Epic Journey: Building a LEGO room from scratch, including walls, floor and door
PART I: Introduction
PART II: Storage during my childhood
PART III: Moving the LEGO down into the basement
PART IV: New metal cabinets
PART V: Cleaning the part and cabinets
PART VI: Moving the parts back to the apartment
PART VII: Final thoughts Note 1: (text in this colored format explains where I live at the moment, i.e. how far from the collection, so it is easier to understand some decisions)
Note 2: There was a small similar topic 5 years ago, I have made this one on top of that, but more like a diary, with newly founded photos, comments, and added all the history and several chapters for the last 5 years. PART I:
Introduction: This topic will cover transformation from a dusty, wooden-walls, earth-floor cellar...previously used for old boxes and such...to a fully equipped LEGO room, complete with building brick walls, with a budget of a large LEGO set, everything covered with comments and photos!
I hope that this may help somebody, or at least provide some inspiration for a similar project. Reading storage and sorting topics, I have noticed that many people said that they did not have enough room in their house or apartment for a LEGO room.
I had that issue, too, so I tried to make one for myself in the basement, with building materials I had, and with a very low budget, and later to move it back to my apartment.
I had basic tools, and a few helpful friends.
The journey went... From this:
To this:
To this:
PART II:
Storage during my childhood: (I was born in 1984, in Serbia, Europe. My father, my mother and me were living in our house at the outskirts of the city of Novi Sad.) I got my first set when I was 3, my grandfather brought it for me from Germany. It was the 333: Basic Set set, in 1987.
After he had seen how much I enjoyed that, whenever he visited us, he brought me a new set, mostly Town and sporadically Space. What a happy time. As any other kid, I used to build wherever my parents let me. My father demanded that I build on a table, or when the time was nice, he would set me a big sturdy table outside, to keep a good posture, with lots of natural light, and to make regular breaks.
He also gave me two large plastic suitcases, where I kept all my LEGO sets and parts. They were kept in a big closet, and I could take them in a minute and start building. Also I could pack everything up very quickly if needed.
When I was eleven, the war which lasted for several years just ended, and there were no LEGO in the stores. Heck, there were hardly any stores open at all.
But, somehow, when I was still eleven, I got the game-changer set, the mighty 8868: Air Tech Claw Rig. My first Technic set, which I adored and wanted for years.
My father somehow managed to get the set, again via a cousin from Germany, and I was over the moon.
I even ended up on our National Television's kids show, where I presented the set and my other MOCs
Great thing about his set was that all its parts came in a yellow tray, so I was able to use this together with the suitcases. (At this point we moved from the country house to a two bedroom city apartment). First dark age came and gone, I was 18 and back in the saddle. The whole collection was still in the very same suitcases, but I purchased my first plastic containers with drawers: I kept my parts in my room in a closet, and built on the main table: Some time later, my father made me two new wooden boxes with dividers. The boxes were from an old large sturdy drawer. I also purchased two tool organizer boxes. Both the wooden and plastic boxes are marked on the photo bellow. I built and sorted bricks like that for years, I was using apartments drawers, bags, boxes, and it was hard to find a part I needed. At this point my father passed away, my mom got ill at the same time, ended up in hospital, my brother just started college, and I had to concentrate on my master studies and work. Hard times. Luckily, my mom fully recovered A new dark age of 3 years came and went, I was now 29 and was thinking of a more permanent solution for the storage.
PART III:
Moving the LEGO down into the basement: (It is 2015 at this point, and my mom, my brother and me all live on the 3rd floor of a 4 story building, in our two bedroom, 60 m2 (645 sq ft) apartment) My collection was growing every month, even just for a few bricks at a time.
My usual method of storing the parts in boxes, drawers and bags was not working anymore. I needed a bigger place for all that.
Since dedicating one of the rooms in the apartment for LEGO was not an option at the time, and because of the fact I wanted to find a new place to live, i decided to step down...to the basement The basement is a big space, divided by concrete walls, and each apartment has its own small area, divided by wooden bars. So security was high on the list.
I was tight on budget, only about 200e, and I worked and studied, so I could only build this after work or on weekends. Luckily, I got a few days off the job to start with. The "Blueprint": Simple 6 square meters (65 square feet) room, with a large main work table on the left with lots of plastic and metal drawers where the main parts will be, on the back - a support table with a PC, on the right - a display shelf with additional storage boxes. At the front should be a strong metal door with a frame. DAY ONE: I hadn't been in cellar for quite a few months, the light broke, all kinds of boxes on the floor, wooden walls moved quite a bit, the wooden door was in a sorry state... Note the naked walls, unpainted ceiling, the wooden walls that are ripped out of their slots and slid in and out. Floor is still just plain earth and dust. Yes, earth. That's how socialistic buildings were constructed back in the 60's. DAY EIGHT: - First, light was fixed, and ALL of the stuff was thrown out. No mercy.
