The 10305 LEGO Icons Lion Knights’ Castle is a pretty cool castle—tall walls, great layout, full interior, tons of minifigures—but the most important thing about a castle is hardly how cool it looks. Obviously, the important thing is… how much fun is it to smash with a brick-built battering ram?

For a little context, we part out sets for pieces to build MOCs with. So when we finished building and admiring the castle, we had to do something creative to take the set apart. Since the set belongs to both me and my brother (fellow BrickNerd contributor Isaiah), we obviously had to do things a little differently for maximum fun! BrickNerd has a history of taking apart sets in interesting ways, so we thought we could continue the tradition.

With the help of my brother, I set about building a wrecking device that would be tough enough to at least stand a good chance against this massive castle’s walls. We debated various battering ram techniques including the use of rubber bands, but we decided to try the simplest design first using gravity to our advantage: a giant hammer mounted on a swivel.

Of course, this is a very impractical sort of battering ram for the Black Falcons to bring against this castle. They must have harnessed an army of dragons and a giant to help operate it. When the device was finished, it was time for the main event.

Did it work? You’ll have to watch this video to find out!

Or scroll down… that works too. Long story short, it definitely does work! Isaiah and I didn’t have any need for a plan B, though a few fingers might have been mangled in the process.

It took us three or four tries before we got the battering ram at the right distance to strike the wall, After that, every blow wreaked havoc on the walls—though in the process we destroyed the bridge, which didn’t make the attacking army’s entry any easier.

What was more, not only did the ram destroy the walls, it destroyed them in a variety of really cool chunks and there was the satisfying sound of LEGO bricks rolling over on the counter and floor after every blow. The upwards momentum of the battering ram certainly helped overcome the vertical clutch power of the bricks making up the keep.

In the AFOL community, “chunking” is a way of quickly drafting a built set among a group of friends (after a team speed build, for example), where the set is "chunked into large pieces and people take turns taking their choicest chunk. It is infinitely quicker than a complete parts draft and can be the best option for people without much extra time on their hands.

That said, my brother and I went on to disassemble every piece and draft the set normally—we had the time and I needed more than just chunks could provide!

So what did we learn from this experiment? Well, the Lion Knights’ Castle is a great set. It’s an amazing building experience with several brilliant techniques to liven it up, an excellent parts pack with a tremendous minifigure selection, and a castle builder’s dream. We also learned that it is a ton of fun to beat up with a battering ram.

Have you ever creatively smashed a LEGO set? Let us know what you think of our experiment in the comments below!

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