61 replies to this topic

[Bonaparte]

I have a good reason for reviving this review  :-)

I just ordered the Cafe Corner (finally).
My hope is the colors issues are fixed by now.

[Holodoc]

Congrats on your buy!
You do know that you can buy the Green Grocer without owning the CC?! ;-)

Bonaparte, on Mar 8 2008, 04:08 PM, said:

My hope is the colors issues are fixed by now.

Very optimistic - I would not count on that!

[cottonwood]

Probably a bad idea to resurrect this old topic but I was extremely angered to open up my shipping box and find this awesome set in a trashy flip-up box! Let's hope this year when I receive GG there won't be such problems...

[Perterz]

Holodoc, on Mar 8 2008, 11:04 PM, said:

Bonaparte said:

My hope is the colors issues are fixed by now.

Very optimistic - I would not count on that!

I don't know, mine is 4 months old and doesn't have any colorissues! Or am I really lucky here?!  

[brickzone]

I recently unpacked mine for modification, and I realised that the colour issues were not random as I had thought. Instead the problem is that the set has bricks in both old and new plastic. The newer bricks are lighter, as the new plastic seems slightly translucent. Anyway, although there are minute variations in colour in one or both of the categories - you would not notice anything but for the mix of these two types of plastic. The differences are stark in the brown and tan walls.

I actually prefer the new plastic as it does have brighter colours - hopefully it will weather well too. Yellow doesn't seem right mind you - too pale. White is especially good obviously.

Any of my recent sets have had no issue, because of course they are all the one brick type - the new plastic.

I've nearly come to the point with MoCing/sorting mind you of separating old and new white bricks - even apart from yellowing, the old ones all look terrible next to the new ones, even the old ones in mint condition.

I prefer the greater flexibility of the new bricks too - I can understand it might be an issue for large structures or structural elements, but for day to day building it really makes things so much easier (no need for picking, just pull the bricks apart).

[CP5670]

Perterz, on Jul 26 2009, 02:26 PM, said:

I don't know, mine is 4 months old and doesn't have any colorissues! Or am I really lucky here?!  

Maybe you didn't notice them. See this for a picture and the typical symptoms to look for.

At this point, I doubt the colors will ever be fixed completely. TLG has surely realized by now that most people haven't even noticed the quality reduction, and they have little incentive to fix it. Some colors do at least seem to be improving, although very slowly.

[Perterz]

CP5670, on Jul 26 2009, 09:47 PM, said:

Maybe you didn't notice them. See this for a picture and the typical symptoms to look for.

Good point, after a pretty close look to the building I have to conclude there are just a few issues.
The biggest issue is the colorvariation in the dark red plates (noticed this before in the Model Town House, the dark red jumper plates)
Further I spot 1 darker redbrown brick and 3 redbrown bricks with a less smooth surface.

That's really it, at least on my copy, plus it's only noticable from it's backview. Ok I'd rather have no issues in a set like this but yeah youcan't have everything I guess..

[brickzone]

CP5670, on Jul 26 2009, 08:47 PM, said:

At this point, I doubt the colors will ever be fixed completely. TLG has surely realized by now that most people haven't even noticed the quality reduction, and they have little incentive to fix it. Some colors do at least seem to be improving, although very slowly.

Well, I think actually it's more just that the stocks of bricks using old plastic are getting used up.

Perterz: sounds like a vast improvement - on my Café Corner the 1x8 tan bricks are all lighter, and many other tan bricks a bit darker. Most of the red-brown is the lighter shade that is ubiquitous now in my experience - but in this set the 1x4s, 1x6s and some 1x8s are noticably darker (I'm not talking about old brown - just a darker shade of red-brown). You can notice the difference in brick type too though as the darker ones jam together tighter and have less of a sheen. Also some older slopes that are a darker shade of dark red and have no texture - and others are the newer brighter ones (again, most dark red in sets in the last year or two seems to be this) and they have proper texture as many slopes are starting to have again.

Ditto goes for market street - a lot of older navy colour that's darker - but in using some of my existing brick stock (from Agents) for modifications it was obvious that the colour differences were where there were newer navy that is lighter (all my Agents brick stock is that shade).

So I do live in hope that this is a time-limited problem.

Edited by brickzone, 26 July 2009 - 10:56 PM.

[cottonwood]

Well unfortunately when I built my set a week ago tomorrow I was not surprised to see that the brown is still noticeable.

[Legocrazy81]

I know, I know. Bumping an insanely old thread, you're wondering, why?! I'll tell you.

I was checking this review to see what color that 1x1 grille piece is. And I noticed that "Inspiration model". And, I was curious if anyone has built it and maybe has instructions or part count? I'd like to add this "official" set to my street.

[ACCURATEin]

I remember when I purchased this set. It was during a trip to the downtown Disney LEGO store.  The green grocer was sitting in a display window. It looked so awesome that I decided to buy it. My girlfriend and I took it back to the hotel and decided to open it and BUILD IT in the room!! hahaha.  I loved it so much that we went back the next day and picked up the market street and cafe corner. lol  ..went back to the room and built them as well.  

I had not one inkling as to the level of an investment it actually has become.    

[Rodrigovms]

how to build the ispiration model?