Introducing grandkids to ME & mfg 1

[tomwalz]

Introducing grandkids to ME & mfg

Any recommendations on toys and books for kids that will expose them to Mechanical Engineering and Manufacturing. Legos and similar are fun but the kids don’t every hear the terms or don’t really know what the process is called and can lead to.

Part of the reason I do what I do is that 50 years ago I read the Tom Swift Jr. books. Science and engineering were really cool stuff.

Thanks,
Tom


Thomas J. Walz
Carbide Processors, Inc.

http://www.carbideprocessors.com

 

[eromlignod]

The best "toys" for me as a kid were old appliances that I could take apart. My grandma would save old clocks, etc. so that I could take them apart and figure out how they work. It was as good as any toy they could have given me.

Also, my buddies and I, who grew up in a small town, would walk through the alleys behind the main business district of town on the way home from school and look through the old junk. If a customer had bought a new refrigerator or TV, the appliance stores would take away their old one and leave it in the alley to be taken away by the trash man. We would completely strip these appliances of anything useful: fan motors, buttons, timers, the flexible magnetic strips in the door gasket, etc. I think there are still boxes of this junk in my old stuff at my parents' house.

Don
Kansas City

 

[swearingen]

I grew up on Lego and when the Technic type came out with gears, pneumatics, and motors it just cemented my interest in engineering.

Now they have Lego Mindstorm, which is a very sophisticated extension of Technics. It has sensors and a programmable "brain" so that you can build robots that react to their environment in ways you choose. If these had come out when I was a youngster, I would have clamoured for every set available. I haven't actually worked with a set yet, but when I saw a news article about them, I did a little reading about them and suddenly wished I was 10 again!

I, too, did what eromlignod did and removed parts from appliances and electronics equipment, but I used them mostly to power or somehow enhance my Lego constructions.

 

[prost]

Here's a pretty cool book

http://trilogypublications.com/

 

[IRstuff]

The original Mindstorms is now obsolete. Mindstorms NXT is the hot thing for this Christmas:

http://mindstorms.lego.com/Overview/NXT_Software.aspx

Note that the new software is based on LabView

http://www.ni.com/academic/mindstorms/

TTFN

 

[65Roses]

What about an Erector set? I had many when I was a kid. But I can't seem to find the kind of set today for my kids like I had when I was their age.

How about an old go cart? My da bought me old junk carts when I was a kid and I would fix them up. Engine rebuilds etc....

Why is my handle 65Roses?
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[Heckler]

I would suggest buying some books that expose them to Biology, Chemistry, Earth Science, Environmental Science, Life Science, Physics, and Physical Science. Check out

http://www.pasco.com

the world leader in helping teachers teach science. Then after they're exposed to principles of science lead them to the applications of science.

Best Regards,

Heckler
Sr. Mechanical Engineer
SW2005 SP 5.0 & Pro/E 2001
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Never argue with an idiot. They'll bring you down to their level and beat you with experience every time.

 

[tygerdawg]

Random Ideas To Ponder:

In the last year or so I was doing some random net surfing and came across a site that showed with pictures, steps, and parts lists how to make different types of electric motors. I was amazed. It was all household stuff (thread spools, popsicle sticks, copper wire, PVC pipe). If I had that kind of home project to do when I was a kid in 4-H, I probably would have been more electrical.

If your grandkids are somewhat older, then you may be able to get materials from Society of Mfg Engineers sme.org . They once were pushing something like "Engineering is Fun". They also have a wonderful "SME/RI Robotics Challenge" contest for school age children. While the FIRST Robotics competition is good, it always struck me as TV-Friendly and the grownups did most of the work. The FIRST also requires heavy $pon$or$hip from Corporations. The SME/RI Robot Challenge is strictly for kids, low-bucks, they do the work, they come up with the ideas, etc., and it was a lot of fun. Don't know if they even still do it. How motivated are you about this? You may want to get hooked up with your kid's school to drive this activity.

When I was involved with SME and ASME, those society chapters sponsored events for kids. One that was particularly popular was the "Toothpick Bridge Building Contest." The kids loved it: build a bridge on guidelines, go to contest, and put the bridges through a crush test to see how much load it would carry. The teachers loved it because it gave them something to do with the class. This was a heck of a lot of work on the part of the Society memebers, but with strong organization it went smoothly.

TygerDawg

 

[btrueblood]

Books: "The Mad Scientist's Club" - and its sequels.