- Wooden walls were placed on their original slots, and secured at the top and bottom,
- Thin layer of concrete floor was made. Sorry, no photos, I just asked construction workers that worked on a nearby construction site to cross the street and bring several carts of concrete to make the floor. They did it in three takes, on their breaks. Paid them with a big chunk of my hefty budget.
- Window frame was painted white, still without the glass atm, the ceiling was also painted white in one layer.
- I had some yellow paint, so I tried to paint the wall just to see how it would look like, and I did not like it. I will repaint it to white later.
- Thin layer of green fabric was secured to the boards, in order to block the curious eyes of the neighbors, even though they very very rarely go down to the basement. Black cable is not a power cable. DAY NINE: I removed (destroyed) my cellar door together with front wooden wall. The same day I sold that wood, so I got some money back to my wallet.
Next, all the remaining time of the day i was taking measurements, starting with the door's steel frame. My plan was to make a room inside the room: I wanted to leave the wooden walls intact and make brick walls "inside" them, and to install a proper, heavy, metal door. Heating and additional electricity work are still to be done at that point.
DAY 11: Materials arrived:
Shot outside my building, where my friend was standing. Note there are holes in the wall. This is the brick-built window of my cellar.
A truck brought one pallet of bricks. Blue canvas on the right is waiting for the sand to arrive in a few minutes. Sand was going to be used for mortar. I have already secured six bags of cement, shown left from my friend on the photo.
DAY 12: Building started!
Picture bellow shows a view from my cellar, looking at the basement main hall. Heavy metal door installed. They are my favorite part of the room. Note that they are secured with the anchors to the floor, ceiling and the wall. First layer of bricks was placed. My another friend expert-real brick-builder is helping here. There where he is standing, the main table will be placed.
Placing the bricks was of course, slow, since we decided that all the work should be done without mechanized equipment. This was be cheaper. Right now the bricks wall(s) is about half done. When it was done, I needed to clean the bricks and to treat the mortar. I was going to keep the brick wall...bricked, without paint or anything, just cleaned. I like bricks too much!
Day 13: Dream team, the expert any my younger brother, at peak efficiency And after many many hand mixed buckets of mortar, and after having the forearms the size of Popey's... My bricked room was finished, at least regarding brick-works.
Now the funny part came: hours and hours of polishing and cleaning bricks with steal-wire-foam, painting them with glossy varnish. Every brick needed to get its treatment and to be glazed with varnish.
The day after I was taking final measurements for my new tables. I used my own wood boards, so I cut expenses there, too.
Basically, I sold everything of the materials which was not used. Still to do in the next three days:
1. fill the gap above the metal door with a wooden board.
2. fill the gaps around the room with foam.
3. get a 20m long extension electric cable and get it to the room from my apartment on 3rd floor.
4. scrape excess mortar of the bricks and polish them, and use eyes and nose protection.
5. get some good night sleep!
DAY 14:
Security: Plan got a security update, nothing big, but it took almost half a day to get it done.
Despite the heavy metal door, I wanted additional protection, so I got an old steel door which I used to as a door in the kennel, I brought that to a city from my cottage house and will place it as an additional door, before the main metal door. Doggy frame door is about 120cm wide and 120cm tall, and is very sturdy. Probably I didn't need them, but I wanted to sleep peacefully at night, not worrying about the LEGO room down there.
My good senior friend was happy to help me install the door. We had to make custom hinges, and a custom locking system. Note the amount of tools required to place such a door on a wooden-bar-wall and other side on the concrete wall.
Almost all the room was filled with various tools and metal pars, since we all did from the scratch. This is how we did the hinges, top and bottom, That upright metal plate was deliberately curved to protect the screw from unscrewing it. Screw had an additional function - to adjust the door's angle.
This is our custom locking mechanism. We deliberately placed the mechanism so much inside, so it would be difficult to cut it. It is ugly, but it is very strong.
Everything was built from scratch and from pieces. Even the doggy door was made by my late father. So the expenses were virtually zero dinars/euros. Final picture of what you would see if you were standing in the man basement hall: It was not pretty, but once i paint the wall in new color, and the doors in grey, it will be nice.
