Advice of lego purchases stateside

[Raptormesh]

Hi all,

I'll be heading to San fran and NY this coming January and am wondering if its worth scouting for and purchasing lego sets there. I'm interested in the Star Wars sets particularly the X/Y-wings and the Republic Striker class and I know it's rather cheap over there however I have a couple of concerns:

1) Weight, and bulk cramming them into my luggage. I will be there for 4 weeks so may not have space.

2) Scarcity as these sets are rather old.

Any ideas? Thanks in advance.

Cheers

[M-bot]

I've done some purchasing of Lego on the net and have a decent collection of my own. In my experience, Lego that's put together is far more dense than the box it comes in, so my advice would be to ditch the packaging and put the pieces together - not necessarily as per the instructions but in as tight a format as you can. It won't affect the weight of course, but it wont take up nearly as much space in your luggage.

If you weigh it while you're there, you can always weigh up whether it's cheaper to take it in your luggage (if you're carrying a chargeable excess that is) or to post it home.

Sounds like a great trip! Hope you enjoy it mate.

[Raptormesh]

I've done some purchasing of Lego on the net and have a decent collection of my own. In my experience, Lego that's put together is far more dense than the box it comes in, so my advice would be to ditch the packaging and put the pieces together - not necessarily as per the instructions but in as tight a format as you can. It won't affect the weight of course, but it wont take up nearly as much space in your luggage.

If you weigh it while you're there, you can always weigh up whether it's cheaper to take it in your luggage (if you're carrying a chargeable excess that is) or to post it home.

Sounds like a great trip! Hope you enjoy it mate.

Thanks might just do that. Cheers.

[griffin]

I agree - check your airline's luggage limits and excess baggage fees, as most let you take up to 20-32kgs of luggage (plus about 7kg carry-on luggage). That's a lot of luggage, and excess fees can be cheaper than Postage on most airlines if you get close to the weight limit on each extra item.
Maximise your weight limits as much as possible, so that you don't waste the "free" amount you are already paying for with your ticket.

[Raptormesh]

I agree - check your airline's luggage limits and excess baggage fees, as most let you take up to 20-32kgs of luggage (plus about 7kg carry-on luggage). That's a lot of luggage, and excess fees can be cheaper than Postage on most airlines if you get close to the weight limit on each extra item.
Maximise your weight limits as much as possible, so that you don't waste the "free" amount you are already paying for with your ticket.

Thanks griffin, seems I should go and pick up one of those handy mobile weigh meters. Went to check out the size of the boxes at Target and they seem to be 50% air.