend…

  • How to use librdkafka to build resilient systems

    Every good story has a beginning, and beginnings are arbitrary since one thing leads to another, so this story may as well start with a Kafka production incident. The root cause was innocuous, something that was easily fixed (a failed network switch), but since one thing leads to another, one by one, the dominoes fell…

  • Lego Space Shuttle Bag 10

    Build date: 2022-11-27 Finally, we’re moving away from the body of the shuttle and onto the real meat and potatoes of the build – the engines. Lots of mechanical components here. The engine installation is interesting to build – the panel that they are installed on clips onto a bar on the base of the…

  • Lego Space Shuttle Bag 9

    Build date: 2022-11-19 This bag is pretty straightforward – lots of top panels for the wings, no structural components to speak of. Just about every piece in the bag is a flat white plate. We lay out the panels across the top of the wings, and the base of what is going to be the…

  • Lego Space Shuttle Bag 8

    Build date: 2022-11-13 Welcome to bag 8! This one’s all about internal details and the flap that is going to sit under the engines. First stage of construction is assembling a body-length unit that’s going to sit over the smooth plate section in the shuttle body, where the black-and-white checked section is visible. The engine…

  • Lego Space Shuttle Bag 7

    Build date: 2022-11-06 Welcome back to the Lego Shuttle mega-thread! We’re onto bag 7/17! Three sub-bags in this one – going to be working on the body and wings today. Straight out of the gates, we’ve got an unusual hinge piece, and immediately we fix it into place so it won’t pivot. #headScratch In the…

  • Lego Space Shuttle Bag 6

    Build date: 2022-10-23 After 3 weeks, welcome back to bag 6/17. My co-pilot and I are working on the front part of the undercarriage. More non-standard pieces in this part of the build. Particularly interesting is the vent-like block that goes in the nose section. Looking forward to seeing the logic behind it. Making the…

  • Lego Space Shuttle Bag 5

    Build date: 2022-10-02 It’s the weekend, so it’s Lego time again! Bag 5/17, and we’re starting on the Space Shuttle proper! Wings and undercarriage. My co-pilot is appropriately themed. Loads of interesting pieces to construct the landing gear. Solid as a rock once assembled. Hats off to Lego’s design engineers. As usual, lots of non-typical…

  • Lego Space Shuttle Bag 4

    Build date: 2022-09-24 Welcome back for bag 4/17. This weekend we’re building the stand for the Space Shuttle. Bag in a bag. Looking at the final result, it’s hard to believe it’s made up of all these tiny pieces. Some of the more unusual pieces. The toothy one is a support beam. Again blown away…

  • Lego Space Shuttle Bag 3

    Build date: 2022-09-18 And we’re back! On to bag 3/17 Lots of small fiddly pieces in this one 2 hours later, the Hubble Space Telescope is done! 3 bags of Lego. 6 hours. The next part is the Space Shuttle – 14 bags! My little helper and I will finish around Christmas 🎄

  • Lego Space Shuttle Bag 2

    Build date: 2022-09-10 Bag 2 is the body of the Hubble. It’s made up of 3 sub-bags. So many pieces. The cool thing here is how Lego has colour-coded these interior pieces. They won’t be visible once the build is complete, but you’d be lost trying to find the right piece otherwise. There are some…