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woodford86

Is it worth spending the money on sealed MVR/MMV?

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I have a chance to trade my sealed 1:8 porsche for a sealed MVR or MMV (Joust is also an option). I'm okay with the price point, but my hangup is the brittle brown pieces. Both sets have a lot of brown, and its all pre-2018. How bad is the brittle brown issue? Is it worth the risk, or should I just try and source the parts through PAB/new sets as per my original plan? The cost would be at least as much or more this way, but then no risk of breaks.

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I have 2 sealed MMV and I have not considered the brittle brown breakage issue. I just pulled out my used set and rebuilt it a few months back. I did have four pieces break. All brown.

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Chances are they haven't broken but of course could break when they get used. But if they do then buy replacements.

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Last year I had a couple broken pieces after dismantling my Medieval Market set (opening shelf space for the Ideas Blacksmith). I sent a broken pieces replacement request to LEGO, and received them a week later. So I wouldn't worry about that.

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3 minutes ago, GeoBrick said:

Last year I had a couple broken pieces after dismantling my Medieval Market set (opening shelf space for the Ideas Blacksmith). I sent a broken pieces replacement request to LEGO, and received them a week later. So I wouldn't worry about that.

Interesting, I never thought about them respecting those orders this many years later. I think I'm gonna go for it. Worst case just be really careful, but I'll blow a gasket if I somehow break a cow lol.

Now to decide which one to get...MVR or MMV hmmm

Edited by woodford86

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Question about brown pieces, as I never had any of mine break (most from the 90's), was this an issue only during a certain time or does it still happen with new brown parts?

I've always considered ordering bricklink pieces to build my own version of MMV/MVR, but was wondering if it'd be better to go with all new parts and go direct with BAP orders.

Edited by Triceron

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At worst, the brittle brown parts are an annoyance. Certainly not a big enough issue to alter purchase decisions. MMV is a great set. 

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12 minutes ago, Triceron said:

Question about brown pieces, as I never had any of mine break (most from the 90's), was this an issue only during a certain time or does it still happen with new brown parts?

I've always considered ordering bricklink pieces to build my own version of MMV/MVR, but was wondering if it'd be better to go with all new parts and go direct with BAP orders.

The issue with brittle brown parts occurred within the past... I guess 15 or so years? I don't remember the exact dates. Had to do with a batch of bad plastic granulate that affected multiple colors of plastic. On most colors it caused notable discoloration and was able to be isolated and removed, but on colors like dark red, reddish brown, and occasionally dark brown it persisted in Lego's supply for quite a while. I think two or three years ago Lego finally announced that the issue was fully dealt with, but on older sets it's still a problem.

That said, I don't really know if buying new-in-box sets is a good workaround. Mint condition sets from that era are just as likely to be affected as ones that were put together, and to be honest you might have MORE luck avoiding bad parts by buying used sets/parts since if they're still in good condition at the time of being packed/shipped to you, there's probably a better chance that the parts were ones that avoided the issue than there is rolling the dice on brand-new parts from that era that have never been put to the test. Couple that with the fact that new-in-box sets are generally more expensive anyway, and I don't really feel like you'd be getting much added security for that money.

Edited by Lyichir

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Just to clarify, I wasn't intending to buy the new-in-box sets, rather talking about 2020+ new brown pieces that matched the same type of the ones back then instead of say using Bricklink, which might be a dice roll since they don't categorize the specific dates of when certain brown pieces were made or specifically from what sets.  Was more curious if the brown breaking issue was still a thing today.  But thanks for the clarification, seems like it was just a problem from a certain period of time.  I'll have to be more careful with my Dark Red pieces from Castle 2004.

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6 hours ago, Lyichir said:

The issue with brittle brown parts occurred within the past... I guess 15 or so years? I don't remember the exact dates. Had to do with a batch of bad plastic granulate that affected multiple colors of plastic. On most colors it caused notable discoloration and was able to be isolated and removed, but on colors like dark red, reddish brown, and occasionally dark brown it persisted in Lego's supply for quite a while. I think two or three years ago Lego finally announced that the issue was fully dealt with, but on older sets it's still a problem.