This way I now have additional area of about 2 square meters in front of the LEGO room, also protected, to store miscellaneous stuff.
DAY 16: Ok, the job for today was to protect the window. Namely, my window there has brick built bars in a simple pattern, but since a good part of the room is underground, lots of leafs and such could get in and got stuck between bars and glass window. Also when I left the window open, once or twice a cat got in, and it sat in our basement few days.
So, my job was to make some kind of screen, which can let air get in, but keep leafs, dirt, cats and insects out. First, this is how the window looked like: My budget at this point was really thin, so i wanted to make the cost of the screen zero euros, with materials i had laying around.
First, I used wooden bars that left from demolition of the wooden wall, and made a 120x100 cm frame, with a support in the middle.
Then, I used an old, but good insect screen and placed two layers of it onto the frame, in a cross way.
Next, I used extra thin aluminum strips to cover the wood, to prevent raindrops to hit it directly. Strips are really bendable and easy to shape, so wood is covered pretty good. Next, my favorite part of the screen...metal mesh. At my cottage we used to have chickens, and we used these metal meshes as a floor for them when they were very small.
I cleaned two of the metal meshes with chemicals and high pressure machine and cut them to fit the wood frame. I bolted the metal meshes to the wood frame, resulting in great stiffness of the frame. The final result was very good: So, now my window screen is extra stiff, wont let any insects in, but will pass air and light in. And no one can get into the basement that way (even if skinny enough to pass the holes in the brick built bars)
When I was done admiring my work of art, I placed it into the place: Not bad considering I invest 0 dinars/euros into the materials. But this required about six hours of work. I enjoyed every minute of it.
Next...electricity work is done...starting on polishing the bricks, varnishing them and first round of painting the walls.
DAY 21: Finalizing the deal, broken budget, but It will be completed.
I spent two days varnishing brick wall with two layers of varnish. My budget suffered greatly due to this, since I thought that my old home made varnish should be enough, but as I tried it, it was clear that I would need a few more cans. Yeah...a few more... And after lots of hours of varnishing, first layer was completed, second day was easier, since varnish provided smoother bricks and mortar to work with: I think it looks much better and the color is much deeper and richer when varnished. Please note a big neon light. Here is comparison between non-treated and treated bricks:. Electricity is also done, I had to make 22 meters long cable and use the old chimney hole that goes through the building to pass it from my apartment to the basement. I have six connectors at my disposal. 1. For 120cm long neon light above the main work table.
2. For 250W work table lamp.
3. For PC
4. For FM radio.
5. For 2kW heater
6. Misc Metal door was also painted in two layers with gray paint, a piece of custom wood panel that allows heating and electricity pipes to go through it was placed above the door, and green carpet was placed also. I will trim excess material on the wood (white foam, when it hardens enough). And finally, my favorite picture, 95%: Not bad considering this was the beginning: Ok after almost a month, I was very pleased.
Next...my tables were to arrive, old PC was about to be installed there, together with a chair.
DAY 23: Tables arrived. Well, "tables" were just a wooden boards made by my carpenter friend, with fancy alu legs. Budget...I forgot to take picture with them in place, but I will show them when all is done.
When I got back from work, we immediately started mounting the table in its position. We drilled the holes in three walls, and secured the table. That way it can support lots of weight. We have added three more legs. Now it stood very stable and firm. I still had to wait for a display shelf (an old shelf from my cottage home), but I could finally start the (very) fun part: Bringing down the parts!
Firstly, I took a great care cleaning and vacuuming the room.
As I said, I live on the third floor and all the LEGO parts were in my room, pretty much hidden in three different closets. I had various drawers and boxes where I hold them, so I did not have to buy anything new for storage. But that was a trap. When I started taking everything on one pile, there was an unbelievably huge pile of them. That was because when I build a MOC or organizing parts, I never use more than few drawers or boxes at the time. So I did not realize how much stuff I had.
I had cca 60000 parts and this was the first time I saw them altogether.
So I began moving them. I had to ask my brother and his gf to help me, we had to go seven times up and down. Then I throw out my brother and began the most beautiful part: sorting all the parts to the new room!
Those few hours were worth every day of hard work spent on building the room. It was so therapeutic that I did not feel the fatigue and exhaustion any more. All my parts were pretty organized in the apartment, but they were never altogether at one place. So I had to organize them to make them look good, beside being easy to reach.
