Brickblog

Back in 2004, some might say I got carried away on eBay. Up for auction was 40 pounds of Lego that had some seriously good stuff in it. I say luckily, my wife may differ, won the auction and not long before Christmas 40lbs of Lego arrived on my door step. When I opened the box, I learned very quickly and with out a doubt that these had come from a smoking household, and what follows is my successful attempt at cleaning the foul stench off of them.

Things to remember when cleaning your Lego:

• This stuff is plastic. Using excessively hot water can and will damage the Lego.
• Cleaning painted and or sticker parts should be done so carefully. I don’t care for stickers, so I didn’t care if they came off. Any painted pieces were cleaned with care. This method did not result in any damage.
• Lego suggests luke warm water and a mild soap. My method was to eliminate smoke odor.

The first step was to determine how to wash the Lego without losing any of it down the drain. It just so happened that I had several of the Creator red buckets, and pleasantly, they stack inside of each other. Having just gotten a Dremel for my birthday, it was painfully obvious to me that I could use one of these buckets and cut thin slots in the sides to use it as a strainer. I removed the sticker label from the bucket and cut a series of slots in the sides of the bucket.

Remember, when working with any power tools, use appropriate safety procedures. In the process of cutting these slots, I did break a fiberglass wheel, sending pieces throughout the kitchen. I found the metal wheel to do much better, as it was not adversely impacted by the heat produced in this process.
With my strainer made, I took another bucket and put the strainer in it. I then filled bucket about 2/3 with the dirty Lego and added warm water with a bit of ammonia.

Using a cheap wooden spoon I stirred the Lego a bit to ensure that the ammonia water would be applied to all surfaces. Once this was done, the power of the strainer became evident.

Lifting the inner modified bucket out was similar to using a deep fat fryer basket. The water drained out while retaining the Lego, even the little tiny pieces. This also allowed for much more lego to be cleaned at once then an ordinary kitchen strainer. I then moved the outer bucket to the side and proceeded to rinse the Lego, still in the inner bucket, under the faucet. If you are like me, BE SURE TO RINSE THOROUGHLY. Ammonia is a nasty chemical, and by rinsing well, you ensure that you don’t get any on things, or in your mouth when you build later. . .

Once the water stopped dripping from the bucket I dumped out the Lego onto towels on plastic shelving I had assembled in the kitchen. Here the pieces dried over time. I aided the drying time by placing the shelves beside our register and using a fan to blow over the bricks. This allowed the bricks to dry over a period of a day or two.

Using this method I was able to remove any odor of smoke and reuse the same ammonia water a couple of times before it cooled.