Storage and Sorting LEGO

[Redhead1982]

A bit off topic, what kind of work you do? We recycle tips boxes, so we don't have any spare ones. But in the past years, we had them from different providers, and they're not all fine for stacking and opening.

I use clear and colourless plastic boxes that we use for pipette tips at work. They are 7cm x 12.5cm x 8cm and have hinged lids that lock. The boxes stack nicely on top of each other. They are great for all pieces except large amounts of larger/longer blocks.

Best of all we throw tons of them out = free.

If anyone is interested let me know and I can try and hook you up.

Another question for all, when you're dissasembling a large MOC or diorama, how do you start? I feel my storage compartment is too small to fit my Kingdoms diorama, so I'm considering getting some 'Really useful boxes' as they're finally available here.

[PsyKater]

I am still looking for a good but cheap drawer system. I do not want to stack boxes.

Maybe I will go with these:

© Allit

Not quite sure if they are the cheapest solution but they make a solid impression. They are from "Allit" called "VarioPlus". Price is between 0.40€ and 0.50€ "per drawer" .

Do you guys have an idea of how many drawers I will need (45'000 parts, ordered by 1st part and 2nd colour, seperated between old parts and new parts). I will calculate myself but I'd like to hear your experiences!

[TheLegoDr]

My dream would be to have those drawers, but I don't know how economical it is. It sounds like our sorting may be pretty similar and I think these drawers would do that quite well. I'd almost want more of the larger open faced drawers too for a lot of the larger plates/bricks and whatnot. I should look into these sometime.

As for Redhead1982, I have yet to disassemble a big MOC, only a few Winter Village sets or Modulars and I just tore them apart and they are still in random chunks of pieces in random boxes, so not very organized. But if I were to disassemble a set and I wanted to keep it organized, I would definitely have designated "boxes" for this purpose. I have a handful of smaller cardboard boxes that I have taken from work since they were going to throw them away and I use those as a mid-sorting stage or to sort my actual colors. That is until I can upgrade to plastic to make everything look more aesthetically pleasing. Otherwise, my various cardboard boxes work quite well and I have essentially a limitless supply of them since we receive so many shipments here. Might as well reuse before I recycle as is the motto (reduce, reuse, recycle).

But I would also say to Redhead1982 to not disassemble that MOC! That was beautiful!

[Boshuda21]

A bit off topic, what kind of work you do? We recycle tips boxes, so we don't have any spare ones. But in the past years, we had them from different providers, and they're not all fine for stacking and opening.

I'm a molecular geneticist. Many labs in our building buy pre-loaded tips and thus have tons of boxes left over. Many times we'll go through several boxes in a day. These are from molecular biosystems, ARC soft tips that fit the Rainin pipettes.

As to the comment about wanting drawers, there are clear advantages to a more modular storage system. The main one being, if you build in an area farther than an arms length from your storage area, then having boxes that you can carry to your build area is useful. Also boxes can be stored on a shelf system, which would allow for a drawer like set-up, but keep the modular nature of boxes.... but to each his own.

[legolijntje]

Maybe I will go with these:

[image]

© Allit

Not quite sure if they are the cheapest solution but they make a solid impression. They are from "Allit" called "VarioPlus". Price is between 0.40€ and 0.50€ "per drawer" .

Do you guys have an idea of how many drawers I will need (45'000 parts, ordered by 1st part and 2nd colour, seperated between old parts and new parts). I will calculate myself but I'd like to hear your experiences!

I have 17 drawer compartiments from Allit (the Varioplus series) and I really like them. They are sturdy and stackable, you can also attacht them to the wall, and they have these little "walls" to put in the small drawers to make smaller compartiments.

I have these 2 versions:

I have a collection of about 40.000 parts, and they all go more or less in the drawers

I see you live in Germany, so this is a good bit of information: here in the Netherlands, we have a supermarket called Aldi, but it is originally a German supermarket. Every year at around December they got these for sale (€9 each). So, last 2 years, I bought mine at the Aldi. I don't know though, if this is also in Germany

[PsyKater]

Thanks for the tip. I will check the ALDI advertisements now ;)

[Balrog]

I see you live in Germany, so this is a good bit of information: here in the Netherlands, we have a supermarket called Aldi, but it is originally a German supermarket. Every year at around December they got these for sale (€9 each). So, last 2 years, I bought mine at the Aldi. I don't know though, if this is also in Germany

This is correct. Last year I bought 2 of the left ones at Aldi for something around 8€ I think. They are pretty good. Once they have them again, I will get more of those, so I can extend my storage.

