Do dolls really get that heavy?

I was fortunate enough that a new acquaintance at a meetup i went to allowed me to hold their 70cm doll, exactly for this reason actually, because I was curious as to how much they weighed. I was impressed at the weight of them!! No wonder they carried them around in a backpack!

 

I am prettty weak lol.

I can handle my heaviest doll, which is a plus-size Argodoll, but it's pretty limited to posing her, putting her on a stand, etc. If I had to "lug her around", I would consider a rolling suitcase.

 

Gosh I’m getting a 75cm doll and I’m not particularly strong. I won’t be taking him out of the house so I won’t need to carry him so hopefully getting him dressed or posing him will be ok. I’m also getting a 32cm doll so that one will be much easier to carry around.

 

110cm doll is very difficult to deal with. It's a combined issue of size and weight and the fact there are only so many ways to carry a human-shaped-object intent on collapsing upon itself.

Regular SD sized dolls shouldn't really be an issue for any reasonably healthy adult in fair shape. They're made of plastic, not iron.

 

120cm?! Thats a size of a kid! Like human kid! How do you manage?

 

I only have 75cm size one, for me its ok. But I rarely bring them out since I do not take 5kg all the time!

 

I actually had an issue with this. I bought a nYID Fantasy Chris, beautiful doll, loved him to bits... but the weight of him was too much and I found myself unwilling to dress or pose him because I would just get tired, I guess, which led to him sitting on a shelf and nothing more. It was better that he moved on.

My other 60-62cm dolls weren't nearly so heavy, but it was that experience with Iplehouse that showed me I could never own a doll bigger than 62cm.

I admire in other people their willingness to pose and dress and interact with large dolls, because 65cm plus has a lot of beautiful sculpts. I'll admire them from afar.

 

So, I think if you see people complaining about the heaviness with 1/3 scale it is relative to different factors. Dolls only weigh so much. I think I don't have any 1/3 dolls that would weigh more than 6 lbs at most. I don't have anything like the 1/2 scale though, nor something over about 71cm.
But I will say that none of my dolls used to bother me, however as time goes on and my own health conditions have worsened, I notice that I am starting to genuinely struggle with some things in this respect. So for me it's issues of devastating fatigue, and I mean I am sometimes so tired that moving at all makes me feel like I just have to get back in bed. On days like this, a lot of my 1/3 dolls are too heavy to try to work with much. There are factors like the conditions of a person's joints, and mine are not good now, so the larger dolls can put too much strain on my wrist or hands if I'm picking one up with one hand not to mention toting them around in my hands for a few minutes or a half an hour outdoors.
I'm a large person almost 6ft tall, but I imagine if you are a lot smaller then the large dolls could also easily get more cumbersome. There are certainly a lot of people in the hobby with health conditions of various types which make some of the things I was mentioning likely factors in the complaints of them being too heavy. But sometimes it's just preference. Sometimes it's just not fun to do whatever you want if the doll is too big and awkward for you to do it.
Didn't think to say this before but editing to add that sadly for me, I've collected older dolls and the old "standard" 1/3 size really is often surprisingly heavier than a newer or slimmer model that visually seems the same scale.

 

I recently weighed my 1/3-sized gang because I was curious.

Spoiler: Taking turns on kitchen scales

Everyone fully clothed but without shoes. Clockwise from top left:

• 62cm girl, 1488 grams = 3.28 lb
• 64cm boy, 1692 grams = 3.73 lb
• 58cm girl, 1326 grams = 2.92 lb
• 65cm boy, 1736 grams = 3.82 lb

I'm 5'4", strong, fit, and have a relatively physical job (laboratory support) where I'm regularly on my feet, handling and moving equipment around. Dolls are much lighter than most of the equipment I work with, so they aren't hard for me to handle!

