This product was sent for inclusion in this post in exchange for our honest review. All opinions are our own.
Moose has always loved STEAM toys which encourage building but up until now we have never really played with K’nex. He was absolutely thrilled then when 2 awesome K’nex sets were sent to us to try out.
Founded in 1992, K’NEX, part of the Basic Fun! family of brands, did not set out to become an educational toy company, all we wanted to do was show kids that the only limit to building was the size of their imagination! More than 25 years later, K’NEX prides itself on connecting Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Math with imagination. K’NEX product line has building toys specially designed for every age group and skill level.
Rad Rides
The K’Nex Rad Rides set is aimed at children aged 7-12. There are a lot of small fiddly bits so I can completely understand this being the target age group. Moose is not 7 yet but he had no trouble fitting the parts together – there were a few exceptions but not as many as I thought there might be if I’m honest!
In the K’Nex Rad Rides set there are over 200 pieces and instructions to build 3 vehicles – there are 9 more to find on www.knex.com/instructions
The first thing Moose did was to choose which vehicle he wanted to make, he chose one from the set of instructions supplied with the set. The vehicle Moose chose had only 7 steps. Aside from assembling the wheels and axels he pretty much just got on with the rest of it himself. Result!
Battle Bow Building Set
Moose was so excited when he saw the Battle Bow Building Set.
The Battle Bow Building Set has a choice of 4 different models to make but Moose knew straight away that he was going to make the bow. I mean, it’s a working bow and he’s 6 so..
Other model instructions included in the set were a crossbow and a blaster!
This was a bit more intense than the previous set. Moose really had to concentrate in places to be able to follow the instructions. It didn’t help that the colours of the pieces were not always the same colour in the instructions so we had to change tact and look at the shapes rather than the colours.
Once we got the hang of it though it was easy enough and actually turned out to be a lovely activity to do together.
After you put the bow together you need to pull back the spring part and insert 1 of the 5 darts into the barrel. Then just pull the trigger and it fires a surprising distance.
What did we think?
K’nex has been a bit of a revelation for us. As I mentioned earlier it had never been on our RADAR before but Moose absolutely LOVED it. The instructions were tricky to follow in places. However, as well as building the supplied instructions. Part of the fun of this kind of toy is using your imagination to build bigger than the box!
The K’nex sets are compatible with each other and with K’nex classic so you could potentially build your collection to be huge! I love STEAM toys and anything which encourages kids to use their imagination so this was right up my street!
K’nex is available from John Lewis and all other good toy shops.