This was the result: Later I have added few more drawers so final unite is some decimeters wider. Right now the whole stack is 210cm long. Table at that side is cca 270 cm long.
There is around 300 drawers ready to be filled with parts :) Still to do:
1. mount the display shelf (at the opposite side of the room), where should also be some parts, mainly big plates and stuff that can only be in Frigo plastic containers.
2. clean and sort
3. rest.
4. build mocs :)
PART IV:
New metal cabinets: (After a few years, I live in a rented 25m2 (269sq ft) studio apartment (one room apartment) nearby) A few dozen orders later, I wanted to upgrade the storage units. I found a guy that makes a custom metal cabinets with clear plastic drawers, any size you want.
It was pretty expensive, more than all the money that went into the building of the room, but I knew I had to invest into it. So, after I got the metal cabinets, I sold the old plastic ones, and transferred all the parts to their new home and the room looked like this:
PART V: SIDE QUEST I:
Cleaning the part and cabinets: (Two years passed, I was back living in my main two bedroom apartment with my girlfriend). Dust. We all hate it, as it just loves to cover our precious parts and models.
Even though I kept all my parts in the drawers, dust always finds a way to them. I should have covered the cabinets with cloth when I do not build. Never mind, it was the time to clean all of the parts nevertheless. I will keep this section short as it is not the main point of the topic.
Basically, the plan is to hand clean all 98kg of pieces, by damping them in warm water, with mild detergent and then carefully polish them with soft cloth until shine. Most of the parts are almost new, but dusty. It may be hard to see, but they are indeed dusty: Soaking: Cleaning: This is how the main area for cleaning looked like: Dry cloth was placed on the table, metal cabinet would stand on the left, a big lamp was later mounted on the right, and lots of cloth materials for cleaning, and a few extra soft brushes for really dusty pieces, before they were soaked.
After drying, we took EACH piece and clean it with a soft cloth until they were shiny. A team of four of us had to do this for several weeks in total!
If I had known it would take so much time, I would have never tried to clean all of them at once.
From now on, I put a cover over the cabinets. I have 3 big cloth covers that always cover the cabinets, and when I want to build, I just lift one side of the cloths and roll them on top of the cabinets. When I am done, I roll the cloths down. PART VI:
Moving the parts back to the apartment: After we finished cleaning the parts, we took a break for a few weeks. Of course, all that cleaning was not just because I was bored, there was much more sinister plan why I wanted the parts to be like new again: I decided I should step up...back to the apartment
The cellar was great, it had music, a PC, a heater, privacy etc...But, I did not have an Internet connection, couldn't search for an image of the object I was building, I wanted to be able to build or check if something is possible without having to get out of the apartment, dress up, unlock all the doors, and bring all the MLCad files I wanted to try in real life, turn on the PC down there etc...
So, I made a transfer: I moved some of my work-related equipment down there, and brought back the LEGO into the newly renovated office in my apartment. When I decided the LEGO will be back to the apartment, I arranged some restoration:
- Polished wooden floor,
- Fresh paint,
- New fancy lights all around,
- Several new power outlets,
- Some stone decoration on the wall,
- New "table" with the old alu legs: Few days after when all was dry, I could start bringing the fresh clean parts: On the left side part of the office is visible, it consists of a PC, two monitors, a laptop and a chair. Finished adding the metal cabinets. Cleaned all the misc. And finally, I present the final installment in this epic journey, the finished LEGO room with 98kg of clean, fresh parts sorted: One of the important requirements was that I had the central position in the LEGO part of the room, and that I can reach everything from that metal chair with sturdy wheels.
I can literally drag around on it and grab any part from any storage unit in the room PART VII: Final thoughts: This setup has been like this for the last few months, and I can honestly say this works best for me.
I have been building for the last 30 years (with several dark ages that lasted for a few years each), I am now 36, and I have probably tried every possible setup, location and approach I could think of, and I am happy that I got to this point.
Compared to the basement setup, this setup is approximately the same size, but my PCs are always there and online, with my LEGO hard drive with blueprints, images and MLCad, I can instantly check if something I think of can be made with bricks, I can test anything at any moment, and I can build in shorter sessions, on the break, after the work, or just before and after the movie night, which is a must for my girlfriend and me
In short, a dream LEGO room come true. And working on a new MOC right now is indeed a pleasure I would love to thank EB for giving me so many nice ideas and the opportunity to peek inside other LEGO rooms all around the world!
