Inconsistent colors

[mpfirnhaber]

I just finished building 21301 Birds. It was a lot of fun to build, but I'm disappointed by the final product, particularly on the blue jay. The medium blue pieces are not consistently colored. There are two distinct shades of blue, one noticeably darker than the other in normal daylight. Some of these pieces are placed adjacent to one another, like a 1x1 tile next to a 1x2 tile, which makes the color difference even more pronounced.

Is this a recent trend? Is it symptomatic of poor quality control and cheaper production? Is it just something we have to learn to live with?

[1974]

It's something you have to live with. It's due to the fact that TLG now uses clear (milkywhite actually) pellets and injects the dye during molding. This seems to be a rather difficult process for one of the most advanced plastic manufacturer in the world

There's a rather long thread about it, lemme see if I can dig it up

Edit : Here it is :

http://www.eurobricks.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=30439

Cheers,

Ole

Edited January 11, 2015 by 1974

[talos]

I too have a new set, just finished building it, the Creator 'Beach Hut' (31035) and it has some big variations in the dark blue roof slope bricks. I think about 5 of them are a noticeably lighter shade of blue than the rest. It is OK I guess, a roof has variations in the tiles..LOL.

I think the darker colors do have problems of consistency, they need to tweak the process molding the parts.

[dr_spock]

Lighter colors vary too. I grabbed a bunch of yellow and bley 1x4s off the PAB wall. They have slight variations that are noticeable in bright light. In my dim LEGO basement, everything looks fine. Also having old man eyes helps not seeing the difference.

[notaromantic]

Dark Red seems the most obvious in terms of inconsistency to me.

However, I seem to enjoy that - as it adds a realism to builds, that I prefer. I don't know that I'd personally want the colors to be too homogenous. Slight shade differences add depth.

I also see it in the black slopes I am using now for a roof; but the bleys seem to be always on point with one another. And I wish there were more inconsistency in the bleys. It seems many builders mix their bleys with their old grays in order to achieve shade.

[trisha]

Hi, I had the same issue with the bike and cafe shop. I went to the lego store to be sure which one is the right blue before I report it as broken and have them change it, and they offered me to get a new set. Just have to bring all the pieces. I was missing the minifigures and the car. Maybe give customer support a call?

Hope this helps

[wilson3a10]

A minor inconsistency in colour won;t much matter if the price can be reduced by slightly lowering the QC