Big Boy 4014 is beautiful, and because of that, he has fans not just in Wyoming, but around the globe. Now one of those global fans hopes to help Big Boy climb the ladder of LEGO success.
With Big Boy’s 85th anniversary and America’s 250th both on the horizon, Canadian designer Olivier Dupon figures now is the time for a moonshot.
He has designed a 3,920-piece Big Boy LEGO kit and submitted it to LEGO’s Ideas page, a crowd-sourcing platform where fans may submit their own designs for a shot at the company’s consideration.
Projects that receive at least 10,000 votes from other fans get reviewed by LEGO for potential production and release as an official, commercial set, with the original designer receiving 1% of the eventual royalties.
Big Boy fans have 500 days to support Dupon's project.
Dupon’s Big Boy design is motorized so it can run on LEGO tracks. It also comes with a miniature conductor and a working mechanism to open and close the model’s boiler door.
The kit was designed digitally in three dimensions using BrickLink Studio, which is how many LEGO designs start.
Olivier Dupon's Big Boy LEGO kit design includes track for the motorized model to run on. (Courtesy Olivier Dupon) 
Canadian designer Olivier Dupon has submitted a motorized 3,920-piece Big Boy 4014 LEGO kit to the company's Ideas page. If the kit gets 10,000 votes it will be among designs advanced to LEGO's review pool for potential production. (Courtesy Olivier Dupon) 
A Big Boy LEGO kit designed by Canadian Olivier Dupon has been submitted to LEGO's Idea Page. (Courtesy Olivier Dupon) 
A removable top allows people to look inside the Big Boy LEGO kit designed by Olivier Dupon. (Courtesy Olivier Dupon) 
A miniature conductor for Big Boy 4014 is part of Canadian Olivier Dupon's LEGO kit design submitted to the company's Ideas page. (Courtesy Olivier Dupon) 
A closeup of the inside of Olivier Dupon's Big Boy 4014 LEGO kit design. (Courtesy Olivier Dupon)
Tiny Trains, Giant Design Challenges
Dupon faced a number of engineering puzzles when designing his Big Boy LEGO kit.
“Motorizing such a heavy model is very complex, because it requires at least two LEGO motors and a LEGO battery box,” he said. “They are enormous and very difficult to fit into such a small space in the locomotive.”
Dupon also had to find a way to stuff a functional gear train into the already tight space.
Then there’s the length of the model itself, which was challenging for Big Boy in real life, on a real railroad track.
“LEGO curves are quite short, while the locomotive itself is quite long,” Dupon said. “That makes accommodating curves very complicated, too.”
With nearly 4,000 pieces involved, the model is also complex to put together, requiring 987 pages of instruction.
“I think I did a good job on the proportions and the pipes of the locomotive,” he said.
Big Boy History
This is a history-making year for the real-world Big Boy, which is on its first coast-to-coast tour across America.
The locomotive has toured the West several times since its restoration in 2019, but it has never returned to the East Coast since rolling off the line in Schenectady, New York, in 1941.
It left for the East Coast leg of the journey on March 29, and is now on its way back home to Cheyenne, arriving at 4 p.m. Friday, April 24.
The eastern leg of the tour will resume May 25, with public display days planned in Omaha, Nebraska; Chicago, Illinois; Buffalo, New York; Scranton, Pennsylvania; and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Additional display days are also planned for Altoona, St. Louis, and Kansas City.
Two commemorative locomotives are tagging along with Big Boy, including Union Pacific’s newest locomotive, No. 1776-American250, which pays tribute to the Declaration of Independence and the founding of America.
The other car is Lincoln Locomotive No. 1616, honoring Abraham Lincoln and his role in uniting the nation via rail.
The real-life Big Boy steam locomotive weighs more than 1 million pounds when fully loaded with fuel and water.
It’s one of 25 built during World War II to haul heavy equipment over the Wasatch Mountains. It is the world’s largest operating steam locomotive, and the only Big Boy that still rides the rails.