Thanks for reading up to this point, dear reader, you are awesome!
PART II: Storage during my childhood
PART III: Moving the LEGO down into the basement
PART IV: New metal cabinets
PART V: Cleaning the part and cabinets
PART VI: Moving the parts back to the apartment
PART VII: Final thoughts Note 1: (text in this colored format explains where I live at the moment, i.e. how far from the collection, so it is easier to understand some decisions)
Note 2: There was a small similar topic 5 years ago, I have made this one on top of that, but more like a diary, with newly founded photos, comments, and added all the history and several chapters for the last 5 years. PART I:
Introduction: This topic will cover transformation from a dusty, wooden-walls, earth-floor cellar...previously used for old boxes and such...to a fully equipped LEGO room, complete with building brick walls, with a budget of a large LEGO set, everything covered with comments and photos!
I hope that this may help somebody, or at least provide some inspiration for a similar project. Reading storage and sorting topics, I have noticed that many people said that they did not have enough room in their house or apartment for a LEGO room.
I had that issue, too, so I tried to make one for myself in the basement, with building materials I had, and with a very low budget, and later to move it back to my apartment.
I had basic tools, and a few helpful friends.
The journey went... From this:
To this:
To this:
PART II:
Storage during my childhood: (I was born in 1984, in Serbia, Europe. My father, my mother and me were living in our house at the outskirts of the city of Novi Sad.) I got my first set when I was 3, my grandfather brought it for me from Germany. It was the 333: Basic Set set, in 1987.
After he had seen how much I enjoyed that, whenever he visited us, he brought me a new set, mostly Town and sporadically Space. What a happy time. As any other kid, I used to build wherever my parents let me. My father demanded that I build on a table, or when the time was nice, he would set me a big sturdy table outside, to keep a good posture, with lots of natural light, and to make regular breaks.
He also gave me two large plastic suitcases, where I kept all my LEGO sets and parts. They were kept in a big closet, and I could take them in a minute and start building. Also I could pack everything up very quickly if needed.
When I was eleven, the war which lasted for several years just ended, and there were no LEGO in the stores. Heck, there were hardly any stores open at all.
But, somehow, when I was still eleven, I got the game-changer set, the mighty 8868: Air Tech Claw Rig. My first Technic set, which I adored and wanted for years.
My father somehow managed to get the set, again via a cousin from Germany, and I was over the moon.
I even ended up on our National Television's kids show, where I presented the set and my other MOCs
Great thing about his set was that all its parts came in a yellow tray, so I was able to use this together with the suitcases. (At this point we moved from the country house to a two bedroom city apartment). First dark age came and gone, I was 18 and back in the saddle. The whole collection was still in the very same suitcases, but I purchased my first plastic containers with drawers: I kept my parts in my room in a closet, and built on the main table: Some time later, my father made me two new wooden boxes with dividers. The boxes were from an old large sturdy drawer. I also purchased two tool organizer boxes. Both the wooden and plastic boxes are marked on the photo bellow. I built and sorted bricks like that for years, I was using apartments drawers, bags, boxes, and it was hard to find a part I needed. At this point my father passed away, my mom got ill at the same time, ended up in hospital, my brother just started college, and I had to concentrate on my master studies and work. Hard times. Luckily, my mom fully recovered A new dark age of 3 years came and went, I was now 29 and was thinking of a more permanent solution for the storage.
PART III:
Moving the LEGO down into the basement: (It is 2015 at this point, and my mom, my brother and me all live on the 3rd floor of a 4 story building, in our two bedroom, 60 m2 (645 sq ft) apartment) My collection was growing every month, even just for a few bricks at a time.
My usual method of storing the parts in boxes, drawers and bags was not working anymore. I needed a bigger place for all that.
Since dedicating one of the rooms in the apartment for LEGO was not an option at the time, and because of the fact I wanted to find a new place to live, i decided to step down...to the basement The basement is a big space, divided by concrete walls, and each apartment has its own small area, divided by wooden bars. So security was high on the list.
I was tight on budget, only about 200e, and I worked and studied, so I could only build this after work or on weekends. Luckily, I got a few days off the job to start with. The "Blueprint": Simple 6 square meters (65 square feet) room, with a large main work table on the left with lots of plastic and metal drawers where the main parts will be, on the back - a support table with a PC, on the right - a display shelf with additional storage boxes. At the front should be a strong metal door with a frame. DAY ONE: I hadn't been in cellar for quite a few months, the light broke, all kinds of boxes on the floor, wooden walls moved quite a bit, the wooden door was in a sorry state... Note the naked walls, unpainted ceiling, the wooden walls that are ripped out of their slots and slid in and out. Floor is still just plain earth and dust. Yes, earth. That's how socialistic buildings were constructed back in the 60's. DAY EIGHT: - First, light was fixed, and ALL of the stuff was thrown out. No mercy.
