Unidentified older Gray colour

Dirk1964

In my pile of Lego parts from the 80's I identified a for me unknown Gray colour; a colour that is darker than Light Gray and lighter than Dark Grey. As an example I have made a picture of 4085 parts in 4 different colours to show the difference. The part with the unknown colour is an older 1 x 1 Plate with Vertical Thin Open "O" Clip. The other three colours are Light Grey and the modern Medium and Dark Stone Gray variants.

Is this "Flat Silver" or a darker tint of Light Gray?

P6tu

So I'm going to skip this stone word, but I know that there are four shades of gray:
- light gray;
- light bluish gray;
- dark gray;
- dark bluish gray.
For me it seems that you have there from right to left dark bluish gray, dark gray, light gray, light bluish gray. But, as always - the lighting, my monitor and picture may impose an improper vision, color balance and I may be mistaken.

Oldfan

If these are the oldest types of vertical clip parts, there was a known defect back in the day where the light gray parts were a little bit darker than they were supposed to be. Not dark enough to be dark gray, but definitely not the correct light gray color. I have only seen this on the 1x1 plate w/vertical clip, so they must have had an off-day (or three) running that particular mold.

I have several of these myself. I record them as dark gray in my inventory, but most of the fan sites call them out as defective light gray. To the best of my knowledge that part (earliest variant with the thin clip design) was never officially produced in dark gray.

Dirk1964

@P6tu and @Oldfan, thank you so much for your feedback. I had already listed these pieces (I have 7 of them) as Light Grey with a comment "This is a darker version of the usual Light Gray tint, but less dark than Dark (Stone) Gray".

@P6tu, it is definitely not Dark Grey. This colour has a brownish element in it. And they are also not discoloured (by UV light). Also I am not sure if Light Bluish Gray = Medium Stone Gray? Or are they different colours?

Thx again. Have a great weekend!

D.

Jay37

Bluish is the term that BL uses for the newer grays. So, yes Medium Stone Gray = Light Bluish Gray and Dark Stone Gray = Dark Bluish Gray. I believe only BL uses the 'bluish' as I think LEGO uses 'stone' in their official color nomenclature.

Dirk1964

Got it. Learning every day! Thx, @Jay37