[PsyKater]

This is correct. Last year I bought 2 of the left ones at Aldi for something around 8€ I think. They are pretty good. Once they have them again, I will get more of those, so I can extend my storage.

Was it Aldi Süd or Aldi Nord?

[Hrw-Amen]

I have been using 'Really Useful Boxes' as like the name says they are really useful and stack easily. They also come in a variety of colours which makes sorting and then finding bits really easy. For example I use the stack of little 4X3 for tiny bits like 1X1 round bricks, cheeses, jumper plates, stuff that I use all the time. I use trans purple 0.75L for all my 1 thickness plates and modified plates, all split into seperate colours and stacked. Then the bigger ones in trans clear for plates of larger sizes. Different colours for brackets, mini-fig parts, Tiles, round bits and so on. They are as they say really useful!

[Vindicare]

I have been using 'Really Useful Boxes' as like the name says they are really useful and stack easily. They also come in a variety of colours which makes sorting and then finding bits really easy. For example I use the stack of little 4X3 for tiny bits like 1X1 round bricks, cheeses, jumper plates, stuff that I use all the time. I use trans purple 0.75L for all my 1 thickness plates and modified plates, all split into seperate colours and stacked. Then the bigger ones in trans clear for plates of larger sizes. Different colours for brackets, mini-fig parts, Tiles, round bits and so on. They are as they say really useful!

I've been checking these out, I really like all the size options for this brand. The locking handles are great as well. They're a bit pricey though for me. Since I'm a set collector, I need a lot of big ones, which get kind of pricey.

[Balrog]

Was it Aldi Süd or Aldi Nord?

Aldi Süd

[Jareth]

I finally got around to taking pictures of my lego area....

On the right is my parts collection. The top has Technic bins and some long term projects that need bricklink orders. The shelves have parts in alphabetical order (more or less) and the individual boxes are usually sorted into zip lock bags.

On the left is my craft table. There are a few loose parts as well as 4 mill battles and 1 london escape. You can also see some storage trays for really small pieces like 1x1 plates and such.

Edited December 11, 2012 by Jareth

[Andy D]

I started using the Akron Mills drawer systems but soon found that they would require too much space.

I am now trying the Glad Food Storage containers, the entree size.

http://www.amazon.com/Gladware-Storage-Containers-5-Count-Packages/dp/B000EG4TLG/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1355326998&sr=8-5&keywords=gladware+containers

After my local sales tax they are about $0.80 per tub. I put parts in and stack inside each other without lids, and put a lid on the top one in the stack. I try to put similar parts in the same stack. This makes it ey to just grab a stack, for example tiles, I can just grab the stack containing tiles and have various sizes and colors.

Andy D

[Phoxtane]

I'm sorting out my Technic right now. I had quite a lot of it sorted out by individual parts into some generic chest-with-a-lot-of-drawers thing, and it was getting unwieldy to find and store parts. My new sorting classifications are:

-Neutral colored beam-likes [black, dark grey, light grey]

-Netural colored connector-types

-Colorful beam-likes [lime green, red, etc.]

-Colorful connector types

-Gears

-Decoration elements

-Assemblies

Assemblies is a weird class. I've got everything in there from shock absorbers to turntables to linear acutators. Basically, any part that is made of multiple components, but is one singular unit. I'm also attaching suspension arms to wheel hubs and adding those as well, since those are kind of a specialized part.

[Lakop]

Hi All,

I was lucky enough to buy two of the technic lego storage boxes many years ago. I could do with another couple. Now I use really useful plastic boxes. Problem is there are so many different elements to lego, which feeds our imagination, I don't think there will ever be a perfect solution. It's down to the individual lego builder.

[slopemodified]

Season's Greetings,

I use the compartment box pictured below to store some minifig parts. I'm wondering how to sort yellow minifig heads - I'm thinking of sorting by the heads' expressions - happy, angry, sad/scared, etc. I thought it could make it easier to grab what I want, based on the emotion.

