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Translation: we took the fun part out if building Lego and gave it to a machine... Seriously, though, I have a real-world problem which needs a solution: give

Translation: we took the fun part out if building Lego and gave it to a machine... Seriously, though, I have a real-world problem which needs a solution: given the roughly 3000 loose bricks in my son's Lego collection, tell me which ones go with which sets? Thank you - we can take it from here.

Cthulhu_ 5y ago
It probably can be done, if someone hasn't already done it; put the bricks in a bin that pulls it through a conveyor belt, which uses image recognition to determine color + shape, matching that up with known lego pieces. And the list of parts for every set is stored online somewhere as well. The difficulty is that some bricks will look like other bricks, close enough that the image recognition might be accurate. But, some margin for error is fine.
- tomjuggler 5y ago
  I did see a sorting project somewhere, with image recognition. Apparently there is money to be made buying old Lego collections and selling sorted. Just the part where it puts the sets together was missing. If I had the time..
- klausjensen 5y ago
  This is a video about such a project - of course done in LEGO! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=04JkdHEX3Yk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=04JkdHEX3Yk
- mbreese 5y ago
  Here are a few... (and yes, they were on HN at the time) 2017 - Sorting 2 Metric Tons of Lego https://jacquesmattheij.com/sorting-two-metric-tons-of-lego/ https://jacquesmattheij.com/sorting-two-metric-tons-of-lego/ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14226889 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14226889 2019 - AI-powered Lego sorting machine built with Lego bricks https://www.brothers-brick.com/2019/12/06/this-fan-created-the-ultimate-lego-brick-sorting-machine-powered-by-ai-exclusive-feature/ https://www.brothers-brick.com/2019/12/06/this-fan-created-t... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21741834 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21741834
hubraumhugo 5y ago
Of course there is an app for this: https://brickit.app/ https://brickit.app/
- tomjuggler 5y ago
  Thank you sir!
klausjensen 5y ago
I was involved in a small group of poeple looking into creating a commercial LEGO sorting machine, which you would feed buckets of bricks, and they would come out sorted and indexed on the other side (in boxes). We moth-balled it, because it would not be possible to make it at a pricepoint, which made commercial sense.
- matheweis 5y ago
  jacquesm here famously built the sorter; everything except for the boxing it up step.
johnl1479 5y ago
rebrickable.com is intended for finding new things to build with your existing sets/bricks, but as a consequence of that, it has a searchable database of which bricks shipped with which sets.

Cthulhu_ 5y ago

It probably can be done, if someone hasn't already done it; put the bricks in a bin that pulls it through a conveyor belt, which uses image recognition to determine color + shape, matching that up with known lego pieces. And the list of parts for every set is stored online somewhere as well. The difficulty is that some bricks will look like other bricks, close enough that the image recognition might be accurate. But, some margin for error is fine.

tomjuggler 5y ago
I did see a sorting project somewhere, with image recognition. Apparently there is money to be made buying old Lego collections and selling sorted. Just the part where it puts the sets together was missing. If I had the time..
klausjensen 5y ago
This is a video about such a project - of course done in LEGO! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=04JkdHEX3Yk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=04JkdHEX3Yk
mbreese 5y ago
Here are a few... (and yes, they were on HN at the time) 2017 - Sorting 2 Metric Tons of Lego https://jacquesmattheij.com/sorting-two-metric-tons-of-lego/ https://jacquesmattheij.com/sorting-two-metric-tons-of-lego/ https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14226889 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14226889 2019 - AI-powered Lego sorting machine built with Lego bricks https://www.brothers-brick.com/2019/12/06/this-fan-created-the-ultimate-lego-brick-sorting-machine-powered-by-ai-exclusive-feature/ https://www.brothers-brick.com/2019/12/06/this-fan-created-t... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21741834 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21741834

hubraumhugo 5y ago

Of course there is an app for this: https://brickit.app/ https://brickit.app/

tomjuggler 5y ago
Thank you sir!

klausjensen 5y ago

I was involved in a small group of poeple looking into creating a commercial LEGO sorting machine, which you would feed buckets of bricks, and they would come out sorted and indexed on the other side (in boxes). We moth-balled it, because it would not be possible to make it at a pricepoint, which made commercial sense.

matheweis 5y ago
jacquesm here famously built the sorter; everything except for the boxing it up step.

johnl1479 5y ago

rebrickable.com is intended for finding new things to build with your existing sets/bricks, but as a consequence of that, it has a searchable database of which bricks shipped with which sets.