Ah, LEGO blocks – the real-life equivalents of Minecraft. From tiny model PlayStations to a gigantic 7,541-piece Millennium Falcon, almost everything has been made a subject by these Denmark-based construction blocks.
To add to the never-ending list of things you can create with this deceptively-called children’s toy, Astonishing Studios has created a handy how-to guide for making your own indispensable Tic Tac dispenser.
Creating two sides of the candy dispenser takes four 2×6 orange LEGO plates affixed together by smooth orange pieces. At the center of this initial layer, add a 4×4 green plate covered in smooth green pieces and surrounded by eight 1×1 smooth pieces. Slap a Tic Tac logo on the two sides and your brand loyalty efforts are now a reality.
The candy dispenser is a bit more complex–as complex as it can get with 10 1×1 pieces. It involves setting five gray 1×1 plates atop the right end of a 1×3 plate and capping them with a 1×1 smooth plate, a single 1×1 smooth plate in the middle, and a 1×2 plate capped off with two 1×1 plates and a sloped 1×1 brick on the other side. See? Complex, but following the video (or the image above) is a lot easier than trying to comprehend what I just said.
Compared to the dispenser, the ‘coin bank’ is a cakewalk. All it needs is one 1×4 brick, a 1×1 plate on one side, a 1×1 brick with a side stud attachment. This is capped with a 1×1 orange stud with a 1×1 gray smooth plate placed up top.
For the base of the Tic Tac dispenser, start with a 1×6 orange brick and stack two 1×2 gray bricks on top of each other on one side. On top of these bricks, add two 1×1 bricks with side stud attachments. Finish this side of the base by adding two more 1×2 plates and capping them with a single smooth 1×2 block.
Taking one of the walls you previously constructed, snap it to the side of the base using the two bricks with the side stud attachments. Add another brick with side studs to the upper right-hand corner of your Tic Tac wall and affix two 1×1 tiles to its bottom and one sloping 1×1 orange tile on its top. Fill the rest of the dispenser’s base with single 1×1 smooth gray bricks and affix your coin bank on the top.
This inside portion of the dispenser is completed by taking a 1×2 brick with two holes, inserting two blue pegs (one facing forwards and one facing backwards), and affixing it to the center top part of the inside wall. Oh, and don’t forget to add a 1×2 brick to the side of the previous one!
After all the grueling work on the previous side, this second wall is much more forgiving. Simply take a 1×1 brick with side stud holes topped with a sloped 1×1 brick and place it on the middle right side of the wall. It’s as easy as making a LEGO Taj Mahal!
Yours looking the same? Ok. Insert your coin bank and candy dispenser, sandwich the two walls together, and the build is almost done!
All that’s left to do is create the remaining top portion of the dispenser. Before getting to it though, remember to drop in your Tic Tacs, because this thing would just be a tiny, well-branded paperweight otherwise. This particular dispenser holds up to two Tic Tacs without jamming. Yeeeeeah, we thought the same. While it isn’t the most efficient candy holder out there, being able to say you made it yourself makes all the difference.
Once you’ve dropped in your diabetes-inducing pills, take two orange 1×2 blocks stuck together with a 1×4 smooth block, pop a 1×2 gray block underneath one side, and add a 1×1 sloped block on the other side of the gray block.
Don’t worry about the gaping hole in the side; this is where you put in coins to dispense the candy. The coin pushes the blocking LEGOs aside and allows a single Tic Tac to drop out of the dispenser. You can then get back your precious penny by pulling the orange stud and opening the coin dispenser.
This isn’t the only food-related build Astonishing Studios has done. They have made LEGO hot dog machines, French fry dispensers, and even donut vending machines. You can find all of them and more over on their YouTube channel.
