K'NEX - 100 Model Building Set ‚ 863 Pieces, STEM Building, Kid Construction Set‚ Ages 7+

I bought it for a 4yo and he loves it. The set is generous with the pieces so you can build about one 3D model (e.g. ambulance) and one 2D model (e.g. turtle) at the same time. I'm planning to order 40 extra green rods and 10 green connectors (135 degree shaped) to add more versatility to the set. It'll cost about $10 extra (because of shipping), but I think it's better than buying another $30 set and having an even greater shortage of green rods. I think there are two reasons why this set is marked at age 7+. First, most of the designs do not have instructions. So you need to use a magnifying glass to see the examples in the instruction booklet. There are designs on the K'NEX website which are nice too, but they use a white background so you can't see the white pieces well. Again, some squinting and spatial intelligence is required to figure it out. Second, attaching a rod perpendicular to a connector requires A LOT of dexterity and strength. I broke a piece trying to snap one in today and the shrapnel hit me in the face. I would rate it about as difficult as unscrewing the lid from a jar: some people will not be able to do it no matter how old they are. I think K'NEX is better than Legos, particularly for this young age group. With Legos, you end up making 1-3 designs (see their Creator series) and then you're done building them forever. K'NEX allows much more variation and adaptation to your design. For example, if you spent over $200 and bought the LEGO Star Wars Millennium Falcon 75105 Star Wars Toy you could only make ONE cool thing with it. In contrast, you could make a similar-sized Millennium Falcon with K'NEX with about $70 worth of pieces (and probably every other model in this set). The trade-off is realism vs versatility/playtime. With this age group, versatility and hours of playtime are going to win every time. Once they're old enough to have a credit card, then Legos and Bricklink become an option. But by then, can you even consider Legos a toy any more?

Knex are absolutely the greatest. It can take you anywhere with your imagination and creativity. You can build anything. The pieces are sturdy and fit together well. It is absolutely amazing what you can do. It will give you and your child hours together which build better relationships and wonderful memories. The challenge creates a real sense of achievement when you finish a project. it’s really more than just a toy. It creates so many wonderful things other than the projects, memories, Togetherness, cooperation, understanding, problem solving skills and even goal setting just to mention a few. Plus it’s great no matter what your age, it’s great for people who like to build models. I first started to do knex with my son. We loved it, we had most of the sets back then and built fabulous things together. Our biggest one was the Ferris Wheel that was motorized. It took weeks. Now I am doing knex with my grandson. It brings back such great memories for my son. He is so excited to be doing knex with his son.

Excellent

Got as a gift for my 9yo. He loves to build and has had fun with this set. He has said a few times that it's hard, but he has slowly gotten adjusted to what he needs to do. It's challenging in a good way. All 4 of my boys have played with knex.

Kids love this set. So many options to build. Many hours of fun.

Purchased as a gift for a 4-5 year old boy. Most of the toy designs/models are likely too difficult for this age group. I would recommend 8+ for most of the projects in the book. On the other hand, it was very enjoyable to build together as a family creative project (under adult supervision). Think of it as a more complex puzzle that offers customization and can be broken down to encourage creativity.

I love to build things and K'NEX us now my favorite system to do this with. I now have 18 different sets and over 8000 parts to play with. I really appreciate their on line instruction manuals as they have great build ideas. I just realized that the hole in the bearings of the Ezoon spinners is a match for the rod size of the normal K'NEX sets. This lets me incorporate figit spinners into the constructions I make. I have a ball machine set on order and am thinking I can add the spinners to the design at some point. I realize some people don't like mixing set, but I enjoy it when different items mix well and add to the things you can build. Maybe i should mention that I am a 71 year old kid when it comes to construction sets and I recommend this set to anyone who likes to build things.

My grandsons love these. I previously purchased the sets that are in the plastic storage boxes years ago. This is the third set purchased. Comes in a cardboard storage box (don't know how long that will last but will reinforce with filament tape if it starts to fall apart). Grandsons are now 12 and 13 and construct things every time they come over. They prefer these over Legos. This set does not have all the instructions to build what they show in the pamphlet that comes with it. You have to go online to get them and unfortunately, we haven't been able to do so on particular builds. We find that frustrating but the 13 year old was able to look at the picture and figure it out. Definitely not to be used around toddlers or dogs that like to chew on plastic as the some of the pieces are very small.