Olar's Lego Tools & Tips

The Lego Brick Separator

Tool Classification: Nondestructive Tool

When you hear the phrase 'Lego Tool', the first thing that probably comes to mind is the Lego Brick Separator.  That funky piece of orange plastic is really a remarkable tool and I bet some its uses will surprise you.
While the tool is called a 'brick' separator, its really a 'plate' separator.  Who really needs help separating two bricks?
The orange brick separator has several obvious features:

• The front end has brick connection points allowing the tool to attach to the top or bottom of a Lego brick.
• It also sports a Technic axle sticking out of the top like a stubby unicorn-horn.  This is intended to help you push Technic axles out of other Technic parts.  I personally find this feature not very helpful and it gets in the way of other uses.
• One often-overlooked feature is the very thin prying section at the back end of the tool.  This is very helpful when prying up Lego tiles and depending on your hand strength can even be slipped between two plates.

Another thing to note is that the orange brick separator (96874) which has been included in more than 150 sets since it's 2012 release, is not the first version of this tool.  The original brick separator (6007) has been around since 1990, and while it doesn't have all the bells and whistles (Technic pin and prying section) that the new one does, in many ways it's still my favorite.

The Brick Separators and Their Uses

The first thing to note are the differences between the two separators.  As mentioned above, the orange tool has a Technic pin and a handy prying section, and the old tool is physically larger, but the biggest difference is the brick attachment angles.  The newer tool has a lower attachment angle, which in itself is not a bad thing, but it does make some things harder.