Its classic steam whistle, a Hancock long-bell, 3-chime, can be heard for miles around, and it makes quite the entrance, chugging into view amid puffs of dramatic, smoky, soot-laden steam.
The hiss of that steam is drowned out by its thunderous, chuffing sound, which feels a bit like standing inside a giant storm cloud.
Heat pours off the huge train, which is 15 feet tall, 132 feet long, and 11 feet wide.
Fans come by the thousands to watch Big Boy roll into town whenever it’s on tour.
Big Boy 4014 rolls into Laramie during a previous whistle-stop tour. (Visit Laramie via Facebook) 
People stood up on tables and tiptoes to film Big Boy's departure from Cheyenne on its America 250 tour. This year, Big Boy will make a coast-to-coast journey, returning to the East Coast for the first time in its history. (Renee Jean, Cowboy State Daily) 
Big Boy 4014 pulls through Cheyenne. (Matt Idler for Cowboy State Daily) 
Ed Dickens, center, looks out the window at a crowd of fans videotaping and waving at Big Boy. (Renee Jean, Cowboy State Daily) 
Inside the cab of Big Boy 4014. (Renee Jean, Cowboy State Daily) 
A crowd gathered despite the rain for Big Boy's hourlong appearance in Cheyenne. (Renee Jean, Cowboy State Daily) 
A historic water tower along the Union Pacific line near the Wyoming-Colorado state line at Harriman, Wyoming, was a local landmark for about 80 years. Now it’s gone, torn down Dec. 17, 2024, without notice or discussion, leaving locals and railroad buffs livid. In this photo, hundreds of people gather by the tower to watch Big Boy 4014 pass through. (Photo by Clark Harris via Flickr)
Long Odds For LEGO Stardom
While Dupon is hopeful his kit will get to 10,000 supporters so it can at least be seen by LEGO’s reviewers, he also knows the odds of a Big Boy kit are long.
Lots of kits make the 10,000 mark, but few are ultimately produced.
“It would be incredible to have a LEGO set of Big Boy,” he said. “But I don’t want to give anyone false hopes. First it needs 10,000 supporters. Then LEGO has to choose it from among all the other projects that have reached 10,000 supporters.”
It’s also not the first time someone has submitted a Big Boy design, he added.
“I think there have been about 10 Big Boy projects posted on LEGO Ideas since the site’s creation,” he said. “Most have expired. Two of them managed to reach 10,000 supporters … but LEGO didn’t choose them.”
The two projects were up against around 50 other projects in a variety of categories.
“LEGO just had to make a choice,” Dupon said. “In the end they chose three — Minifigure Prize Machine, Western River Steamboat Vending Machine, and Disney Pixar Luxo Jr. Lamp.”
Lifelong Train Fan
Big Boy, at the end of the day, isn’t an easy set to adapt, Dupon said. The design difficulty could be part of the reason LEGO hasn’t picked any Big Boy designs yet.
Still, Dupon figures the timing — Big Boy’s 85th and America’s 250th — makes the effort worthwhile.
“I became a fan of Big Boy after its restoration in 2019,” he said. “I’ve always wanted to make a model of this locomotive, and one day I’d like to see it in real life.”
Dupon has been a lifelong train fan. In fact, one of his earliest memories was watching Thomas the Tank Engine when he was 3.
Nothing compares to Big Boy, he added.
“Big Boy is a symbol of American industrial power,” he said. “It’s so impressive in size and presence. And I’m someone who thinks the more massive a locomotive is, the more beautiful it is.”
Dupon has so far designed 26 different LEGO train sets for the Ideas page, including one of the New York Central #5405, which has managed to reach 10,000 supporters. It will be up for review sometime this year.
Given that other Big Boy proposals have come and gone, Dupon is keeping his expectations realistic.
“Why not give it a try?” he said.
Renée Jean can be reached at renee@cowboystatedaily.com.
