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Lego's 0.002mm specification and its implications for manufacturing (2025)

thewave.engineer

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Re: Lego's 0.002mm specification and its implications for manufacturing (2025)

#311

Post by abustamam »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #305
mytailorisrich wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, that's not the case. For instance, the median household income in the United States in 1976 was $12,686. That's $72,857.55 today based on inflation (Google/Census Bureau Data + online inflation calculator). However, Google's AI overview says " As of early 2026, the median household income in the United States is estimated to be approximately $84,000. " So the the median household income in the US today is about $…

The key terms in this discussion are disposable income and discretionary income. Housing share if income has outpaced inflation, as have many other categories. You can simultaneously make more and have less if your income doubles but rent goes from 25% to 50%

I remember reading in a personal finance book, it's not about what you earn, it's about what you keep. I think the concept applies here too, even if the context is slightly different.

Re: Lego's 0.002mm specification and its implications for manufacturing (2025)

#312

Post by jamesfinlayson »

Keyframe wrote: post #251
qingcharles wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These collectible (read: branded) sets are what saved them from bankruptcy, though.

How can you go bankrupt with Lego? That's almost like going bankrupt with Coca Cola. It's probably one of the most if not the most recognizable toy brand there is. I'll have to read up on this, sounds like a fantastic voyage of mismanagement, if true.

It was in one of those Netflix documentaries - I didn't realise it at the time but there was an 18 month period from 2003 to 2004 during which no new Harry Potter or Star Wars movies came out so sales of the licensed IP sets was down.

Re: Lego's 0.002mm specification and its implications for manufacturing (2025)

#313

Post by kalleboo »

StilesCrisis wrote: post #208
gmueckl wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had a weird build recently with the Luxo Jr model. There are a couple of cavities in the model that are partially filled in with very small parts. These parts don't connect in a way that makes then structural. I'm still puzzled why these parts are there.

That's the one I was building too!

Are they the pieces that are colored like Pixar characters? https://jaysbrickblog.com/reviews/review-lego-21357-disney-p...

Re: Lego's 0.002mm specification and its implications for manufacturing (2025)

#314

Post by brazzy »

bombcar wrote: post #149
brazzy wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It has almost 4 times the number of pieces, but is only about 50% longer and wider - there's just way more smaller pieces. Price per piece is very misleading when comparing older and newer sets. The newer ones have more details, look slicker, but have a lot less "meat". Which is not that great for creative play.

It's the other way around - because pieces cost roughly based on their size (amount of material) modern Lego sets are "denser" and heavier on average than similar sized sets of the past, because as piece count (and detail) goes up, piece size has been going down.

The discussion is about price, not cost. Lego is keeping the price per piece somewhat stable because they know people look at that, but as pieces get smaller (and thus cost less to make), their margins go up, and sets get smaller for the same price.

The set that started this subthread is very much an outlier in that regard. Usually it looks like this: https://www.reddit.com/r/legostarwars/comments/1lpuz4d/lego_...

Re: Lego's 0.002mm specification and its implications for manufacturing (2025)

#315

Post by lloeki »

tracker1 wrote: post #164
scatbot wrote: post #12

Lego is one of those companies that is simultaneously amazing and kind of sucks. On one hand the core product is incredible. The tolerances on the bricks are micrometer-level precision and the fact that pieces from the 70s snap perfectly into ones made today is mind blowing. On the other hand, a lot what the company does today just sucks. Set prices are outrageous. Printed bricks get replaced with stickers and many s…

I feel the same... I remember as a kid, being able to get kits of hundreds of just random blocks and variations and just being able to build/play... all the sets today are all custom blocks that just constrain you and often aren't significantly reusable while I'm not sure that I've even seen basic block kits anywhere in decades now. edit: I know you can get thousands piece brick sets from third parties or random bulk…

> all the sets today are all custom blocks that just constrain you and often aren't significantly reusable

Given the crazy assembly that is happening in the adjacent room, my kid would vehemently disagree.

Re: Lego's 0.002mm specification and its implications for manufacturing (2025)

#316

Post by FinnKuhn »

bigstrat2003 wrote: post #129
FinnKuhn wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can argue this for their sets targeting children and I don't think anyone minds stickers on those. On display sets for multiple hundred Euros however it just looks cheap due to different surfaces and colors - especially as no one is ever going to disassemble these sets.

