sin Posted January 10, 2014 I just received my first 2 BL orders. Only 67 pieces but it marks the beginning! I have another 11 BL orders that have shipped and 2 that have not yet been invoiced ( one of them is 127 lots so I figured it would take a while, the other I'm not sure what's going on as its only 12 lots). I also got a shipping notice regarding my PAB order. Unfortunately it also said that some items were back-ordered and that it was only a partial shipment. Total progress now - 443 parts, 18.42% Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Ivan001 Posted January 11, 2014 I just received my first 2 BL orders. Only 67 pieces but it marks the beginning! I have another 11 BL orders that have shipped and 2 that have not yet been invoiced ( one of them is 127 lots so I figured it would take a while, the other I'm not sure what's going on as its only 12 lots). I also got a shipping notice regarding my PAB order. Unfortunately it also said that some items were back-ordered and that it was only a partial shipment. Total progress now - 443 parts, 18.42% Blimey, with that many parts orders the shipping is likely to cost as much as the building? or is shipping a lot cheaper in the US? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Superfunk Posted January 11, 2014 Great topic! The GG ist still one of my favourite modulars. I bricklinked it some months ago, but just this week I decided to add another floor to it: 110 different parts/lots, found most of them in my collection and needed 3 Bricklink orders for the remaining lots. Looking forward to building this! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
sin Posted January 11, 2014 Blimey, with that many parts orders the shipping is likely to cost as much as the building? or is shipping a lot cheaper in the US? I have been tracking shipping costs and minus the two orders that I haven't been invoiced for I have paid a total of $56.64 in shipping charges and packing fees, including my PAB order. That come out to an average of $4.05 per order. Interestingly the most expense shipping charge was the PAB order which was pretty small. Cost of PAB parts was $36.10 and shipping /tax was $8.92, ouch. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Wodanis Posted January 11, 2014 Cost of PAB parts was $36.10 and shipping /tax was $8.92, ouch. That is why when I do PAB orders I usually wait till I am ordering something else to qualify for the free shipping after spending $75. Unfortunately as I wanted the January promo at the Lego store I paid for shipping this time. ($50 was the threshold.) It is easy for me to spend $75 with just PAB. I only wish Bricks and Pieces (BnP) orders counted for VIP points... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
The Jersey Brick Guy Posted January 11, 2014 Are you planning to do the other 2 modulars as well? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
sin Posted January 11, 2014 Are you planning to do the other 2 modulars as well? Yes, but not right away. I need to let the budget recover a bit and both of my kids birthdays are in a couple of months. I have started looking at the parts lists for both though. I'ill definitely do Cafe Corner before Market Street, MS is probably my least favorite in terms of looks. CC will require some more inventive part swapping to keep the cost manageable, but I will want to stick with colors in the actual set like I am doing with GG. I can't let you get me thinking about this too much right now! Maybe late Spring... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Andy D Posted January 11, 2014 (edited) I built the "Blue Grocer" as well. I had wanted to build it for years but I didn't want to spend a lot. I began slowly gathering up the pieces starting with what I could set aside from my own colllection. I found the sand blue 1x2 bricks with grooves on BrickOwl for about $0.15 a piece and decided to just go with sand blue for the whole building. I used a lot of my own parts, and was able to build it for a pretty reasonable cost, although I didn't keep an exact total since I collected the pieces over a year. I made some other changes (alternate colors) as well and I'm really happy with how it turned out. I like that it is mostly unique(other posters seem to have had the same idea). I was glad to get to build an iconic set and enjoyed the challenge of collecting the parts and adjusting the build when necessary. Edit: Here's a photo http://www.flickr.co...02/11856197266/ Wow! Your "Blue Grocer" is great! I wish I had thought of that. As it was I decided to substitute some less expensive colors on the side where it would not be noticed. I also substituted some green window frames (because I had green) for the white ones, I may go back and fix that one day. My Green Grocer still cost me more to BL than a set at that time. Now I look at the cost of a set and decide if I really want an old set "that much". Since the only old set I want that I do not have is the Market Street I just may build it using alternate colors. I saw a good looking tan Market Street, not sure what color I would choose. Andy D Edited January 11, 2014 by Andy D Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
