Nice they have that. Just to point out though, OP does add historical materials (vs. Lego's seems to be just current uses) as well as some details like who supplies it.
More likely it's the other way around. The Bricknerd post was first published in May 2022, whereas the graphic art asset for TP plastic has existed on Lego.com since at least November 2021.
I'm no longer in my "Lego phase" but still found the article reading like a taxonomy of plastics in general.
Like if you were to create a (okay, not-so) Periodic Table of Plastics, you might as well populate it with Lego parts because most of us are familiar with the bricks and their characteristics.
(And, crazy, who knew Lego used Bakelite at one time?)
I never understood the point of making sterile models. Legos, trains, or otherwise.
I want to sit there and play with them. Create elaborate worlds. Have crazy car crashes, recreate die hard, and have plane crashes and other nutty things.
That's me right here. Sandbox entertainment, with no goal or point of reference, gives me anxiety attacks. A slightly directed sandbox is entertaining for a few hours, after which the thought that it's all arbitrary hits me and things stop being fun. Something in my mind broke, but I don't know when and why.
You are looking for deeper meaning. That's probably not to be found in Lego, unless you use it to teach kids about engeneering/robotics (a shame they stopped the mindstorms). And coincidently, that is how I enjoy Lego nowdays. Building a big castle for myself would also feel like a waste of time, because I see so many problems in this world (my personal as well as the bigger one) that I can relate to not having fun with simple things that used to be fun, because I think I could do something more useful. (and then I don't play, but also don't do something useful - and that is then a waste of time)
Some of us have the same experience with real life problems. It's fun to work on the problems for a little bit, but then the realization hits that it's arbitrary and it all seems pointless.
For some, there is no deeper meaning to be found.
At that point, you can either choose to sit and do nothing (die), or engage and play (live). Since the choice is meaningless anyway, you might as well follow the path that gives you happiness. Life is simply more pleasant that way. Along this road lies the pleasure of enjoying things as you did when you were a child, while also uncovering and solving new mysteries (as you did as a child).
I get the sentiment, but at some point, the novelty wears off. Building a new set just isn't exciting because the process is almost exactly the same as building the last set.
not everyone has the creativity for that. i am struggling too. the best i manage is to take existing models and fix flaws in them. the struggle is to find the right kind of abstraction. there are some people who create really awesome looking scenes. and every time i look at one my fingers itch. but designing something like that takes time and patience. i think i'll revisit that topic when i retired and less mobile.
I'm 50 but I've got an eight-years old daughter. So this week-end we're building the Lego Ducati Panigale bike (bought new) and we also ordered two used Lego "elves" sets.
My daughter is really into Lego.
And it's a blast from the past to see her play with my very own original space sets from the seventies (I think they're from the seventies).
So yeah: having a kid (or niece/nephew) is the perfect excuse to play Lego again!
I get the impression that when people are buying a Lego model of e.g. the Millennium Falcon, they aren't so much interested in building the model. They just want a model of the Millennium Falcon, to display on their shelf; and the one that best optimizes appearance + affordability for them, just happens to be one that comes as a kit of small modular parts that they must assemble. It's less "a building-toy set that happens to build into a model" and more "a model that happened to be released by a building-toy company." The making part of these sets is secondary.
depends, i find the building part the most fun. once a model is built, it's less interesting. which is partly frustrating. i want to do more than just build a model and put it on a shelf.
This must be true since models with limited replay value other than gazing at its built state and maybe mesmerizing the fun of making it (cfr the ikea effect) seem to do well. It puzzles me.
Taken to the extreme as: glueing the pieces together with kragle to build an entire Lego city/world only for your son to free the Lego people from their boring repetitive prison and connect with his father on a whole new level.l when they start building a world and stories together.
And, as a parent, after stepping on a brick for the 20th time: never again will I ever buy any more and am gathering them all to donate right now phase.
i did that with my kids, although it was all completely disassembled. we had stored our stuff at my parents place, and when my dad sent the boxes (each 10kg) he said he could not find one box. so he bought another from ebay to make up the difference. then he found the lost box. my kids got more lego than i ever had. and they still wanted new stuff...
I was always a Lego kid (and I dabble as an adult- those Mindstorms robotics sets are a hoot) so this was a fun read. I knew ABS was the main material they used, and the bendy Bionicle parts must have been made of something else, but I had no idea that the whole story was this complex. It's remarkable that they can manage such an enormous catalog of parts, while also handling all the fiddly variations in manufacturing processes for each material. Good stuff.