I have some of those display sets and I think the stickers look fine. Yeah it's less convenient than printed pieces, but I think the complaints are significantly overblown.

I have one since a few years (it's a display set) and you can clearly see the stickers now as they haven't aged the same being subjected to sunlight.

I also have a set from another manufacturer that prints everything and there you don't have this problem.

Re: Lego's 0.002mm specification and its implications for manufacturing (2025)

#317

Post by FinnKuhn »

ryukoposting wrote: post #242
FinnKuhn wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can argue this for their sets targeting children and I don't think anyone minds stickers on those. On display sets for multiple hundred Euros however it just looks cheap due to different surfaces and colors - especially as no one is ever going to disassemble these sets.

I think that's fair, though I'm sure we would disagree on plenty of edge cases in the definition of a "display-oriented" set. It just feels to me like AFOLs poopoo on any set for having stickers, without considering the advantages stickers have from the POV from the POV of a child with few LEGOs and fewer dollars.

In my case I think we can agree that the Lego Icons series is mostly display sets I think. At least those are what I was thinking of and that is how Lego markets them as well.

Re: Lego's 0.002mm specification and its implications for manufacturing (2025)

#318

Post by utopiah »

jamesfinlayson wrote: post #312
Keyframe wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How can you go bankrupt with Lego? That's almost like going bankrupt with Coca Cola. It's probably one of the most if not the most recognizable toy brand there is. I'll have to read up on this, sounds like a fantastic voyage of mismanagement, if true.

It was in one of those Netflix documentaries - I didn't realise it at the time but there was an 18 month period from 2003 to 2004 during which no new Harry Potter or Star Wars movies came out so sales of the licensed IP sets was down.

Is it episode 7 of "The Toys That Made Us" (May 2018)?

If so that'd make a lot of sense, same thing for Google where founders hated advertising but when it was either going under or getting rich by doing the 1 thing they didn't to go, they chose wealth.

Re: Lego's 0.002mm specification and its implications for manufacturing (2025)

#319

Post by arkh »

roelschroeven wrote: post #189
arkh wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can still buy basic brick sets. With lot of nice color nowadays. Like the CLassics or Creator lines: https://www.lego.com/en-us/themes/classic And for $100 you get a lot of bricks to play with and let your imagination go wild. Just don't buy sets aimed at adults and IP fansumers.

The point is: when I was a kid, all Lego sets consisted almost completely of general bricks. You could, and would, start building different things from the moment you got your first set, and the possibilities would increase exponentially once you got a few more sets. Any set contributed to your collection of building blocks to create new things.

I think you have the same feeling I have with most modern sets (and especially technic ones): not blocky enough and too much smooth curved surfaces. But you can still make blocky stuffs if you want to, while being able to learn modern lego building methods and integrate those curved designs in your builds.

Re: Lego's 0.002mm specification and its implications for manufacturing (2025)

#320

Post by alpaca128 »

mmustapic wrote: post #281
mcphage wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As long as the quality moat persists The risk Lego faces is that they don't actually have a quality moat any longer. You can get non-lego sets with no stickers, plenty of prints, LED lighting, at a cheaper price, and with the exact same piece quality. I purchased this set: https://www.lumibricks.com/collections/steampunk-world/produ... over Christmas, and I paid $105 because it was on sale. The pieces were indistin…

What you mention is true, but Lego sets are (almost always) very well designed, specially the ones for kids.

I've seen enough reviews of recent Lego sets to doubt this. Sets with a brick or two where the color is off, sets where the final model falls apart if you look at it wrong, and when there's fan designed alternatives which are more solid and better looking it's clear it wasn't a physical limitation.

Not to mention sets that indeed just feel like a ripoff, like the pyramid of giza which costs $130 and is actually just half of a pyramid, but the backside of the model has slots that let you connect it with another half if you buy two of them. And they even admit in the marketing it's an incomplete product with "Complete the pyramid - This model comes with clear instructions and can be connected to a second model (sold separately) to create a full pyramid", of course only visible after scrolling or looking at more product pictures.

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