What's the Biggest and Smallest Lego Piece of All Time?

[CP5670]

The differences would be significant in some cases. Pieces containing metal or rubber components would generally be heavier than purely plastic pieces. A control center (even without batteries) or the 8466 tires are much heavier than raised mountain baseplates, for example.

[davee123]

The lightest was tested back in 2001 by Chris Tracey on a chemistry scale:

http://news.lugnet.com/market/shipping/?n=362

He found that the lightest element (of the candidates listed at the time) was a minifig coin, although he didn't test the small plume or dragon plumes, which are possible contenders (I think I'd still bet on the coin, though).

As for volume, that's tough. The hardest part about measuring the volume would be:

1) air bubbles sticking to the parts

2) the elements floating

The accuracy in terms of telling how far the water level progresses up a cylinder can be aided by using the right equipment for the job (skinny cylinders or flasks) and using high quantity. If you tested (say) 100 coins and 100 plumes, the difference is magnified by a factor of 100, so is easier to see.

Plastic density is iffy in these small amounts, though. The ABS mixture has changed over the years, so it may be lighter or heavier from one year to another. It also varies with the type of part, as seen in, say, the broadswords that used to be a higher concentration of ABS, and now use a different mixture so they're less brittle and more flexible. I honestly don't know how much of a difference it makes-- it might be significant enough to change an element's mass so that it's heavier than one with more volume, hard to say.

DaveE

[Mr. Elijah Timms]

Okay, kind of a weird question, but I was thinking the other day... what's THE smallest Lego piece ever made?

I have a lot of Lego in my collection, but as far as I can recollect I can't imagine anything being smaller than the small plume piece, as pictured here:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE BRICKLINK ENTRY ON THIS PART)

Am I right, or is there something smaller? And, if I am indeed correct, what's the runner-up?

Edited January 24, 2012 by Mr. Elijah Timms

[obsidianheart]

Maybe Twitch's antenna?

http://www.bricklink.com/catalogItem.asp?P=90192

[just2good]

Levers are also pretty small...and coins are too! Edited January 24, 2012 by just2good

[JackJonespaw]

I'm going with coins or cherries. Those are pretty small.

[Legogal]

Each cherry is small, but is one piece the whole stalk or whatever of 3 cherries? Thank god each cherry is not a single piece or I could never see them to pick them up off the floor or place them where they should be! They are so lightweight that they always bounce out of whatever fruit bowl I manage to put them in, so they always end up on the floor! :laugh:

[Shadows]

A coin is a pretty good guess, but I'd go with a minifig hand. I'm certain that if you melted both, the hand is made of less plastic, at least.

[Hobbestimus]

A coin is a pretty good guess, but I'd go with a minifig hand. I'm certain that if you melted both, the hand is made of less plastic, at least.

And I think the minifigure pirate hook would be even smaller.

[brickmack]

Either coins or flowers.

[Sid Sidious]

Coins and flowers both come on sprues, so you would have to count all four plus the middle piece. I think it's a sticker sheet.

[wokajablocka]

A coin is a pretty good guess, but I'd go with a minifig hand. I'm certain that if you melted both, the hand is made of less plastic, at least.

Dont melt it , why would you not just weigh it?

I would have to probably have to go with the hook hand at the moment.

Edited January 24, 2012 by wokajablocka

[antp]

This reminds me an old topic,

http://www.eurobricks.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=35795

[Blondie-Wan]

I'd say that the minifig hand is probably the smallest part.

A coin is a pretty good guess, but I'd go with a minifig hand. I'm certain that if you melted both, the hand is made of less plastic, at least.

And I think the minifigure pirate hook would be even smaller.

A minifigure hand isn't officially a distinct, separate part, though; it may be removeable, but as I understand it, it's not really designed to be, and removing it from the arm (or the arm from the torso) stresses it more than normal LEGO assembly & disassembly.

IIRC, TLG itself stated somewhere that the smallest LEGO element was "the coin," though they didn't distinguish between the four different coins that existed then. I'll have to see if I can find where they said that...

[Sid Sidious]

A lot of people have said on here (Ok, it was in 2009, but it still counts) that it would be hard to take the volume of a piece because it floats. To fix this, you could put the piece in a different, less dense, liquid in a graduated cylinder. For example, ethanol.

[Piranha]

Hmmm, smallest part either a coin or a minifig hand or maybe a plume; the original feather one?

Largest I would guess would be some raised baseplate but the T-rex from the new Dino theme is giving it a run for its money, it has some pretty dense plastic there.

[lisqr]

This is probably one of the biggest non-baseplate pieces.

I judge a piece's size by how much space it takes in my storage space.

Edited January 26, 2012 by lisqr

[JackJonespaw]

Gotta say the biggest piece is the 64 x 64 plate. I wonder what the biggest minifg piece is?

[wokajablocka]

Gotta say the biggest piece is the 64 x 64 plate. I wonder what the biggest minifg piece is?

The CMF S6 Minotaur head is pretty big and bulky, cant think of anything else at the moment but I only built it last night so its fresh in my mind.

[CMP]

The CMF S6 Minotaur head is pretty big and bulky, cant think of anything else at the moment but I only built it last night so its fresh in my mind.

The big jetpack with handles?

[LEGOman273]

Do you mean biggest/smallest as in most/least plastic, of as in size of the piece?

[DaddyDeuce]

What about the 1x1 round tile?

[CaptainCRO]

Maybe it has been mentioned before, but the smallest would probably be THE RING.

[Oddibossity]

For the smallest amount of materials used, how about the Star Wars Sandtrooper pauldron?

EDIT: Or how about a 1x1 tile sticker?

Edited February 20, 2012 by Oddibossity

[Modulex Guy]

Modulex 1x1 cheese slope gets my vote.

Its about a third of the size of a LEGO cheese.