- Wooden walls were placed on their original slots, and secured at the top and bottom,
- Thin layer of concrete floor was made. Sorry, no photos, I just asked construction workers that worked on a nearby construction site to cross the street and bring several carts of concrete to make the floor. They did it in three takes, on their breaks. Paid them with a big chunk of my hefty budget.
- Window frame was painted white, still without the glass atm, the ceiling was also painted white in one layer.
- I had some yellow paint, so I tried to paint the wall just to see how it would look like, and I did not like it. I will repaint it to white later.
- Thin layer of green fabric was secured to the boards, in order to block the curious eyes of the neighbors, even though they very very rarely go down to the basement. Black cable is not a power cable. DAY NINE: I removed (destroyed) my cellar door together with front wooden wall. The same day I sold that wood, so I got some money back to my wallet.
Next, all the remaining time of the day i was taking measurements, starting with the door's steel frame. My plan was to make a room inside the room: I wanted to leave the wooden walls intact and make brick walls "inside" them, and to install a proper, heavy, metal door. Heating and additional electricity work are still to be done at that point.
DAY 11: Materials arrived:
Shot outside my building, where my friend was standing. Note there are holes in the wall. This is the brick-built window of my cellar.
A truck brought one pallet of bricks. Blue canvas on the right is waiting for the sand to arrive in a few minutes. Sand was going to be used for mortar. I have already secured six bags of cement, shown left from my friend on the photo.
DAY 12: Building started!
Picture bellow shows a view from my cellar, looking at the basement main hall. Heavy metal door installed. They are my favorite part of the room. Note that they are secured with the anchors to the floor, ceiling and the wall. First layer of bricks was placed. My another friend expert-real brick-builder is helping here. There where he is standing, the main table will be placed.
Placing the bricks was of course, slow, since we decided that all the work should be done without mechanized equipment. This was be cheaper. Right now the bricks wall(s) is about half done. When it was done, I needed to clean the bricks and to treat the mortar. I was going to keep the brick wall...bricked, without paint or anything, just cleaned. I like bricks too much!
Day 13: Dream team, the expert any my younger brother, at peak efficiency And after many many hand mixed buckets of mortar, and after having the forearms the size of Popey's... My bricked room was finished, at least regarding brick-works.
Now the funny part came: hours and hours of polishing and cleaning bricks with steal-wire-foam, painting them with glossy varnish. Every brick needed to get its treatment and to be glazed with varnish.
The day after I was taking final measurements for my new tables. I used my own wood boards, so I cut expenses there, too.
Basically, I sold everything of the materials which was not used. Still to do in the next three days:
1. fill the gap above the metal door with a wooden board.
2. fill the gaps around the room with foam.
3. get a 20m long extension electric cable and get it to the room from my apartment on 3rd floor.
4. scrape excess mortar of the bricks and polish them, and use eyes and nose protection.
5. get some good night sleep!
DAY 14:
Security: Plan got a security update, nothing big, but it took almost half a day to get it done.
Despite the heavy metal door, I wanted additional protection, so I got an old steel door which I used to as a door in the kennel, I brought that to a city from my cottage house and will place it as an additional door, before the main metal door. Doggy frame door is about 120cm wide and 120cm tall, and is very sturdy. Probably I didn't need them, but I wanted to sleep peacefully at night, not worrying about the LEGO room down there.
My good senior friend was happy to help me install the door. We had to make custom hinges, and a custom locking system. Note the amount of tools required to place such a door on a wooden-bar-wall and other side on the concrete wall.
Almost all the room was filled with various tools and metal pars, since we all did from the scratch. This is how we did the hinges, top and bottom, That upright metal plate was deliberately curved to protect the screw from unscrewing it. Screw had an additional function - to adjust the door's angle.
This is our custom locking mechanism. We deliberately placed the mechanism so much inside, so it would be difficult to cut it. It is ugly, but it is very strong.
Everything was built from scratch and from pieces. Even the doggy door was made by my late father. So the expenses were virtually zero dinars/euros. Final picture of what you would see if you were standing in the man basement hall: It was not pretty, but once i paint the wall in new color, and the doors in grey, it will be nice.
