Where to get lots of basic bricks & what are all these colours?

[Hrw-Amen]

I have recently come back to LEGO after a period away of about 15 years or so. I still have all my old LEGO but cannot get at it right now as it is in the attic at my parents and I cannot go up there. (I hope I will be able to one day.) I am trying build up a reasonable collection of basic bricks but am finding it hard to source them in quantity at a reasonable price. I have tried the Brick-link site and have got some good bricks, but these have tended to be special shaped ones. They don't seem (Or at least the stores I've looked at so far.) to have masses of 'normal' bricks, OK they have some but not loads. By 'normal' I mean 2X4X1, 1X4X1 and the like. Just plain ordinary bricks. Is it a case of having to go to the LEGO store and using the pickabrick section or are there other places. I've also looked on e-bay, but although I've got a few that way they can be much more exspensive and chewed.

I hhave also noted that there seems to be a huge range of colours. When I had LEGO in the past I think it was white, yellow, blue, red and black and that was it. Green and Grey for plates and bases. I think just when I left LEGO all those years ago they had just brought out a few green 'normal' bricks for some sets that had Octan trucks and things. But now I am a bit amazed at the variety. Did they all suddenly get introduced all at once at some point or have they just come in dribs and drabs over the years and for specific sets?

Thanks for your help.

[Brickdoctor]

You can use Pick-a-Brick online, or buy one of the Basic Brick Tubs. Bricklink does have basic bricks (and plenty of them) as well.

[Rufus]

There are plenty of boxes of bricks available, here is an example:

They're useful for building up a collection, but there's a limit to what you can do with just a pile of 'ordinary' bricks - it depends on what you want to do.

As for the colours - I'm no expert, but new colours appear gradually as you suggest. Newer colours like dark green, dark tan and medium nougat (see the colour range here) are only available in certain sets, and in a limited part range, so you might have to use Bricklink to get those colours.

[fred67]

PAB wall is a good bet; if you don't want to stand there meticulously packing round containers with square bricks, trying to maximize value, you can ask if they have a box. It's iffy which is a better deal, but it's a lot less annoying than packing those containers.... I know there's comparisons around here somewhere; I got something like 640 2x4 bricks in a box, if I remember correctly. The smaller the piece, it seems, the better the value compared to what S@H (or bricklink) charges.

Of course, then, you're limited to what they have on the wall.... they usually have basic bricks, but maybe not exactly what you're looking for in the color you want.

On bricklink, search for the item... go to the catalog entry for a 2x4 brick, for example, and click on the color you want in Lots For Sale. Sort by cheapest price (the default), but put a minimum quantity for how many you want... say 500 for example.

Sometimes you can get a better deal if you're willing to buy from two or more sellers. So if you want 500, you set the minimum quantity to 250, sorted by price - you might get lucky and the first shop has all you need, but maybe not. Make sure you are also specifying new or used.

EDIT: Follows Closely listed the box counts in this post.

Edited April 24, 2011 by fred67

[Aanchir]

Did someone say colours?

There's a huge number of LEGO colors, which are incredibly hard to keep track of. For building a collection, I'd recommend sticking to the current colors, of which there are about 60. This way your bricks won't be incompatible with those you're likely to find in stores.

LEGO's color palette expanded gradually but without much restraint until they realized the problem they had around 2004. Since then, they've cut down significantly on their color palette, even though it's still pretty broad with a lot of colors that people rarely have in great quantity.

Most of the colors you listed as remembering from your childhood have remained pretty much the same over the years. There are a couple other colors that have been replaced entirely, though, most significantly 25 Earth Orange (the original brown color) with the 192 Reddish Brown, 2 Grey (the original light grey) with 194 Medium Stone Grey (Light Bluish Grey, and 27 Dark Grey (the original dark grey) with 199 Dark Stone Grey (Dark Bluish Grey). These three colors changed in 2004 when LEGO first began to restructure their color system into something more manageable, and have been standard ever since. Other colors were also changed at the same time, but these tended to be more obscure colors that few people had in great quantity.

As for basic bricks, I'd recommend buying sets from the "Bricks & More" line, such as this year's 5749 Creative Building Kit or, if you can find it, last year's 5508 Deluxe Brick Box which contains many very useful pieces as well as two minifigures. Since Bricks & More sets tend to have mostly basic bricks, they have some of the lowest price-per-piece ratios of any LEGO sets out today. The Deluxe Brick Box in particular has mostly basic colors, but it includes some more-recent and less-frequent colors like 102 Bright Orange (Orange, introduced in 1998) and 119 Bright Yellowish Green (Lime, also introduced in the late 90s/early 2000s). And it has a good mix between basic bricks and semi-specialized pieces like doors and windows.