> Further, Dacta is the educational arm of Lego, and it seems
> as though one might not be able to purchase from their catalog unless they are associated with an
> educational institution. Is that correct?
No - it's not. I've bought loads of stuff from Dacta. It's not cheap - but they have
lots of obscure stuff that's hard to get any other way.
I recently started looking at some of the offbeat parts (not in the Mindstorm big kits) mentioned in Dave Baum's book and the Ferrari brother's book. Here's a preliminary list: Flex (wire) system--pg. 159 of Ferrari Tile plates with no studs--pg 158 (...) (22 years ago, 22-Aug-02, to lugnet.robotics)