This way I now have additional area of about 2 square meters in front of the LEGO room, also protected, to store miscellaneous stuff.
DAY 16: Ok, the job for today was to protect the window. Namely, my window there has brick built bars in a simple pattern, but since a good part of the room is underground, lots of leafs and such could get in and got stuck between bars and glass window. Also when I left the window open, once or twice a cat got in, and it sat in our basement few days.
So, my job was to make some kind of screen, which can let air get in, but keep leafs, dirt, cats and insects out. First, this is how the window looked like: My budget at this point was really thin, so i wanted to make the cost of the screen zero euros, with materials i had laying around.
First, I used wooden bars that left from demolition of the wooden wall, and made a 120x100 cm frame, with a support in the middle.
Then, I used an old, but good insect screen and placed two layers of it onto the frame, in a cross way.
Next, I used extra thin aluminum strips to cover the wood, to prevent raindrops to hit it directly. Strips are really bendable and easy to shape, so wood is covered pretty good. Next, my favorite part of the screen...metal mesh. At my cottage we used to have chickens, and we used these metal meshes as a floor for them when they were very small.
I cleaned two of the metal meshes with chemicals and high pressure machine and cut them to fit the wood frame. I bolted the metal meshes to the wood frame, resulting in great stiffness of the frame. The final result was very good: So, now my window screen is extra stiff, wont let any insects in, but will pass air and light in. And no one can get into the basement that way (even if skinny enough to pass the holes in the brick built bars)
When I was done admiring my work of art, I placed it into the place: Not bad considering I invest 0 dinars/euros into the materials. But this required about six hours of work. I enjoyed every minute of it.
Next...electricity work is done...starting on polishing the bricks, varnishing them and first round of painting the walls.
DAY 21: Finalizing the deal, broken budget, but It will be completed.
I spent two days varnishing brick wall with two layers of varnish. My budget suffered greatly due to this, since I thought that my old home made varnish should be enough, but as I tried it, it was clear that I would need a few more cans. Yeah...a few more... And after lots of hours of varnishing, first layer was completed, second day was easier, since varnish provided smoother bricks and mortar to work with: I think it looks much better and the color is much deeper and richer when varnished. Please note a big neon light. Here is comparison between non-treated and treated bricks:. Electricity is also done, I had to make 22 meters long cable and use the old chimney hole that goes through the building to pass it from my apartment to the basement. I have six connectors at my disposal. 1. For 120cm long neon light above the main work table.
2. For 250W work table lamp.
3. For PC
4. For FM radio.
5. For 2kW heater
6. Misc Metal door was also painted in two layers with gray paint, a piece of custom wood panel that allows heating and electricity pipes to go through it was placed above the door, and green carpet was placed also. I will trim excess material on the wood (white foam, when it hardens enough). And finally, my favorite picture, 95%: Not bad considering this was the beginning: Ok after almost a month, I was very pleased.
Next...my tables were to arrive, old PC was about to be installed there, together with a chair.
DAY 23: Tables arrived. Well, "tables" were just a wooden boards made by my carpenter friend, with fancy alu legs. Budget...I forgot to take picture with them in place, but I will show them when all is done.
When I got back from work, we immediately started mounting the table in its position. We drilled the holes in three walls, and secured the table. That way it can support lots of weight. We have added three more legs. Now it stood very stable and firm. I still had to wait for a display shelf (an old shelf from my cottage home), but I could finally start the (very) fun part: Bringing down the parts!
Firstly, I took a great care cleaning and vacuuming the room.
As I said, I live on the third floor and all the LEGO parts were in my room, pretty much hidden in three different closets. I had various drawers and boxes where I hold them, so I did not have to buy anything new for storage. But that was a trap. When I started taking everything on one pile, there was an unbelievably huge pile of them. That was because when I build a MOC or organizing parts, I never use more than few drawers or boxes at the time. So I did not realize how much stuff I had.
I had cca 60000 parts and this was the first time I saw them altogether.
So I began moving them. I had to ask my brother and his gf to help me, we had to go seven times up and down. Then I throw out my brother and began the most beautiful part: sorting all the parts to the new room!
Those few hours were worth every day of hard work spent on building the room. It was so therapeutic that I did not feel the fatigue and exhaustion any more. All my parts were pretty organized in the apartment, but they were never altogether at one place. So I had to organize them to make them look good, beside being easy to reach.
