Preventing Figure Crack?

[Forresto]

Hello everyone! So I was curious if there is or are any techniques to prevent the serious problem all AFOLs must know, which is minifgure cracking. I'm talking about the cracks that seem to emanate on the torso and arms, but especially the torso. Figures that I keep stored in containers that were in previous good condition seem to sometimes get these cracks and I don't know why.

Is this an issue of storage? The weather changing dramatically? Pressure points giving way?

More importantly how does one prevent this?

[MacK]

I don't think there is any way to prevent it.

I've found many of my newer figures, and for that matter, other pieces such as cheese slopes developing hairline cracks. These cracked pieces are fresh out of sealed sets, and haven't been heavily used or abused.

I believe it's a sign of decreasing quality control on Lego's end.

[marshall]

Does anyone know approximately when this started happening with figures? The frustrating thing is that my figures from 20-30 years ago, all of which have been heavily played with (both by me and now my children) rarely if ever have any cracks, while the new legos I buy for my kids are almost all cracked, even the most recently purchased ones. Clearly this is something Lego can prevent, since it didn't used to be a problem.

[Foxw]

well, (now this IS ONLY MY UNDERSTANDING), part of the issue is that the materials have changed, it's not the same ABS from when we were kids 30 yrs ago. And alot of that is due to things outside LEGO's control. i would not be shocked to find the change came from the old formula being considered 'harmfull' somewhere, blah, blah.

but the reality is this issue started creeping in about 2k which i believe is when lego switched ABS suppliers.

granted i'm no historian and not an authority.

[Boettner Builds]

Might have something to do with the "color added" ABS. Before the ABS was pre colored, but now it is clear and LEGO adds color. That's why a lot of the new colors are a little different than the old. That's my best guess at least.

[Cobb]

It's a big problem. I made a thread about it some time ago. My son had multiple figures with cracks in their torso's, some figures were just a few months old.

Lego should adress this by adding a little bit of width to the torso's or adjust the legpegs. Some figures fit tighter than others. Same goes for the arms/hands.

Edited September 15, 2016 by Cobb

[npgcole]

Huge problem at my place. Almost every third figure I own has at least one crack somewhere. A couple of them have a crack from the bottom of their torso to their arm socket, making the arm loose and totally unposable.

[TheLegoDr]

Exactly. I've encountered this a lot too. Just random cracking along the sides where they connect to the hips and occasionally where the hands connect to the arm. The main problem is there is nothing connecting all of the cracks outside of shoddier materials. I've had plenty of feet cracks, but they are attached to a stud to display them (similar to CMF, which is funny considering they were designed specifically for minifigures to stand on...).

With the amount of money LEGO is making and opening up new markets, I'm sure they will maintain the cheap route to make higher profits and if a few of us complain, it won't hurt their bottom line. Until they stop seeing profits (which is highly unlikely) I don't see them fixing this problem.

[BrickJagger]

I think it's safe to say that Lego's quality control is at an all time low. Hopefully the new eco-friendly materials they introduce will make the bricks better.

[1980-Something-Space-Guy]

I'm just curious, has this been brought up to Lego through the embassy? I can't imagine them being unaware of this and/or doing nothing about it. Clearly something that used to work doesn't anymore.

It has gotten to the point where I place only a few figures (that I have repeats of) in stands, because of fear of leg cracking.

[VintageLegoEra]

I did a scan to my sets ( modern and vintage ) and guess what!

The modern figures has no cracks but legs and arms became loose, while vintage figures are still solid.

I live in a hot and humid country.

[dr_spock]

I live in cold country and haven't noticed any cracking problems with my figs from 1980s and the recent ones. I now store my figs in ziplok plastic bags in a dark basement.

The inside torso ribbing design is different between 1980s and now. The black one is the firefighter fig from a 1980 fire station that sat on a shelf near a window for decades. Its joints are very stiff to move. It feels like old LEGO that sat around for a long time and not played.

[Bricky Dee Williams]

My most recent and worst minifgure to date was Scott Lang Ant-Man. After just mere days of coming out of the box, I took the minifgure off the display I had made to find his left torso, under the arm, was cracked. I remember Lego had a big quality control issue with the original, 2012, Captain America minifigure, with many of him coming cracked straight out of the box in numerous batches. I picked up three of that set like this. I don't believe there is a way to isolate them from the epidemic, it may sadly be decreasing quality control of the minifigures. It's a sad thought, but as they expand, Lego may possibly be neglecting some things.

[davee123]

I noticed this for the first time in tiles, not minifig torsos in 2003 from 4486. I got a few copies of the set, and while building them fresh out of the box, there were hairline cracks visible in the short-end of 1x2 tiles, when they were attached to hollow-studs. When they were sitting idle, there were no cracks, and I believe when attached to solid-studs instead of hollow ones, they similarly did not show cracks.

Around that timeframe is when I first recall hearing of the issue via FBTB, although it hadn't happened to me in minifigs as of yet. Some people seemed to complain that it happened to them a LOT, and others it had never happened to at all. The suspicion was that possibly certain distribution chains went through extreme heat/cold/humidity/whatever, to account for the discrepancy, but we never found out anything terribly interesting.

LEGO's suppliers in China use a different plastic-- we were explicitly told that they were required to do things differently in China, where the plastic had to be sourced from within the country. But in different discussions with different people, LEGO simultaneously said that the plastic used in China was from the same company. Hence, the guess is that the supplier operates in at least both China and Europe, with two different plastic types and qualities.

