- Manufactured by a top-notch children’s company
- Great brand-name children’s item
- Safe, non-toxic, time tested
- Perfect gift for birthdays, holidays, & special occassions
- Satisfaction guaranteed
Product Description
The Fuel Cell Car & Experiment Kit has been a hot item since its introduction a few years ago. It has captivated tens of thousands of children and adults alike, who have played and learned with it. Now, another version of the fuel cell car kit, the Fuel Cell X7, is available. This kit still has the same award-winning model car with its unique reversible fuel cell not found in other fuel cell car models…. More >>
#1 by Heidi the Homeschool Mom on March 20, 2010 - 6:32 pm
I purchased this for our 14 year old son. I thought it might be a really neat project for him, and I was able to get it 50% off online (not by Amazon this time).
The total project time took probably about 40 minutes for him to put together and “use”. He gets frustrated easily, and doesn’t always read the directions well after his frustration level increases, but he says the instructions to put the parts together before assembling the car were very poor. He also said the wheels were really junky. However, he did get the stickers put on, and assembled the vehicle. After watching it “work” for about a minute, it became completely boring. He and some of the other children thought it might be entertaining to chase the dog with it, but alas, it only has one very slow speed, so that wasn’t fun, either. Besides, it is not durable material at all, so why break it?
Possibly we could pawn it off on somebody else for a 5-10 minute project. We laughed that it provided goggles, too, but I guess they had lawyers encourage that. The goggles were sized for a small child, even though the instructions stated that a child “as young as ten” could try this.
Inside the booklet that came with it was an explanation of how Fuel Cell cars will help the future energy issues. I would say that it was moderately educational, but I’d have rather read that elsewhere and saved my $54.50.
In all honesty, we probably shouldn’t have purchased it because we have not always been happy with the Thames-Kosmos kits. I thought it looked more durable in the pictures, and I assumed at the retail price that it must have been more educational and entertaining. Now it will sit on a shelf before we debate letting one of our now-younger children “grow into it”–or before we just throw it away.
Rating: 2 / 5