Sorting my lego collection into 10 tubs

[ForlornCreature]

ATM I have a loosely sorted lego collection, but finding parts is hard. I'm using two plastic towers with 5 drawers each. Ever since th floods and all that crap, It's been mixed up. It takes ages to sort them, so any suggestions on what 10 categories I should sort them into? Not including minifigures and accessories.

[morganm]

I've been having similar struggles.... used to have everything in a couple of 2' wide x 4' long x 2' deep bins.  Finding anything small or semi-rare took forever.  

Went out to Wal-Mart and got three of their smallest 3 drawer bins.  Each one is a theme for minifig and minifig accessories.  So one unit (3 drawers) is Castle, one is Space, and the other is Misc.  

Then I bought 3 of the medium 3 drawer units.  Each drawer is a loose category
- Translucent ....  anything but windows or windshields.  All of the little translucent bits... cylinders, studs, angled studs, etc.  These are tough to find as they sift to the bottom of big bins.  
- Windows / Doors / Windshields
- Hinges & Swivels ... anything that bends, turns, or swivels. Stuff that can clip together and hinge like the studs with verticle/horizontle clips.  
- Stuff that can easily be made into weapons.... kind of a loose category but things like cylinders, rods, hoses, cones, or basically anything that you look at and say "Ya... I could make that a gun!".... that drawer is really full =)  
- Medium / Large creatures.... cows, horses, ogres, trolls, and large rock monsters from Power Miners.  These were too big to fit in the tiny drawers for their theme.  
- Small vehicles ... motorcycles, three-wheelers, speeder bikes, etc.  Things small enough for 1 or 2 operators.
- Single studs... and closely related items.  Round & square studs, those 2 stud plates that have a single stud on top, and single stud bricks with studs coming out any side.  

Finally I have one big drawer for "stuff we built that's too cool to break.... yet...."  Obviously it's full =P  Things like Battle for Endor or larger vehicles are in there.  

Not sure where to go from here....  still have several cubic feat of Legos unsorted.  I'm not really looking to sort everything out.  I don't mind sifting through to find the right briks and plates that I want.  What kills me is looking for 10 minutes to find that one weird piece I know I have but it's lost in a sea of briks.

[enders_shadow]

well, I'd sort them out with your armies colors, that way building would be alot easier. So for me, it would be light grey, bley, and tan (obviously the smaller bitz would be put in a separate drawer) that woud make creating stuff less of a hassle and you wouldn't have to look through every box if you sorted them by size or shape

[aoffan23]

I currently have a lot of drawers.I have 2 small Wal-Mart drawer units, which have little tiny drawers (not sure how many). I have yet to fill the first one, but I like being specific in my sorting, so I'll need a lot of drawers. So far I have:

Heads
Hats (any headgear that would be soft in real life)
Helmets (any headgear that would be hard in real life)
Neck Stuff (backpacks, beards, armour, etc.)
Visors (includes goggles)
Animals (probably going to graduate to one of the bigger drawers at the bottom, it's almost overflowing)
Cheese Slopes
Pips
Translucent Pips
Melee Weapons
Window Panes (sizes separated into plastic bags)
Rods
Those funky 1x1 plates with a tooth on them
Small Wheels (any wheels that fit on the small wheel pegs)
Gold
Light Pink
Dark Pink/Purple
Medium Blue
Dark Tan
(I may get rid of all the colour-specific ones)

Then in one of the bigger drawers at the bottom I have plants.

I also have a few bigger drawer units, which have 5 drawers each. They currently have mixed up stuff, since I had to clean up for Astarte dinner, but my plan is as follows.

All my baseplates and large plates will go in one drawer, and then my railroad tracks will go in another. For sorting my bricks, I'll be using a system that's based around the number of studs on the brick. For example, 1x1's and 2x2's will be on their own, but in the 3-stud drawer I'll have 1x3's and the corner bricks. In the 4-stud drawer I'll have the 1x4's and the 2x2's, etc.

I also have dividers for the drawers, so I'm putting arches, Exo Force joints, headlight bricks, and other stuff in the smaller sections.

Hopefully you can draw some inspiration from that wall of text.

[Nitewatchman]

I have a tower of plastic drawers that I picked up at walmart for cheap. Bottom drawer is XL specialty pieces like boat hulls and large wheels.

The next drawer up is the 2xwhatever brick drawer, along with slightly modified bricks of a similar size.

Next up is the 1/whatever brick drawer, and it also houses modified bricks of a similar size.

Above that is minifigures, minifigure accessories, transparent pieces, and 2x2 plates and round bits. It also houses 1x1 modified bricks.

Above that is large and medium specialty pieces, such as doors and large transparent windows.

The next one above that is plates of 1x3 or 2x3 or larger.

And finally, the last drawer is technic pieces.

I still have quite a few pieces that need to be sorted out of my tubs, but I'm lazy so I'll do that some time in the future.

I want to, in the future, bag up the individual colored bricks in each of the brick drawers and then just pull out whatever bag(s) I need when starting a specific project.

[enders_shadow]

man, I wish I was that motivated to sort stuff. right now it's all in various bins that used to be sorted by theme, and they take up my whole closet

[subyrally]

i have 6 large bins to sort the bricks by color, then i have a pull bin with 30 small and 9 large drawers, then i got a tool box with removable organizer cups and then a larger tool box with something like 42 compartments for small stuff. all of em are full. then there are two large cardboard boxes that still need sorted out and then i have about 5 or 6 med or large lego boxes stuffed full of parts. i need more room for storage.

[Gungnir]

I usually keep all my stuff in one bin, and as I'm building, I take rarer pieces and throw them into a smaller bin that I keep on my desk.