Stuff: Lego mindstorms is pretty cool, but take a look at the BOE-bot on the Parallax website, a cool build-it yourself robot using their Basic Stamp as a microprocessor core. Bought one for myself (ok, I put it on my Xmas list and the wife bought it for me); I didn't get around to it for 6 months, and then my son asked if he could put it together... I told him I thought it would be too advanced for him, which of course made him want it more...

 

[IRstuff]

Yeah, seen that. Lego had more appeal for my kids, since they can attach a bunch of stuff to build up structures that would require some amount of sheet metal bending with a BOE bot.



TTFN

 

[JStephen]

A lot of it is just in the kids- either they like Legos and similar type building toys or they don't, and if they don't, you're probably not going to change it a lot.

There's also Tinkertoys.

I never had an erector set- expensive, small fiddly pieces. Probably would have liked it when I was about 11 or 12, though.

 

[KENAT]

Mechano, or the 80's plastic equivalent bolt & build. My oldest was into kennex.

I used to build things out of wood, Cardboard, what ever was around.

I'd take things apart but was never good at putting them back together, no so much because I couldn't but I always wanted to improve them.

 

[Cockroach]

I have my son, 3 1/2 years old, sit with me in the office and write on discarded prints. He thinks that "Bob the Builder" is going to machine the part for him.

So I bring him into the machine shop and have him take a look at what some of the manufacturing processes are all about. It looks really cool from the point of view of a three year old, but in the end "Mighty Machines" still rules.

Just expose the kids, maybe something will rub off and stimulate the genes!

Kenneth J Hueston, PEng
Principal
Sturni-Hueston Engineering Inc
Edmonton, Alberta Canada

 

[GBor]

You may want to look up "First Lego League" or "BEST Robotics Competition". The first, obviously, involves Legos: building a small robot and programming it to perform a set of functions under a specified time frame. They usually have some theme such as "exploring Mars", or something similar. The second is more of a hand maipulated, much larger robot where you control where it is going, but it has to "reach out and change the batteries of the International Space Station", perhaps. In addition to the race for performing these actions, there are extra points for doing a presentation, making drawings of your robot...I don't really know what else.

Garland E. Borowski, PE
Borowski Engineering & Analytical Services, Inc.
Lower Alabama SolidWorks Users Group

 

[Ashereng]

Our science center has a whole place devoted to kids, with really neat stuff like:
- arechimedes' screw conveyor
- self-pull pulleys (your pull yourself up)
- perpetual climbing wall (its on a conveyor, based on your mass)

I am sure they would have a good resource for books, toys, Christmas gift ideas etc. Maybe contact the science center nearest you?

"Do not worry about your problems with mathematics, I assure you mine are far greater."
Albert Einstein
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[MadMango]

How about balsa wood model planes (RC or Gliders)? That worked for me since one had to make all your own parts.

[green]"Art without engineering is dreaming; Engineering without art is calculating."[/green]

Have you read faq731-376 to make the best use of Eng-Tips Forums?

 

[ornerynorsk]

Start with a plant tour of a local mfg company. I was in 8th grade when my industrial arts class took a field trip to a coal fired power plant. Awesome. I was amazed and immediately hooked on machinery. There was a high rate of incidence in things being dis-assembled at home after that!

 

[Vaporware]

Transformer toys. Transformers are fun because they turn into a toy car+robot and are mechanical because you learn about joints and they way mechanisms. much easier to explain to a kid.

I love the books called things like "How stuff works" or something. It's full of science facts.

Heinlein would also involve fun fiction with science in a couple years when they want junior literature. I seem to remember he had a youth books series about adventures in space.Heinlein Bibliography
Look for the books marked with a *. These are considered youth adventure novels.

 

[MintJulep]

The Tom Swift books were somewhat dated when I read them 30ish years ago. I imagine they would seem really out of date today.

Just go build fun stuff with them.

Modify their bicycles, build a go-cart (powered or gravity), restore a car if that is age-appropriate, watch myth-busters with them and recreate some of the "experiments", or just myth-bust on your own.

 

[hydroMC117]

All these suggestions are good. My best contribution would be to think about what makes an engineer, and what makes an engineer a good engineer. I think the single most important thing is curiosity. In my case, I have an intense desire to know how things really work. I got hooked on this early working on the junk cars that I and my friends drove around, and it continues today in combine hydraulics and submarine nuclear propulsion. I've tried to stimulate the same in my son, building his first car, a 68 Buick GS, for his 16th birthday with his help. We watch discovery, History and PBS channels, not sitcoms, in our house. We do our own carpentry and plumbing. Who knows what will become of this, but at least my son will likely never fill his windshield washer with anti-freeze.