Customer Reviews

K'NEX Double Dare Dueling Coaster Construction Toy

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I am a Middle School Math Teacher and I purchased some K'Nex projects for my students. Some of the reviews here about K'Nex seem to blame K'Nex because they and their 7-year-old couldn't get an "instant" toy to appear. My students worked on these projects over the course of weeks, exploring the directions and understanding the "engineering" dynamics of the project. These are more learning experiences than toys. I HIGHLY recommend them for the classroom setting. They definitely link students to higher levels of thinking. Keep up the great work K'Nex!!!!

My 7 year old grandson put this together himself with no problems. It is correct that there are no extra pieces and we actually had to call Knex once and have them ship a missing piece, but everything fits together just fine. The instructions are a little confusing, but once you undertand that previously connected parts are shown in a washed out color, it is easy to concentrate on the construction being presented. He was proud of himself and I guess he should be, considering the last review.

I bought this as a birthday present for my 11 year old grandson.....He has done several of these before and I was amazed at the results.....He is very patient, despite his two cousins who are 2 and 4, constantly trying to impede the progress.......They are not cheap but they are very well made and worth the extra few dollars to see the outcome...............I have no problem ordering more of these if he still desires to make them.

I gave this to my son for his 7th birthday and we made it today. He started out on his own but it got more complex so I helped. We had a few simple mix-ups but it went together well. We had a small sample of spare parts. Once you get a hang of the pictures it's not too hard to follow. My son gained a lot of confidence with this project. He really likes it!

My eight year old & I assembled this over a span of several hours on Christmas Day. The directions were easy to follow, and my son learned a lot about the importance of cross-bracing during construction. I do suggest a tackle box or something similar to sort the pieces. My son was thrilled with the end result--he was so inspired that he's designing his own coasters now.

I got this for Christmas!! And my sister and I were doing the roller coaster together!! It took me 3.5 hrs to complete this!! I recommend this for ages 9+.

Purchased as a gift for my nephew from Amazon marketplace, the box arrived broken from Target.com, but everything seemed to be there. He spent several hours putting it all together, and as such was enjoyable and kept him busy. Once assembled, it works like its supposed to, but is very flimsy. It didn't maintain play interest more than a few cycles of the game and within hours was already just sitting in the corner of the basement. If your kids like Legos and KNex, then this is a good item. If they don't, it's not for them and will be too difficult. Note that this is not a "starter set -- if your kids don't already have some experience with how KNex does things, then they will be very frustrated and find this too hard.

K'nex makes some of the most educational and imaginative toys available. They do require patience and some adult assistance is helpful, but that is true for any good learning experience. Introduce a kid to K'Nex in a positive and supportive way, and you open the door to so many possibilities. Once building a few models, you've created a 'knex kid' and next thing you know, this kid might be able to construct intricate towers as tall as any adult! Build roller coasters and learn physics in the most fun way imaginable. Get them off the tube and the video games for awhile and do something contructive - literally - with K'Nex!

My son loved making these when he was about 10 yrs. old. It kept him busy for hours.

This was received as a birthday present, and I'm sad to say that I would not recommend this product to anyone! My 10 year old son and I have been working on it all day, and it's still not assembled. He is getting very frustrated, and as for me, I'd like to throw the whole thing into the trash!
The main problems are:
1) There are NO extra pieces. So if one of the many little pieces is misplaced, too bad, there is nothing to be done except leave it out and hope it's not important. If they had only put in some extra pieces, much frustration could have been avoided.
2) The diagram is very difficult to figure out. We needed a magnifying glass and a flashlight and it was still difficult to figure out how to properly connect certain pieces. The colors are rather indistinct on the diagram which does not help matters.
3) For some unknown reason, certain of the stabilizing bars do not connect correctly and thus cause the other pieces to twist. We had to leave out some of these stabilizing bars and are hoping it does not cause the coaster to be weak in certain places.
4) We have just begun putting on the track pieces, which has presented a whole new level of confusion. For the life of me I cannot figure out from the diagram where the track pieces go. My son is doing his best, but it is nearly impossible to tell how the track pieces relate to the frame. We are using the picture on the box more than the diagram.
When we finally get it finished, I'm sure my son will enjoy it, but I think K'NEX needs to go back to the drawing board on this one!