This is a great read about plastics from an engineering perspective. Also this: "and, famously, LEGO makes most of the tires in the world, by number if not by mass!"
I never really thought about it much. But I guess this is why my baseplates from childhood want to shatter when bent and my kids just want to bend and go white? Or is that really just a function of time and not material?
That's a function of time. "Plasticizers", the chemicals that make plastics varying degrees of bendable†, sweat out of the plastic over time, turning the plastic stiff/brittle [which is really what plastics are like by default with no plasticizer in them] and the plastic's surface layer either oily or tacky, depending on the particular plastic. (The surface gets oily for "hard plastics", and tacky for "soft-touch" plastics. If you've ever touched a 40-year-old Apple keyboard cable, you know what soft-touch plastic with the plasticizer sweated out feels like.)
† Which ironically makes "plasticizers" actually elasticizers. Plastics are polymers named for how they undergo plastic deformation — "bending and going white", as you say — at pretty low stress levels. "Plasticizers" are ironically chemicals that make plastics into materials that undergo elastic deformation — flopping around without damage — instead.
They sure are. The German word for elasticizer – Weichmacher (literally “soft-maker”) – has acquired a negative connotation over the years. Colloquially, it’s now kind of synonymous to toxic stuff in plastics.
Some things I haven't seen answers to yet: What's the best way to store lego to keep it like new, or at least well preserved? Is the material choice of the storage container important?
Is it possible to improve the quality of old bricks by storing it together new material of the same plastic type? (A bit like reviving stale bread or cookies/biscuits with fresh ones)
Not a Lego expert but from a material science perspective your worst culprit is always going to be UV, or sun exposure. It’ll change colors, make plastics brittle, and even introduce some warping. Then come heat and oxygen. Obviously some materials are more susceptible to chemical damage than others; ABS is very prone to breaking down even from exposure to weak solvents while PET is ridiculously solvent-resistant.
Storing old bricks with new shouldn’t really matter. ABS off gases but mainly when heated. Most damage to ABS is irreversible. It’s not a great long-term material and it has many shortcomings.
Anecdote about how badly ABS ages: I have a 30+ year old car and all the parts on it are fine EXCEPT everything made from ABS.
After this long inside a car (little UV exposure I'm guessing, but lots of heat exposure) the strength of 1 to 2 mm thick ABS is "empty egg shell" strength. Really really brittle.
I’ve recently unpacked my own childhoods Lego, and most pieces are like new even after 40 years. Some white pieces are a bit yellow, but it’s inconsistent, so I suspect that happened by laying in the sun before it all was packed away. The battery boxes seems to have become a bit brittle.
The lego has been stored in cardboard boxes first in the attic in my parents house, and after that in miscellaneous cellars and then an attic again.
Store tyres separately. I have tyres from the 90s that are fine. But tyres from the 2000s started melting after ~10 years. I don’t know a lot about rubber but I guess they switched from natural rubber to petroleum-based rubber. Problem with the melty tyres is that they also damage any pieces they’re touching, so it can ruin a set.
“But as of now, no final replacement has been announced, and the vast majority of LEGO parts remain fossil-fuel-based”
I think their initial goal was sustainable Legos by 2030. I applaud their decision but it seems it’s been hard to materialize. Bummer but I hope they keep pushing.
Using fossil fuels to grow food, move things and people around, etc. all puts CO2 and other pollutants directly into the atmosphere. Using it to make lego, on the other hand, is comparatively benign.
If they can come up with a replacement plastic that has a lower environmental impact, that'd be great. However, they shouldn't use a less environmentally friendly alternative just because it's not based on fossil fuels. That would just be greenwashing.
Greenwashing, also called "green sheen", is a form of advertising or marketing spin in which green PR and green marketing are deceptively used to persuade the public that an organization's products, aims and policies are environmentally friendly.
Just to state one aspect of this, since I don't think you said it explicitly. Alternative plastics currently are generally not as efficient to produce as mainline plastics, IE they consume more energy. If that energy consumption is connected to fossil fuels, it could be a step backwards to implement such a process at Lego scale. There's also another aspect of, if the demand of global oil used for plastics goes down, it could be more appealing to burn oil for energy, if the price goes down accordingly. There's some argument to be made that while we spin down the oil industry we should be making more fossil fuel based plastics, to be entombed in the earth somewhat like nuclear waste. I say all this unhappily as someone who really wants our species to make forward progress on climate and resource policy.