How do you sort minifig heads? By colour, theme or type? New and used? By facial features (facial hair, wearing glasses)? Do you separate the double-sided ones? Or do you not separate your heads at all?

How about the torsos and legs then - how do you sort and store them?

[tomdobs55]

I sort everything according to the official bricklink catalog and have everything mixed as far as old and new parts are concerned. I haven't gotten around to sorting my minifig parts yet, but I'll base it on the catalog and just have a spot on my spreadsheet for each type. As far as storing, they'll probably all be lumped into a single compartment, one for heads, for legs, and torsos.

Edited December 26, 2012 by tomdobs55

[BlueCaret]

Hi all,

I just signed up here on EB and am excited at what a community this seems to be! I look forward to being a part of it!

So I am about to move into a new house that is going to afford me a "hobby room". And for that hobby I have chosen Lego. I want to do some stop motion videos of Lego but also plan on doing a big Lego city.

Right now all I have are two big boxes full of miscellaneous Lego that I have kept since I was a kid that my nephew plays with once in a while. Since I plan on making this a hobby though I figured I should separate the bricks out so it is easier to work with.

My question to you all is how do you go about separating your bricks and then storing them? Or do you? I'm looking for things like do you keep all 2x4 bricks together, or separate bricks by color? Things like that.

Oh and maybe a side question, what do you do when kids want to play with your nicely organized Legos?

Thank you.

[Modulex Guy]

Check out this thread, Its all you need to know about storage!

http://www.eurobricks.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=26213

[BlueCaret]

Thanks! Sorry about the extra post about this. Should have figured it would have been talked to death already :)

[Redhead1982]

Oh and maybe a side question, what do you do when kids want to play with your nicely organized Legos?

When my nephews come for a visit, I let them play with my sorted bricks. It doesn't work anymore to give them the unsorted bricks in a bucket. The first hour or so is ok, however, after a couple of days, I just know more sorting is needed. They're not often at my place, so I let them enjoy. (In their words: It's not fair I have so many bricks, and it's even worse if they're not allowed to play).

I used several boxes with drawers and zip bags, and sort by part and colour, depending on the number of specific bricks. If your collection plans to grow over the next year or to, it's good to keep in mind a system that can be rearranged for better use.

[dvsntt]

I keep all my sets in their own plastic bins with their instructions and pieces. I prefer the ones where the handles flip up to lock the lid in place.

All of my parts not in sets, for custom building and modeling, are sorted by color in approx. 50 clear tackle boxes labeled with a code on the outside (BLK1, BLK2, GRN1, GRN2, etc..) and mostly sub-divided by Bricks, Plates, Wedges, Slopes, Everything Else. I maintain a brickstore database of my inventory so I can quickly lookup how many of a certain piece I have and in what quantity as well as learning which container I have stashed it in. I can fnd nearly any piece in a few seconds since the shelving unit containing the inventoried parts are next to my comptuer station. Parts not yet inventoried are stored in plastic containers with lids, where I then sub-sort them into baggies by brick, plate, wedge, slope, everything else, then one baggie at a time I inventory them into brickstore and place them in their respective destation containers.

Minifig pieces and tiny technic pieces are one exception to the sorting by color and then piece hierarchy, they not sorted by color at all and they just have their own containers (MNFG1, MNFG2, TCNK1, TCNK2, etc...) sorted only by part.

Another exception is baseplates and rather large pieces, they go into a plastic bin and get inventoried into (LRG1).

Edited December 28, 2012 by dvsntt

[Redhead1982]

I'm almost done with sorting my medieval diorama. The build started more than 6 months ago, and was displayed at two exhibitions. While not on display I kept it stored under a bed or out in the open in the living room, so there's no need to mention the dust.

Prior to disassembly of the diorama, I used a brush for dusting which was effective, but time consuming. Does anyone have any better ideas? I tried using a hairdrier before, but it's not effective as much - the dust gets back pretty quickly.

[legolijntje]

You have the exact same drawers as me

About the dust; I had a little usb vacuum cleaner for a year or so, but it's broken now. It worked really well though

[zrgrvsh]

It might not be worth buying one only for that reason, but since i already own a airbrush gun + compressor i use that for dusting, and its really effective. The powerful and concentrated air jet blows away the dust really good, and you can also easily clean the parts that are hard to reach.

And no fear of soaking some parts up with the hoover ;)