Subject:
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Re: Questions for FAQ
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.faq
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Date:
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Sat, 27 Feb 1999 17:22:40 GMT
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Reply-To:
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cmasi@cmasi.chem(spamcake).tulane.edu
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Viewed:
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1680 times
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Larry Pieniazek wrote:
> Robert Wallace wrote:
>
> Q1:
>
> > How do they (TLG) determine which pieces go into which bags in a kit?
> <snip>
I do not know.
>
>
> Q2:
> > Related: Is the kit inventory build process automated? Or is there
> > some poor guy with really thick glasses going "Seventeen black 1X2s?
> > Check. Two black rubber bands? Check. Thirty-four glow-green dots?
> > One, two, three, four, five, six, seven...".
> >
> > If it's automated, I'd sure be interested in how that works.
The process is automated, and I do not think I am giving away any
secrets...I have not worked for LEGO Systems Inc. since 1987
As I remember there were about a dozen baggers around 1986-87. Most of the
baggers had 16 hoppers, but two of them had 18 hoppers.
A few (3 to 4?) operaters made certain that the baggers were making the
little plastics bags or moving boxes to catch the full baggies.
Usually two material handlers made certain that all the machines had the
write bricks (that was one of my jobs).
A brief description...
The machines looked like long draggons spitting bags of LEGO out of their
mouths.
The devices were long conveyor belts (at floor level) with little buckets
riding on the conveyor.
The bucket would pass under a hopper and a piece would fall in (I think
multiple pieces cold be dropped too).
The bucket would move to the next hopper get another piece...and so on.
I cannot remember if the buckets are weighed but I do not think so. I
think the count was checked when the brick fell from the hopper to the
bucket; however, when sets are boxed the piece count is checked by weighing
set. (I have a story about this for another time).
Then the bucket would go up a conveyor and at the top the pieces were
dropped into a waiting bag.
The bags were made from a roll of plastic. The sheet would be curled into
a cyclinder and fused along the side. The bottom of the bag was made by a
device that sealed and cut the baggie off.
The bag was sealed and cut off. The sealing of the full bag created the
bottom of the next bag. And the process contiued over and over again.
The hoppers were neat. The top of the hopper was a bowl with a spiral
(approximately 3 studs wide) that ran from the bottom of the bowl to the
top. The bowls vibrated and the vibrating action caused the brick to move
UP the incline. Very neat watching the LEGO bricks march up the ramp.
The largest piece count box I ever remember handling was a box containing
10,000 small gears (the ones used in the first differential gear housing).
I was kinda cool handling the materials for these machines; especially when
staging the next run. We would be driving forklifts to get pallets of LEGO
(by the way the forklifts were yellow with a big LEGO Logo on them) and
then we would create wall of boxes of LEGO next to the machines so we could
switch over the run as quickly as possible. We thought of it as a
challenge, "How quickly could we get the next run up and going?" No,
reason..it was just fun (hard sweaty work, but fun...alot of nice people
worked there while I was there.)
>
>
> The process is automated. Some digging on Dejanews will get you a number
> of posts that describe it in detail. These posts would form the basis of
> a good A to your Q2.(1)
>
> Unfortunately, they do not answer your Q1 question, which is a good one.
> AFAIK, no one has ever said how Lego set designers make the partition
> the set into bags decision.
>
> It is clear, though, that size is a factor, You will almost never find a
> 2x4 brick and a 1x1 round plate in the same bag except for the smallest
> sets (pre Town Jr. that is... all bets are off now.) So the set into
> bags decision may soon be a lost art.
>
> 1 - See also "The World of Lego Toys" (2)chapter "Precision in Plastic"
> starting on p. 67... p. 74 and 75 have good pictures. Text on p. 74 says
> that there are 16 cassettes per bagger. Can anyone validate if 16 is the
> largest number of different element types in a bag??
>
> 2 - copyright 1987. I got mine at the Orlando (Disney Village) LIC. I
> heard they're out but Mall of America (Minnesota) LIC still has them. I
> will check in late Jan as I have arranged an all day layover in MSP.
>
> --
> Larry Pieniazek http://my.voyager.net/lar
> For me: No voyager e-mail please. All snail-mail to Ada, please.
> - Posting Binaries to RTL causes flamage... Don't do it, please.
> - Stick to the facts when posting about others, please.
> - This is a family newsgroup, thanks.
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Message is in Reply To:
 | | Re: Questions for FAQ
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| Robert Wallace wrote: Q1: (...) <snip> Q2: (...) The process is automated. Some digging on Dejanews will get you a number of posts that describe it in detail. These posts would form the basis of a good A to your Q2.(1) Unfortunately, they do not (...) (25 years ago, 4-Jan-99, to lugnet.faq)
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