Hard to not to have a cognitive dissonance on this one. As a kid I loved Lego, and my kids have plenty too. But thinking of all that plastic that eventually makes its way to a dumpster... Lego is brining so much joy, but you can't ignore the environmental impact too. I am actually disappointed at myself about not having thought to buy second-hand instead.
It is an interesting example of why the pollution problem is hard. Here we are not even talking about anything essential for the quality life, not even comfort. That's basically "just a toy". But, theoretically, would we be willing to give it up if we don't find an environmentally friendly way to make it?
Idk what happened with you, but I inherited legos from my older cousins and then when I grew out of my collection my newphew got it. No legos ended up in a landfill.
If you threw yours out, that's your fault, and does not mean there needs to be an environmentally friendly way to make legos (which will undoubtedly be functionally worse and not last as long).
Toward the end of the article they mention the investments LEGO are making into developing sustainable, plant-based plastics. They are doing the work. Keep buying LEGO and feel good knowing you are helping to curb the plastic waste problem.
Lego is $10/lb and easy to sell because of its durability and quality. It'll very often get passed down multiple times. When you don't make your stuff out of the cheapest bottom-of-the-barrel shit you can get away with, people notice and act accordingly.
Adding onto the other comments (durable for generations) - almost no other toy is like that.
Barbies break. Toy cars break or the models get out of fashion. Electronic stuff is broken or severely out of date 20 years later.
Sport equipment can be durable, but usually holds for less than 10 years.
In the grand scheme of things, Lego is completely fine, we have hundreds of more wasteful one-time-plastic usages.
I've never heard of someone throwing away legislation. My son and daughter got my collection. Sets from the 80s that are amazing and in excellent shape. Some of them could be sold for thousands of dollars.
Legos are more profitable than gold in terms of investment - literally. So yeah, throwing away Legos is really really dumb.
For me, lego is an example of the mantra to make durable things that last for a very long time (several generations), having the benefit of not easily ending in a landfill or being burnt.
Yes. Cellulose acetate warps or breaks down in two main ways: it can warp from plasticizer migration, and it can “weep” or liquify as it ages. Weeping has been called “vinegar syndrome” because of the smell involved, which of course is acetic acid.
Storing in vinegar would catalyze and accelerate the decomposition of the acetate. And once it starts, it can’t be stopped.
To prevent decomposition, use breathable enclosures and store in a low temperature and low relative humidity. Proper storage and handling practices, particularly using gloves and storing in low light environments, can prevent vinegar syndrome almost entirely.
These are learnings gleaned from those involved in the historical preservation of acetate photographic films.
I know you're just joking, but concrete is weak in tension and it doesn't bend much before breaking, so they cannot be made like Lego bricks because they will not connect securely.
The closest you can get IMO is the Roman Colosseum. It's mostly made of large blocks with a series of notches in them. Metal bars are placed in the notches so the blocks can move slightly in relation to each other, but not so much as to fall apart.
There's a recycling plant not far from where I take the train. In their yard, they have large (5' x 3') concrete blocks that are "stackable" in that they have voids in their bottoms that fit their counterpart's ridges on the tops—just like a lego.
They stack these 4 or 5 high and create huge U-shaped corrals for various types of metals.
My town does something similar to store rock stalk for the winter—these blocks are stacked and a pre-fab roof is placed directly on top.
To my knowledge, there is no mortar or rebar of any kind, and it can be undone and reworked into another configuration with just a forklift.
These are meant to be temporary, but have been there for >8 and >5 years respectively.
Somewhat related: The famed "Jersey Divider" is cast in a similar way, albeit without any consideration for vertical stacking.
I've heard these called 'Benton Blocks', though, looking that up now, that seems to be a brand [0], not sure if there's a more specific generic term other than 'concrete block'.
> Somewhat related: The famed "Jersey Divider" is cast in a similar way, albeit without any consideration for vertical stacking.
