What do you want to be when you grow up?

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Well done. I got my son a circuit set a age 5 and I was the limitation, not him. It would be so messy and I'd have to supervise (and his younger brother would try to take pieces of it), so I often said; "lets do that another day", rather than letting him pursue his passion.

I'll have to get it out again - you've made me feel guilty - though on the plus side, I'd already decided to take some home-made electronics kits to scouts this term and teach them all.

BTW: You do have to supervise those sets. I let my son randomly connect components and he built something that just kept getting hotter and hotter - I had to disconnect the battery before it did damage.

That IS a good point. ANY short circuit could be a bit dangerous. Heck, look at all the SONY batteries that blew up. GRANTED, that is a worst case scenario(BIG high amperage batteries made with lithium), but it shows how bad it could be. But randomly connecting them is a bad idea. Maybe if you taught the very basics first...

BTW here is an experiment to illustrate how seemingly unpredictable things can be. Take a big inductor(like half of a transformer), and hold both ends of the same coil. While STILL holding it, touch it to both battery terminals. NOTHING happens!! !! !! !! NOW, while STILL holding the coil, disconnect it from the battery. You may get the SHOCK of your life! You just experienced "inductive kickback"! Connecting the batter created a magnetic field. When you disconnect iit, the field collapses and generates power over the coil.

BTW I don't think it is dangerous for a healthy kid, or adult, but it CAN be quite a wallop.

Yes! I think you have a good point. We are from Seattle and road the monorail a few times - when he was 2 1/2 (he has a wonderful memory). The monorail has a overhead lines. Nate also just read a pretty indepth book about trains with his dad. He remembers practically everything that he has seen and read, so perhaps he did read about one of those trains. I will go over those websites tonight with him! Thanks.

Regarding circuits - I should be watching him more closely. I have never thought that those little ones can be dangerous. He usually follows the directions and hasn't tried to be creative with the circuits yet.

2uk - - Nate would love to learn all about that! A few weeks ago, we took a battery, a buzzer, some wire and another piece of stronger wire and made a game. I can't explain exactly what was done because I really didn't help with it. It was a dad and son thing - a science experiment. Nate is really into learning that sort of stuff. I should just let him take off and learn all he can. I think we have been holding him back some. Not on purpose.

Last edited by natesmom on 25 Apr 2009, 9:57 pm, edited 1 time in total.

It was the same way for us.
It was either tracker or 2uk who told me more about circuits and convinced me to let him pursue it more. I have an almost 2 year old son, so I really understand. It is so hard. We have a three bedroom and finally had to make one room solely a sleeper room to allow another room for Nate's experiments and small things like circuits. I am sure we can't do that for too much longer but for now, the situation is working. It really isn't the best solution, though.

That is so cute.
Teletubbies are banned in our house, though LOL. I can handle barney but something about those teletubbies gives me nightmares.

Cable cars have cords.

Wikipedia - cable cars

My 9 year old brother has a phobia of the teletubbies,no joke. When he was 1/2 he was watching it and he had face against the screen and this puppet bear thing goes "I am the beeaaar!" and the volume was turned up loud and it made him jump real bad. Now if he see's it on TV he freaks out and hides.

I forgot about that, but they don't provide electricity, etc... But YES Cable cars, and some devices(like the "train" at the detroit airport, or the palm springs aireal tramway DO have CABLEs that are used to move them. The one in palmsprings even delivers the water!

BTW, interestingly, the detroit "train" ALSO has a third rail to provide power, but it isn't used to move it.

Last edited by 2ukenkerl on 26 Apr 2009, 7:14 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I DID mention special tracks, and overhead lines. BOTH use brushes, and can't really be considered cords. And who knows WHAT they will do when nate graduates. I knew a guy in highschool that played on top of such a train, and lost BOTH legs! And all the "third rail" type trains have warnings on the tracks. And motors and batteries are getting better and cheaper.

Regarding my little experiment, I said that more like a joke. If nate wants to try it, he CAN take one of those 99volt neon lights, attach it to a battery(Probably one of those big 6volts is best, though I think it will work with even a AAA), NOTHING! Remove it, NOTHING! Attach it to the inductor, like I described, and attach it to the battery like I described, but NOT touch the leads. Nothing happens. Remove it from the battery, and the neon light will flash for a moment. THAT way he can see the effect, but not be subjected to the jolt. It takes a lot of power to light that little light, but the inductor will only light it for a small fraction of a second. Of course, he could do it over and over again.

As for the short circuit problem, that can happen to ANYONE! Heck, there is one person that, in his biography, spoke of how a device HE created basically started smoking, etc.... He admittedly used substandard parts, since they were young, and the parts were expensive. They used rejects from various companies, since most parts were merely out of spec, and still usable. That was embarrasing because his friend got him an interview, IIRC, and they were writing an article on him. The person's name was Stephen Wozniak, and his friend's name was Steven Jobs.

So it probably IS a good idea to make sure the battery doesn't get too hot.