MOCs, how much do they end up costing?

[psdillon]

$1000 for 2500 pieces can only mean you are using some rare stuff (the kind of stuff I usually run away from),

Yeah, I'm revising my guess down to $600 for the average 2500 piece MOC, where parts haven't been sourced from PAB wall or existing inventory. As I mentioned before, I tend to use alot of windows/panels that cost around $0.80 each, so that's why I'm getting a skewed price-per-part ratio. A 2500 piece MOC of mine would be much larger than a typical 2500 piece MOC due to the large windows & panels.

7 - 7900 pieces / ~650$

Ouch, that one comes out at $0.08 per piece. Assuming you're using 1x1 tiles?

It really was just me wanting it to be under $30. I didn't actually run any previous calculations besides the "oh, it should be about that much" thoughts. There were a couple specific pieces I needed in higher quantities so I went through the first few shops that had those plus the other pieces I needed and ended up shopping from 2 stores totally $60 between the 2. I guess the only thing I could have done better was shop around more but that would have taken so much more time and I already had put a couple hours into it.

Brickficiency really helps with this and doesn't take much effort:

http://buildingoutlo...ickficiency.php

Edited May 3, 2014 by psdillon

[antp]

I MOC mostly from my parts inventory, that's much cheaper :D (but it requires a rather large initial parts inventory)

And I do not keep my MOCs at the end, to re-use the parts for the next one.

Edited May 3, 2014 by antp

[MKJoshA]

Brickficiency really helps with this and doesn't take much effort:

http://buildingoutlo...ickficiency.php

Where has this been all my life! This is perfect, thanks for sharing it!

[TheOrcKing]

I only use parts from my own collection which is constantly being added upon from every set I purchase in store new. The few times I bought anything off BrickLink was for specific and typically older minifigures or even a couple sets. I honestly have no idea as to calculating what it cost to build something considering all the pieces came from a number of sets bought at retail or sometimes discount.