Additionally, we heard that while LEGO used to only use a single source for their plastic, that they were concerned that this might create larger costs if that one supplier was more expensive. Hence, they began sourcing from MULTIPLE (possibly just 2, but maybe more) different plastic suppliers, in order to be competitive.

We also know that the technique for molding has changed-- they supposedly now add the dyes when a part is molded, as opposed to before when the raw ABS granulate was purchased pre-colored. I think we heard about that in about 2007 (and it likely started earlier), which makes sense considering the internal re-structuring that started in earnest around 2005 (Jorgen essentially explicitly said that they intentionally lowered quality across the board, without much detail as to how).

I believe this has been raised with LEGO many times already, although I don't think we've seen it get addressed. My advice wouldn't be to go through the ambassador network. They probably already know, and have discussed it on various occasions. Instead, call LEGO directly, or send them an email. (That's what we've been advised to do in the past to address quality concerns).

DaveE

[1980-Something-Space-Guy]

"Only the best is good though"

[Spectator2285]

Part of it may be the change to a greener solution for the bricks, they have changed what the plastic is made from. Maybe it sacrificed some quality? Whatever the case it’s a change that needed to happen to help our planet.

Edited July 1, 2019 by Spectator2285
Misspelling

[MAB]

5 hours ago, Spectator2285 said:

Part of it may be the change to a greener solution for the bricks, they have changed what the plastic is made from. Maybe it sacrificed some quality? Whatever the case it’s a change that needed to happen to help our planet.

Not for minifigures they haven't. The "greener solution" parts are used in botanicals, https://www.lego.com/en-us/aboutus/news-room/2018/march/pfp, mainly softer polythene parts. Although polythene made from sustainable sources is the same chemically as polythene from oil based sources.

[lego the hutt]

Having discussed this a few times over the years, I believe the reason behind it to be fluctuation in humidity.   The recommended humidity range seems to be in the 60+% range and that fluctuating humidity can put stress on parts over time.

[ks6349]

30 years ago, value of $1 is not equal to now due to inflation. However, I find that the price of different Lego sets could sometimes, yes sometimes even cheaper than those times, I remember in around 1992 my parents bought me a pirate boat set which contained approx. 500 pieces cost $100 but today in 2019 I don't see any set here in my country with 500 pieces would cost that high $100.

Today people are getting higher salary while being more mean, Lego won't sell if they rise up the price so the only 

way for them to survive is to cheap out the production cost. Please be understanding.

 

[MAB]

1 minute ago, ks6349 said:

30 years ago, value of $1 is not equal to now due to inflation. However, I find that the price of different Lego sets could sometimes, yes sometimes even cheaper than those times, I remember in around 1992 my parents bought me a pirate boat set which contained approx. 500 pieces cost $100 but today in 2019 I don't see any set here in my country with 500 pieces would cost that high $100.

 

Sets of 30 years are not really comparable to today's in terms of parts count, due to the different size of parts. Which ship was it? I couldn't see any that cost about $100 with only 500 parts. For example 6285 / 6286 was $110 $126.50 but had over 900 parts, 6271 was $50 with 317 parts. Some of those early pirate sets had very large molded baseplates which are not seen today.

[ks6349]

3 hours ago, MAB said:

Sets of 30 years are not really comparable to today's in terms of parts count, due to the different size of parts. Which ship was it? I couldn't see any that cost about $100 with only 500 parts. For example 6285 / 6286 was $110 $126.50 but had over 900 parts, 6271 was $50 with 317 parts. Some of those early pirate sets had very large molded baseplates which are not seen today.

Sorry I was wrong. I just checked, it was 6086, not a boat or ship. The most memorable large set I got as a present in those time, I remember 

clearly that it was sold at 800 of our country currency, approx. equiv. to $100 something usd dollars

[CP5670]

A change in humidity or temperature would be the best explanation. I've seen these cracks on a few minifigs and cheese slopes, but it's pretty rare in my collection.

We also know that the technique for molding has changed-- they supposedly now add the dyes when a part is molded, as opposed to before when the raw ABS granulate was purchased pre-colored. I think we heard about that in about 2007 (and it likely started earlier), which makes sense considering the internal re-structuring that started in earnest around 2005 (Jorgen essentially explicitly said that they intentionally lowered quality across the board, without much detail as to how).



A lot of other issues came up as a result of this, especially with the color consistency, and it's been like that ever since then. I've just come to accept that Lego quality is never going to be like it was back in the day. It hasn't affected their business, so they have no reason to go back.

[Henchmen4Hire]

I found a little batch of old (90s?) minifigure torsos recently, no legs attached, and they were all cracked up the sides, no explanation. It was a police man, firefighter, brown shirt with a wolf logo, chef?, 2 astronauts, a boat guy.

I recently got the Futuristic Flyer set, one of the dark red jumper plates snapped in half. I havent bought a Lego set at retail in years, and this is not a good impression to get when trying to jump back into the Lego world.

Edited July 5, 2019 by Henchmen4Hire

[MAB]

11 hours ago, ks6349 said:

Sorry I was wrong. I just checked, it was 6086, not a boat or ship. The most memorable large set I got as a present in those time, I remember 

clearly that it was sold at 800 of our country currency, approx. equiv. to $100 something usd dollars

That has 20 large panels and a raised baseplate. Four horses and 12 minifigures. Those large parts take the place of many smaller parts of today. Take a look at any 450-550 part set of today and they look way smaller than that 30 year old set.

[ks6349]

The best way now is to keep the minifigures clean and free from grease and moisture better

will i be able to request for free replacement from the local LEGO main distributor when the mini-figure cracks after a year of two