Greater Brick Area

Useful Links

• Building Instructions

• Bricklink - largest Lego "store" with lots of data about bricks, sets and pricing. Can programmatically access, or if a seller, use the API.

• Colors - photo of every color and neat analysis.

Washing Legos

If you are buying used bricks, it is wise to clean them. Lego has official cleaning instructions, and there are some good tips out there, here are they key points:

• Disconnect all pieces, maybe Google image search anything that looks interesting

• Use warm water not hotter than 104F

• Use a detergent safe for synthetic fabrics (legos are usually ABS, sometimes polyethylene )

• To disinfect, use 1 cup vinegar per 4 cups water

• Dry on pile of sheet covered with towels, spread out with windows open and fan; don't use heat

• Folks say to remove stickers - I found they survive one wash and it may not be needed.

I clean with one wash tub and one rinse tub using pillow cases to hold the pieces. Washing 25lbs of bricks is a workout!

Automated sorting

There have been several attempts to make automatic Lego sorters. Here is the state-of-the-art to build off of. Hacker News (HN) has good Q&A with creators.

• Lego Parts Sorter by Brickformula (2014) - Youtube,

• LEGO Mindstorms NXT Vision Guided Brick Sorter by Akiyuki - youtube

• LEGO MINDSTORMS EV3 Color Sorter Programming Using MATLAB & Stateflow - Instructables

• Sorting 2 metric tons of Legos by Jacques Mattheij - HN, Blog 1, Blog 2, Blog 3; Goal with this project is industrial-scale so it moved away from Lego parts

• Lego Sorter using TensorFlow on Raspberry Pi (2018) - Medium

• Universal Lego Sorting Machine by Daniel West (2019) - HN, Youtube about device, AI Youtube, distributor component, raspberry pi article, capture pipeline article, training article

• A.I. LEGO® Sorter (2019) - Thesis

• BrickIT AI (2020) - not a sorter, but part recognition. Youtube

• Mechatronics Project: Lego Sorter by Réda Babour et al (2020) - Instructables

• Github repos

  • https://github.com/archieroques/LegoSorter

  • https://github.com/mreutegg/lego-sorter

  • https://github.com/blazejkustra/lego-sorting-machine

Overview of machine

• Mechanism to separate legos - usually two conveyor belts and maybe a vibrating feeder

• Imaging area - use good lighting, background may be tough

• Computer vision - segmentation, image transit, piece identification

• Binning - air or arms to push pieces into sorting bins. More bins means fewer passes through the sorter