I think Jersey Barriers are usually re-enforced with steel rebar and all the ones that I've seen have a steel cable running through them with a loop at either end to link up to the one next to it, by dropping a pole or similar through both sets of loops, to create a continuous wall. (Though, interestingly, the Wikipedia article [1] doesn't seem to mention that feature.)
ABS can be food safe, but there is more to food safety than the type of plastic used. And I don't think Lego is food safe, it is certainly not advertised as such.
An important consideration when it comes to food safety is that your it doesn't become a breeding ground for bacteria. That's why FDM 3D prints are usually not food safe no matter what they are made off. For your Lego lunchbox, assuming the bricks themselves were food safe, you would probably need to regularly take the box apart and wash each brick individually.
That being said it probably won't kill you, but don't expect Lego or anyone in a position of authority to tell you that's fine.
Yes, but the best way to wash Lego bricks is to disassemble the build, put the bricks into a washing net (the type you'd use for a bra), and put it in a european-style washing machine together with your regular clothes.
It'll come out perfectly clean without any damage.
Depends on the plastic, it's just the same question (for plastics anyway) as what temperature does it deform at. So if a thermoplastic just needs to be stable up to at least 70°C or whatever max temp. you're going to run it at.
I think we're talking about putting Lego bricks in the dishwasher (to clean them), not building a dishwasher out of Lego? Or did I misunderstand your comment?
Why wouldn't you? I'm pretty sure lots of kids put lego (or more likely duplo) pieces in their mouth all the time. Probably about the same risk as drinking from a plastic bottle.
Approx. a billion times more risk from wherever you've been keeping the bricks, what else they've touched etc. rather than the plastic itself.
I assume you're from the US? What is it that seems to promote such food safety fear over there? It's really noticeable in 3D printing and food preservation communities/recipes.
You mean as a source material to create the pellets that ultimately go into the molding machines? Well no, microplastics can't be recycled because they've broken down too much to make usable plastic.
No, the material has degraded too much to be of any use. Yes you can melt it into a pot of plastic but whatever comes out will be too brittle to be of practical use.
"Microplastic" describes a small pellet of plastic less than 5 mm in length. It doesn't refer to any specific type of chemical used to create plastic.
If the question is whether or not lego bricks generate microplastics, the answer is no, not really. Microplastics are mostly a problem when they wind up in the water supply, either from plastic fibers in clothes that are being washed, or plastic microbeads in shampoo that gets rinsed down the drain, or in plastic trash that has wound up in a river or ocean and is deteriorating into smaller particles.
4 mm is already considered microplastics? Wouldn't have guessed that. Almost as if the definition was "smaller than a 1x1 Lego plate" (which wouldn't be all that unreasonable I guess, it's the only system of units more commonly understood than the metric system)
I don't see why Lego needs to be singled out here. It is (by volume and weight) a relatively expensive product and it's not like anyone is buying bricks by the ton and dumping them from trucks. Besides, it is one of the most reusable toys to ever exist.
If it's plastic in use does it matter? Legos don't get thrown out. They almost never break with the exception of a few exotic pieces that are a big more fragile. Even clips are surprisingly durable.
Compare this with dolls, trucks, etc that break after 6 months and do end up in the trash. Phones, laptops, TVs these create so much more waste than bricks that are still perfectly usable 40 years later - I know, I have a lot.
> Most people know that most LEGO bricks are made of ABS
LOL? No, most people don't know that? Shall we head to the streets and make a video where we interview random people about what plastic is used in Lego bricks?
If we do that in the hallways of a chemistry building at a major university campus, we might hit above 50%, particularly if we go at a time when it's not crawling with undergrads.
To clarify, what I understand by "most people know" is that they could answer the question point blank, not that "most people have an internet-connected mobile device which could inform them in a few seconds".
Just a fun aside, but did you know that "point blank" actually means something completely different than the way that most people use the term?
Rather than meaning something like "so close you couldn't miss" (which is how it's usually used) it technically means the much longer distance at which you can ignore gravitational drop and just hold the sights on the target you are aiming at. As in: "Therefore point blank range for a deer size target is about 275 metres (300-310 yards)" (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Point-blank_range).
For reference, a 300 yard shot at a deer is really far, rarely should be taken, and is rarely successful. Which is to say that by analogy, answering a question "point blank" arguably should mean something closer to "can access the information in a few minutes with an internet connection"!
https://www.lego.com/en-us/sustainability/product-safety/mat...