Subject:
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Re: The first Lego color change of 1962-70
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.color
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Date:
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Fri, 16 Jul 2004 03:04:23 GMT
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Viewed:
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812 times
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In lugnet.general, Gerhard R. Istok wrote:
> Well I see that the color change of 2004 has generated some strong emotions...
>
> The first color change (of modern Lego starting in 1957) was that of 1962-70.
> TLG replaced Cellulose Acetate with ABS Plastic, and in doing so the colors red,
> yellow and blue changed quite a bit, especially red. Any of you who find old
> Lego will agree. The red Cellulose Acetate pieces were more of a red-orange
> color, the yellow pieces were a bright lemony yellow, while the blue pieces were
> a lighter brighter blue. The changes to ABS plastic can hardly be noticed in
> black, gray, white or green Lego, except that the CA pieces were shinier.
>
> Unfortunately, USA Samsonite Lego had a large quantity of old Cellulose Acetate
> granules left over (in red and yellow), and USA sets still had old pieces,
> especially yellow, until 1970. Europe pretty much completed the switch by 1963.
> Samsonite sets from the mid to late 60's sometimes had dark red (ABS) sloped
> bricks along with red-yellow (CA) regular bricks in many of their basic sets.
> And interestingly enough there are some pieces in yellow CA that were never
> available in Europe (small yellow plates, 1x2 and 1x4 bricks with the posts
> underneath, while the 1x6 and 1x8 bricks were still produced with the old (pre
> 1965) "postless" molds.
>
> The 60's were a very confusing time for USA Samsonite Lego. Today's color
> change is relatively minor compared to the chaos of the 60's.
>
> This topic gets discussed in greater depth in my upcoming new cd/book.
>
> Gary Istok
The color change you speak of took place before I was born. The only way it
has affected me is in the collections of old pieces that I have bought from
ebay. Despite the downside of that era's color change, I would have to say that
it was for the best since the ABS plastic is a superior polymer to C.A.
The color change of the 60's & 70's would also have had a lesser impact on
users of that time period, because at most it would have disrupted the
continuity of their 15 year old collection. Today's change has affected 30 year
old colections. I also assume that the 2004 change has affected more people,
but that's just my guess; I really have no numbers to back that up.
From what I've read, The LEGOS made from C.A. could have undergone a color
change anyway after this many years. One of the reasons that TLG switched to
A.B.S. was that it's a more colorfast material. After a few decades, those C.A.
pieces might not have retained their original color. Is that right, or did I
read that in the Enquiror? I'm sure you'd know more about it than me and would
be able to shed some informative light on it, as long as you don't mind giving
away too much info from your new CD/book.
David "Fuzzy" Gregory
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