But I also treat them like any other potential ergonomic hazard, and stay aware of my physical limits. Have all restringing tools close at hand and find a way to hold dolls securely when I'm restringing them -- especially when pulling elastic (you can hurt yourself if you don't posture yourself properly to pull an object). I would never carry a doll in my arms for extended periods - again, one can hurt oneself doing that with any weighty object. I've found that I can hand-carry 2 dolls in my carrier without issue, but 3 dolls is too heavy -- so use either a backpack or rolling suitcase to move more. And while I love and only own 1/3 dolls, I'm personally limiting myself to 70cm and smaller: I might be strong but I'm not tall, and I think heavier/bigger ones will be too unwieldy for me to handle, especially since I do a good amount of outdoor photoshoots with my crew. (But don't worry - ergonomics isn't the only reason, I also have aesthetic reasons for sticking with a crew all around the same height. )

As weird as it sounds to look at dolls as a potential ergonomic hazard to your health, I think it's worth considering them that way! Be aware of your physical limits, and change the way you transport/carry them as necessary. Especially since we want to enjoy them long-term, and love taking them to conventions and meetups, and doing photoshoots and such.

 

Heavy is so relative.
Before I got really sick, I didn't mind the weight of my dolls in the least. Big boys are chunky but it makes them stand firm.
Now I have Severe ME/CFS, and a ten pound doll becomes wearisome to hold and lift pretty quickly. A twelve pound doll is a burden I can only hold for a few minutes, and close against my body, because ten is about my stamina limit these days. I don't move my big dolls around much anymore outside my sewing room, and I do photoshoots only with help.

So yeah dolls can get that heavy, if one gets that weak or holds a heavy doll for a long time.

 

I didn't know this term but it's so true, I have to stock it up in my vocabulary.
I'm happy I still have an old pram, that's what I use for my photo stuff, and the doll will go right in there. My back wasn't won in a lottery after all.

 

The biggest dolls I have are 56cm. I love them for the weight actually. Bigger dolls (over 60cm) might be too big for me to handle if not too heavy. My height is 148cm/ 4'8" and I found it too big to handle when I had chance to hold 72cm boy
Outside the difference of joint mechanism, they are ball jointed...the heavier the more difficult to hold their own weight.

 

This came up recently in a doll group I'm in and some people were sharing headless bodies that were almost 3kg (so roughly 6lb)! Having carried other items around fairs and cons that were that weight, I can honestly say it's not difficult until a few hours in and then your arms want to fall off. And that's not counting however you're carrying your camera equipment if you're not doing it with your phone.

 

My 70cm crew is around 3-5lbs each. I don't find them too difficult to maneuver, but it would be tiring to carry at a convention due to the unwieldy shape of a floppy human. One time I thought it was a good idea to carry 3 dolls in a messenger bag on my shoulder and my shoulder was dying in no amount of time.

There is some variation in like how much some companies hollow out their sculpts. Some of them definitely feel chunkier than others.

My Dollmore Dell is 11 pounds and he is very difficult to maneuver and even changing his clothes is kind of exhausting.

 

I'm working on fitness, so i'm okay for the most part. My problem right now is no space and too much clutter for nice photos. The heft of a resin doll feels good to me.

 

My vinyl Dollfies aren't too bad but Dynamite Towa is *really* heavy compared to the others. Right now she's wearing Miku hair and a Super Dollfie outfit so she's even heavier than usual.

 

This whole thread is making me excited? and/or anxious for my 80cm xD!

 

I’ve seen someone carrying dolls on wagon at doll meet/event like for human kids so you can show them off while carrying. He was strolling with about 10 dolls at the same time.

 

For me, they are; but i’ve only got Charm Dolls and Luts, which was over 3kg, i believe.
I’m quiet weak and I cannot handle my bigger dolls for too long- it’s also hard to carry them around too much.
My arms hurt a bit after a while.
They’re also too big in height compared to me to pose comfortably- so its a combination of their height and weight. I think if I had an MSD as heavy as an SD, it wouldn’t bother me as much.
They’re so cool for that too though- the height of the is sick.
They’re also a fantastic doll size for a lot of other reasons, I just prefer shorter ones for the reasons above!

 

That's awesome! What doll are you getting?