This was the result: Later I have added few more drawers so final unite is some decimeters wider. Right now the whole stack is 210cm long. Table at that side is cca 270 cm long.
There is around 300 drawers ready to be filled with parts :) Still to do:
1. mount the display shelf (at the opposite side of the room), where should also be some parts, mainly big plates and stuff that can only be in Frigo plastic containers.
2. clean and sort
3. rest.
4. build mocs :)
PART IV:
New metal cabinets: (After a few years, I live in a rented 25m2 (269sq ft) studio apartment (one room apartment) nearby) A few dozen orders later, I wanted to upgrade the storage units. I found a guy that makes a custom metal cabinets with clear plastic drawers, any size you want.
It was pretty expensive, more than all the money that went into the building of the room, but I knew I had to invest into it. So, after I got the metal cabinets, I sold the old plastic ones, and transferred all the parts to their new home and the room looked like this:
PART V: SIDE QUEST I:
Cleaning the part and cabinets: (Two years passed, I was back living in my main two bedroom apartment with my girlfriend). Dust. We all hate it, as it just loves to cover our precious parts and models.
Even though I kept all my parts in the drawers, dust always finds a way to them. I should have covered the cabinets with cloth when I do not build. Never mind, it was the time to clean all of the parts nevertheless. I will keep this section short as it is not the main point of the topic.
Basically, the plan is to hand clean all 98kg of pieces, by damping them in warm water, with mild detergent and then carefully polish them with soft cloth until shine. Most of the parts are almost new, but dusty. It may be hard to see, but they are indeed dusty: Soaking: Cleaning: This is how the main area for cleaning looked like: Dry cloth was placed on the table, metal cabinet would stand on the left, a big lamp was later mounted on the right, and lots of cloth materials for cleaning, and a few extra soft brushes for really dusty pieces, before they were soaked.
After drying, we took EACH piece and clean it with a soft cloth until they were shiny. A team of four of us had to do this for several weeks in total!
If I had known it would take so much time, I would have never tried to clean all of them at once.
From now on, I put a cover over the cabinets. I have 3 big cloth covers that always cover the cabinets, and when I want to build, I just lift one side of the cloths and roll them on top of the cabinets. When I am done, I roll the cloths down. PART VI:
Moving the parts back to the apartment: After we finished cleaning the parts, we took a break for a few weeks. Of course, all that cleaning was not just because I was bored, there was much more sinister plan why I wanted the parts to be like new again: I decided I should step up...back to the apartment
The cellar was great, it had music, a PC, a heater, privacy etc...But, I did not have an Internet connection, couldn't search for an image of the object I was building, I wanted to be able to build or check if something is possible without having to get out of the apartment, dress up, unlock all the doors, and bring all the MLCad files I wanted to try in real life, turn on the PC down there etc...
So, I made a transfer: I moved some of my work-related equipment down there, and brought back the LEGO into the newly renovated office in my apartment. When I decided the LEGO will be back to the apartment, I arranged some restoration:
- Polished wooden floor,
- Fresh paint,
- New fancy lights all around,
- Several new power outlets,
- Some stone decoration on the wall,
- New "table" with the old alu legs: Few days after when all was dry, I could start bringing the fresh clean parts: On the left side part of the office is visible, it consists of a PC, two monitors, a laptop and a chair. Finished adding the metal cabinets. Cleaned all the misc. And finally, I present the final installment in this epic journey, the finished LEGO room with 98kg of clean, fresh parts sorted: One of the important requirements was that I had the central position in the LEGO part of the room, and that I can reach everything from that metal chair with sturdy wheels.
I can literally drag around on it and grab any part from any storage unit in the room PART VII: Final thoughts: This setup has been like this for the last few months, and I can honestly say this works best for me.
I have been building for the last 30 years (with several dark ages that lasted for a few years each), I am now 36, and I have probably tried every possible setup, location and approach I could think of, and I am happy that I got to this point.
Compared to the basement setup, this setup is approximately the same size, but my PCs are always there and online, with my LEGO hard drive with blueprints, images and MLCad, I can instantly check if something I think of can be made with bricks, I can test anything at any moment, and I can build in shorter sessions, on the break, after the work, or just before and after the movie night, which is a must for my girlfriend and me
In short, a dream LEGO room come true. And working on a new MOC right now is indeed a pleasure I would love to thank EB for giving me so many nice ideas and the opportunity to peek inside other LEGO rooms all around the world!
Thanks for reading up to this point, dear reader, you are awesome!