Whenever you get a “build a specific model” Lego kit, the parts are invariably in several little baggies, with no apparent rhyme or reason to them - the time at which you need the pieces therein is spread out, and the pieces aren’t “related.”
Further, when you complete the model, there are invariably like 3 or 4 extra pieces.
Here’s the question: Are these baggies atomic packaging sets Lego uses? In other words, is a baggie with 4 2x8 gray plates, 3 1x3 gray regular bricks and 2 black ‘head’ pieces used in more than one set, so that a ‘Harry Potter Brushes his Teeth’ set just a matter of throwing together an A61 baggie, an HP52, and a UN311? Has Lego performed some LP optimization and determined that these various baggies are the least costly way of putting together different sets? Are Danes that optimal?
Through my many years of lego experience, I have learnt the rhyme and reason behind these bags, they are IME defined by size of pieces enclosed and the stage at which the instruction to use those parts apply, it’s not a perfect system but i t seems to work.
If they still do it this way, I thought it was clever of lego to adopt Bags that came pre-holed. Then again, one (a kid no doubt) could still choke on the pieces.
You guys seen those new Quatro blocks? (Yes, blocks bigger than Duplo) What next? Octuplo?
So, if its Quatro (Meaning 4, and Duplo meaning 2) Why are they 12 times bigger? (4 “times” in each dimension)
Meeko, didn’t anyone ever tell you about the Alphabetical Law of Common Usage and Marketability[sup]TM[/sup]? Let x equal the use a given letter gets in everyday speech and let y equal the effectiveness of that letter in marketing. Then:
x ~ 1/y
or
xy = k
where k is the Alphamarketing Constant[sup]TM[/sup]. Clearly, the most successful letters to use in selling a product (maximum y values) are the ones used the least (lowest x values). This is why X, Q, and Z are used so much in marketing: because they are used so little in real life. It’z X-tremely simple! “Quatro” was just lucky enough to include one of these ultra-successful letters.
As a therapist that works mainly with boys, on occassion I get paid to play with Leggos. I don’t care how the parts are arranged in the bag. The kids and I usually tear open the bags and arrange the parts in some sort of groupings, whether it be shape, color, size, or whatever…it is part of the fun. I then put them in one ziploc bag after we build the thing and take it apart.
Of course there are parts that are used over and over again between the sets, but I do not believe that they are packaged the same in units like you suggest. I appreciate when there are extra parts, since some of them are pretty tiny and are easily lost.
I always thought that the reason for the extra parts was to be able to build a different model using most of the same pieces. If you see in the box, they have about 3 or 4 models shown, and I remember the booklet sometimes had instructions for more than one building or car.
Of course, after I got bored with the pre-designed models, I always ended up building my own stuff using all the pieces I could find from different sets. I haven’t played with my Legos in years, but I still have a lighthouse, a clinic, and a few houses.
TJdude825, your Alphabetical Law of Common Usage and Marketability[sup]TM[/sup] fails miserably in the internet age, with its e-this and i-that. Guess that’s what they mean when they say it’s a whole new economy.
By the way, Quatros used to be called Primos, back when my kids were young enough that we were buying them. I was fascinated by the concept of a fractal scale of building blocks, arbitrarily large or small (in powers of two, anyway).