LEGO Techniques - Minecrafty

I picked up a copy of 21113 The Cave for myself as a parts pack. I don't often have enough bricks and I got a good deal on this set. I'm flipping the Zombie and TNT bricks but keeping Steve, the spider head, and the pickaxe. I almost flipped the pickaxe as well until something caught my eye (ba-dum bum). After test fitting a piece I kept it too.

Tim J. over at the New Elementary already played around with the heads a bit. I plan to keep doing so and see what can happen. Steve (and the zombie and skeleton's) heads are all about 12mm cubes. This is a bizarre but not unheard of dimension. It's the same as a brick and a half in width. Or 3.75 plates tall.

The animal heads are 12.8mm cubes. This is the equivalent of 4 plate thicknesses in every direction. Or a brick with a bracket and plate to one side.

It's the pickaxe that got me. The end had a very familiar shape and the nub was almost a tell. "By Jove!" I thought. "That looks like the invert of the bottom of a 1x1 plate!" Sure enough our block headed friend demonstrates. Even cooler is that the pickaxe appears to be thin enough that three could fit inside a 1x1 brick. That tells me that it's 1.6mm thick, or, a half plate.

Note that even the notch near the handle can accept the wall of the brick. It's a snug fit making it 1.6mm as well. For even more amazement, hold a 1x1 brick up to the tool and see how many other dimensions match. It's almost like finding a Fibonacci spiral in everyday objects.

Yeah, I'm pimping this article. You should go spelunking.