My Lego Collection sorting

[MattGee]

Since I was encouraged to make up some of my old sets and take some photos to share I thought I would make a thread about it, and hope it is of interest to some of you, who might like my revisiting of the past.

So, where did the story start? Well, it probably started when my parents got given some old Duplo size bricks for me, but I cannot really remember that! What I remember was being given the 918 Space Transport ship as a present after I had broken my chin and been in hospital for a few weeks circa 1979/80. It started me off loving the Lego Space sets, along with the Lego Town that me and my sister got given for birthdays, Christmas and other little gifts over the early 1980's.

Over time this collection became pretty large, in various little boxes and buckets until my parents bought a clean new white dustbin with a close-able lid. At one time the bin was virtually full and pretty heavy. It stayed in my parents loft for years and handed down to my niece. More was added and some bits sold at a car boot sale at some point. Eventually with my eldest young daughter growing and as my niece grew it came back to me in 2014.

It's been taking me a fair amount of spare time to sort out the Friends and other "modern" Lego but slowly since November I have been getting around to sorting the old stuff. Thanks to discovering Brick link etc its been great to find replacement parts for broken bits, lost stickers and bleached parts! I have been finding way more than I thought there would be.

Of course this has now led to buying bricks to make sets I never had, or that have been lost in the mists of time! .

This is the little display on the top of one of my bookcases with all the little vehicles I have made from the parts I had. I will try taking individual pics or a smaller group as I work out how to do the photo hosting and posting. The two large sets on the left are eBay buys of sets I never had and on the right is a little space base MOC I am working on being guarded by my daughters astro kitty!

[MattGee]

Intermingled with the building I keep looking at classic space era bricks and parts that I can use to MOC a Space Base of my own.

I got this little lot for just under £14, plus 3 crater plates two still with loads of shine on them and virtually mint for and some "town" Lego for the girls for £5.50.

I was so pleased to open up the parcel. Not only in the town stuff was mixed up the blue and trans yellow windows I'd wanted but also the grey old style TV aerial antenna, stoked! Also all the glazing and most of the white bricks for the Breezeway Cafe minus the plates and base. Not pictured but also present was an original classic space flag from one of the larger sets, white with two stickers applied - one of them upside down

Although three of the red spacemen have lost almost all of their gold the white ones are surprisingly good with only one of them showing a little bit of 'yellowing'. All of them have what I am told is the early 'seamless' legs and hollow bodies, apparently making them quite early ones? Soon these will become a part of my growing space diorama. Sadly what I am lacking most at home is "space" to display them!

[62Bricks]

You got a good deal. There are some scarce and desirable parts in there.

Yes - the hollow body torsos found on the red and white space men are the oldest version from the late 70s, although LEGO used parts until the stocks ran out, even after new versions were in production, so they might have been sold in later sets.

Originally the gold planet was printed directly on the torso, but around the time the torso design changed from the "hollow" to the "short prong" version, LEGO began under-printing the full planet in white, then printing the gold planet on top of that. I suppose this made the gold stand out better on the red torsos, but it also had the effect of leaving behind a white planet after the gold wore off. The hollow-torso red space men were only printed with the outline of the planet in white, so when the gold wore off it left a "red" planet.

[Blondie-Wan]

Very nice, MattGee. I'm envious.