The Jersey Brick Guy Posted January 11, 2014 Yes, but not right away. I need to let the budget recover a bit and both of my kids birthdays are in a couple of months. I have started looking at the parts lists for both though. I'ill definitely do Cafe Corner before Market Street, MS is probably my least favorite in terms of looks. CC will require some more inventive part swapping to keep the cost manageable, but I will want to stick with colors in the actual set like I am doing with GG. I can't let you get me thinking about this too much right now! Maybe late Spring... I know what you mean, I did GC, MS and CC all at the same time to save on costs, in total it took me about 9 months to complete all the purchases for the parts. I was limiting myself to about 100 bucks a month, this allowed my budget to be manageable and also to stay on top of all my parts orders. You will feel such a sense of accomplishment once you're finished building it. Out of the 3, the GC is by far the best. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
TheLegoDr Posted January 12, 2014 I am currently working on green grocer and cafe corner simultaneously, but that is because I just started green grocer. Otherwise I hadn't considered working on multiple sets to save on costs. I guess depending on order sizes, it may save on shipping if certain shops have a lot of the pieces you need. I've been sorting out pieces from my collection and I basically just need the sand green. Everything else is available from my collection. So that helps a lot. There will be a few small orders needed, but shouldn't be too bad. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Wodanis Posted January 12, 2014 That's pretty good LegoDr. I was doing just that with my project. All those extra cheese rooftop pieces came in handy. Do you have a market street as well? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
TheLegoDr Posted January 13, 2014 ^ are you talking to me? No, I don't have a market street. I've considered doing that one as well, but with heavy modifications. It looks really amateur compared to the rest of the series. So it didn't blend in as well in my eyes. So I will change it up. The color scheme is decent but looking at the medium blue near that beautiful sand blue, it makes me want to change the color. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
elleana Posted January 13, 2014 Just getting started on this now with Green Grocer. Am at the first (probably most arduous step) of pricing everything out on BL stores. There are some great fluctuations on individual part prices between stores, and its hard balancing getting the best price for each part without having to order from fifty different stores (and having to pay for shipping fifty times). What I've been trying to do is to identify a couple of large stores that have good prices for the most expensive parts (sand green, I'm talking about you) and try to get as much stuff as possible from them at reasonable prices. Its extremely time consuming and detailed work though, and with the amount of time I've been spending plugging numbers and sorting data in Excel I feel like a first year analyst at an investment bank. I'm only halfway through and I'm already wondering if it would be overall less grief to find a decently priced set on eBay and pull the trigger.. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
The Jersey Brick Guy Posted January 13, 2014 I think 75% of the fun is pricing everything out and searching for the best deals, when I did my 3, I didn't really know how to use Bricklink to it's potential. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
TheLegoDr Posted January 13, 2014 That's true, part of the fun is the hunt! Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
sin Posted January 13, 2014 I think 75% of the fun is pricing everything out and searching for the best deals, when I did my 3, I didn't really know how to use Bricklink to it's potential. That's true, part of the fun is the hunt! I couldn't agree more, I have a slightly sadistic love of making excel sheets for things that have nothing to do with work! My last BL order was invoiced yesterday so I have a final cost for this project - $404.65 including shipping charges and tax, I am quite pleased with that and it comes in a minimum of $200 less than if I would have ponied up for an original set. Well worth the effort. BL orders were trickling in Friday and Saturday, 8 have been received with 7 more plus my PAB order on the way - I now have 554 out of 2405 pieces total. I am keeping my fingers crossed that I can start building this by the end of this week but I'll have to see what was on back order from PAB first. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
timmyc1983 Posted January 13, 2014 Its extremely time consuming and detailed work though, and with the amount of time I've been spending plugging numbers and sorting data in Excel I feel like a first year analyst at an investment bank. I'm only halfway through and I'm already wondering if it would be overall less grief to find a decently priced set on eBay and pull the trigger.. Wait until you start MOCing, when I can afford it again, I will begin sourcing over 7000 bricks for a modular I've designed in LDD My last BL order was invoiced yesterday so I have a final cost for this project - $404.65 including shipping charges and tax, I am quite pleased with that and it comes in a minimum of $200 less than if I would have ponied up for an original set. Well worth the effort. That's really well done!! I think mine came in around $500 but I have a feeling the extra was all in shipping, sometimes it really sux living in Australia!!! But you've done really well, I look forward to seeing the finished product! Happy building Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
