BrickArms is a

limited liability company A limited liability company (LLC for short) is the US-specific form of a private limited company. It is a business structure that can combine the pass-through taxation of a partnership or sole proprietorship with the limited liability of a ...

specializing in minifigure accessories, specifically weaponry. It is unaffiliated with

LEGO Lego ( , ; stylized as LEGO) is a line of plastic construction toys that are manufactured by The Lego Group, a privately held company based in Billund, Denmark. The company's flagship product, Lego, consists of variously colored interlocking ...

, instead privately owned and operated by designer Will Chapman from his home in

Redmond, Washington Redmond is a city in King County, Washington, United States, located east of Seattle. The population was 73,256 at the 2020 census, up from 54,144 in 2010. Redmond is best known as the home of Microsoft and Nintendo of America. With an an ...

. The company was briefly the subject of controversy when one of its products was accused of being based on a member of

al-Qaeda Al-Qaeda (; , ) is an Islamic extremism, Islamic extremist organization composed of Salafist jihadists. Its members are mostly composed of Arab, Arabs, but also include other peoples. Al-Qaeda has mounted attacks on civilian and military ta ...

History

BrickArms began in 2006 when Ian Chapman, Will Chapman's youngest son approached him with the need for World War II weaponry for his LEGO builds. Ian was disappointed with what historical weaponry LEGO offered. Will ultimately choose to begin to design and produce his own, more accurate minifigure accessories, running the company from the Chapmans' garage in Redmond, Washington and packing orders in the family's bonus room. In 2011 Will and Jennifer Chapman decided to focus solely on the creation and production of the BrickArms product line, rather than the sale and on May 1, they ceased direct sales on the BrickArms website. On the same date, the Chapmans' nephew Keith Nelson and his wife, Julie, launched the new GI Brick website, becoming the third authorized reseller of the BrickArms line in the United States. As of 2017, there were nine resellers worldwide, including GI Brick.

Products

By 2008, BrickArms was producing more than twenty weapons. BrickArms produces a variety of minifigure-compatible accessories including an

M4 carbine The M4 carbine (officially Carbine, Caliber 5.56 mm, M4) is a 5.56×45mm NATO, gas-operated, magazine-fed carbine developed in the United States during the 1980s. It is a shortened version of the M16A2 assault rifle. The M4 is extensively ...

, M21 Sniper Rifle,

M1 Garand The M1 Garand or M1 rifleOfficially designated as U.S. rifle, caliber .30, M1, later simply called Rifle, Caliber .30, M1, also called US Rifle, Cal. .30, M1 is a semi-automatic rifle that was the service rifle of the U.S Army during World War ...

, M84 grenades, M1 Helmet,

Stahlhelm The ''Stahlhelm'' () is a German military steel combat helmet intended to provide protection against shrapnel and fragments of grenades. The term ''Stahlhelm'' refers both to a generic steel helmet and more specifically to the distinctive Ger ...

, Minigun, AK-47,

M3 Grease Gun The M3 is an American .45-caliber submachine gun adopted by the U.S. Army on 12 December 1942, as the United States Submachine Gun, Cal. .45, M3.Iannamico, Frank, ''The U.S. M3-3A1 Submachine Gun'', Moose Lake Publishing, , (1999), pp. 14, 22� ...

M16 The M16 rifle (officially designated Rifle, Caliber 5.56 mm, M16) is a family of military rifles adapted from the ArmaLite AR-15 rifle for the United States military. The original M16 rifle was a 5.56×45mm automatic rifle with a 20-roun ...

, and a

Combat Shotgun A combat shotgun is a shotgun issued by militaries for warfare. The earliest shotguns specifically designed for combat were the trench guns or trench shotguns issued in World War I. While limited in range, the multiple projectiles typically us ...

, along with many other items related to warfare. The accessories are designed by Chapman using a

CAD program Computer-aided design (CAD) is the use of computers (or ) to aid in the creation, modification, analysis, or optimization of a design. This software is used to increase the productivity of the designer, improve the quality of design, improve co ...

and are prototyped using a small mold cut by Chapman using a

CNC Numerical control (also computer numerical control, and commonly called CNC) is the automated control of machining tools (such as drills, lathes, mills, grinders, routers and 3D printers) by means of a computer. A CNC machine processes a ...

to test the proportions, aesthetics, and playability of the resulting prototype. Once the design of an accessory is finalized, it is mass-produced via

injection molding Injection moulding (U.S. spelling: injection molding) is a manufacturing process for producing parts by injecting molten material into a mould, or mold. Injection moulding can be performed with a host of materials mainly including metals (for ...

Acrylonitrile Butadiene Styrene Acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS) (chemical formula (C8H8)''x''·(C4H6)''y''·(C3H3N)''z'' is a common thermoplastic polymer. Its glass transition temperature is approximately . ABS is amorphous and therefore has no true melting point. A ...

(ABS) plastic into professionally tooled production molds. In 2013 World War Brick, a lego fan event, Brickarms brought a new series of weapons called Over Molded. These weapons were more detail and colored. Using a special "overmolded" technique, Will Chapman was able to hand-inject these special two-color BrickArms weapons. These are not painted, but two colors of solid ABS plastic molded into one piece. Each one comes in a special "BrickArms Reloaded" blister pack and are rare. Brickarms is also known for its minifigs such as a colonial marine based on the game Aliens: Colonial Marines, Shaun based on the movie Shaun of the Dead, and Private Ryan from Saving Private Ryan.

Bandit controversy

On December 4, 2008, a BrickArms custom minifig called the "White Bandit" sparked controversy when

The Sun (United Kingdom) ''The Sun'' is a British Tabloid (newspaper format), tabloid newspaper, published by the News UK#News Group Newspapers Ltd, News Group Newspapers division of News UK, itself a wholly owned subsidiary of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. It was found ...

published an article claiming the figure was based on a follower of

Osama bin Laden Osama bin Mohammed bin Awad bin Laden (10 March 1957 – 2 May 2011) was a Saudi-born extremist militant who founded al-Qaeda and served as its leader from 1988 until Killing of Osama bin Laden, his death in 2011. Ideologically a Pan-Islamism ...

. Chapman has denied this, saying it is a generic villain and "is merely a bad guy for the good guys to battle."

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Brickarms Lego Companies based in Redmond, Washington