The sets I've had it happen to were 10229 Winter Village Cottage (2012), 10223 Kingdoms Joust (2012), and 7947 Prison Tower Rescue (2010).  I disassembled, cleaned, and rebuilt all my winter village sets in 2020 and the cottage was the only one I remember getting broken parts in the process.  The two castle sets both have had a few tumbles from where I keep them, and a few pieces got broken in the falls (all brown or dark red).

 

I have also heard of people who have had issues with the 75060 UCS Slave I (2015) and 75059 UCS Sandcrawler (2014).  I own the Slave I, but I'm terrified to rebuild it (luckily the dust on it isn't too bad).  I own several other sets from this time frame that have also never been rebuilt and could have issues.

 

But from these few examples alone, the issue was definitely present in sets produced between 2010 and 2015, at least.

 

Edited by Phyre

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4 hours ago, Phyre said:

But from these few examples alone, the issue was definitely present in sets produced between 2010 and 2015, at least.

Yop, i own quite a few Uruk-Hais and after 10 years i am too scared to even move legs/arms for most of them since some did break doing that. Combination of dark brown and dark red is a killer for these minifigs.

Edited by sahidko

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From the Uruk Hai Army set I had a reddish brown horse broken in two when just moving the back legs … Pearl gold arms are worse though.

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brittle brown issue is real. I try to avoid using a brick separator, that thing applies to much pressure for brittle brown to handle

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LEGO did visibly change the pearl gold coloring around 2019, and the brown/darkred fix was announced somewhere for 2018, wonder if that was the cut-off point where LEGO used new manufacturing method for those colors.

Now I'm kinda worried for Nexo Knight sets from 2016-2018 which use a lot of brown/darkbrown in the first wave, and a lot more gold in the second/3rd wave.

Edited by TeriXeri

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All my kingdom Brown bricks broke even in storage after years but it’s just best to replace them with new ones, I sat down and tracked down all the ones I had and all is good! 

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I guess I lucked out that most of those were in production during my dark ages.

I think the only real broken pieces in my collection are the mostly transparent bricks and windshields from Classic era Space.  Those are really brittle when stored with other bricks.  Other than that, it'd be the odd broken clip or cracked torso.

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23 hours ago, sahidko said:

Yop, i own quite a few Uruk-Hais and after 10 years i am too scared to even move legs/arms for most of them since some did break doing that. Combination of dark brown and dark red is a killer for these minifigs.

 

22 hours ago, Moexy said:

From the Uruk Hai Army set I had a reddish brown horse broken in two when just moving the back legs … Pearl gold arms are worse though.

Oh man, I never even really considered how much it might affect minifigs and animals too, but yeah it definitely would.  My Uruk-Hai and LOTR horses have been just sitting around for several years now, this makes me afraid to even touch them.

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Well don't touch them if you don't need to. :D I think the way you store/display them might help a bit. The ones I had stored in a box look in better shape than the displayed ones.

Edited by sahidko

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I can chime in on this with my anecdotal story too!

I had quite a few of the sets from the Fantasy Era, mostly from the 2007 wave. I recently uncovered most of these from an old box, and they were covered in dust but still mostly intact. I decided to disassemble them to clean and sort the pieces, and in the process I had quite a few pieces break on me. Of course, the pieces that broke were all either Dark Red or Reddish Brown.

I suspect a set that is still sealed might fare better (and make for an excellent display piece). But if you ever decide to disassemble it, you might experience pieces breaking despite your best efforts at being careful! :doh1:

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Interestingly, I've rebuilt my Medieval Market Village 3-4 times over the years and the only pieces I've had break are 2 of the window frames and the blacksmith's torso.

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I had reddish brown bricks break the very first time I (very gently, as always) disassembled the MMV. It was definately not a great time period for reddish brown...

That said, it's a wonderful set - one of my very favorites. In fact, I'm going to rebuild it in anticipation of the upcoming castle. MVR is good as well, but not quite as great as MMV. Get MMV if you can. But not MVR at the same value, it should be a bit cheaper.

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Looking at MVR at the moment. Found one without goats which makes it actually affordable. Yes I’d like a goat but not that much.

Edited by Rjbricks

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I've bought the farmer minifigs on bricklink several years ago, so never felt the need to have the rest of the set.

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