TheLegoDr Posted January 13, 2014 So the remaining 2000 pieces are in your last 7 + PAB orders? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
sin Posted January 13, 2014 So the remaining 2000 pieces are in your last 7 + PAB orders? Yes that is correct, 1851 parts to go from 7 BL orders and 1 PAB order. I was forced to place a bunch of smaller orders looking for rarer parts and minifig pieces and most of those arrived 3 to 4 days after I initially ordered. PAB is only 159 pieces and my three largest BL orders are 988, 352 and 185 parts none of which have arrived yet. 3 of the remaining are about 60 parts and the last is only for the 'wig' that was a pain to find. I threw in about 100 pieces unrelated to the GG project into that order to make it worth my while. I had to do the same for the order that had the minifig heads and lime colored cherries. On the plus side I now have 15 dark flesh, 15 dark tan, 15 dark blue-grey and 90 light blue-grey 1 x 2 bricks with the bricks etching on the side plus some cool printed 2 x 2 tiles Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
elleana Posted January 13, 2014 Do you guys mind sharing the merchants on bl you placed the largest orders with? Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
sin Posted January 13, 2014 Do you guys mind sharing the merchants on bl you placed the largest orders with? Sure thing! My largest order was from Voyageur's Brick Company, other order that was kind of big was from Buddysbricks.com - These are both on BL of course. Hope that helps. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Wodanis Posted January 13, 2014 ^ are you talking to me? No, I don't have a market street. I've considered doing that one as well, but with heavy modifications. It looks really amateur compared to the rest of the series. So it didn't blend in as well in my eyes. So I will change it up. The color scheme is decent but looking at the medium blue near that beautiful sand blue, it makes me want to change the color. Yes I was. I agree with that sentiment. I built Market Street on LDD and want to mod it. It does look terribly amateurish. On the back side for example why not put in windows instead of the tan bricks? Seems silly to design it like that. I had my spreadsheets narrowing down the costs but I did not factor in shipping costs. The total cost for the project was estimated around $810 for both sets of GG and CC. I managed to do it for $600! With a combination of PAB, BL and BnP orders. All those extras pieces from sets came in handy. Haha. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
sin Posted January 13, 2014 The total cost for the project was estimated around $810 for both sets of GG and CC. I managed to do it for $600! With a combination of PAB, BL and BnP orders. All those extras pieces from sets came in handy. Haha. Wow, that's nice work! Did you sub a lot of parts/colors? I have done a little investigating with CC and I don't think I could do that alone for $600... Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Wodanis Posted January 13, 2014 (edited) Wow, that's nice work! Did you sub a lot of parts/colors? I have done a little investigating with CC and I don't think I could do that alone for $600... Thanks Sin! That's just the thing, I am about 99% authentic with my parts. I insisted upon myself to keep as many pieces as original as possible. Minus of course the changes I mentioned with Green Grocer. As for Cafe Corner the only thing I may change is the far grey door. I got a horribly scratched one used. The seller stated minor surface scratches...so far removed from the truth as one could get. So I may swap it or leave it out. Don't feel like paying $30 for one right now. Edited January 13, 2014 by Wodanis Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
TheLegoDr Posted January 14, 2014 I agree about those extra pieces in sets..sure they may be small, but they can add up to not needing them for a future MOC. With Cafe Corner, as much as I love staying true to the source material, I am making a lot of changes it seems. I am keeping the original color schemes, but I ended up not using the 1x4x5 doors and instead modified the doorway to accommodate a 1x4x6. That way it is cheaper, plus it keeps it in scale with the rest of the newer modulars. since the 5 height went bye-bye. And since I'm changing my CC to the L shaped corner instead of the traditional corner, I am using a lot more bricks, so I can't say for sure how much it has cost me so far and how much it will end up costing me. But I would definitely recommend picking up the dark red roof slopes and the dark blue arches while you can. I bought enough to build Market street also, but then I realized they are only on the alleyway courtyard area which I don't particularly care for anyway, so I have a lot of extra dark blue arches I guess. Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
