The Off Bits Erector Set: Animal Mini STEM Toys for Kids 6+, Toy Building Sets with Nuts & Bolts, STEM Building Toys Gifts for Boys and Girls (Red Moose)

These are great quality heavy duty toys. The kids had fun building the box characters then fun just building what ever came to their mind. Happy with the purchase. Would definitely order more in the future. :)

I got this for my 9 year old son. The instructions were pretty clear but a few of the pieces didn't quite match up. Minor bends in the metal caused the holes not to align properly but with help holding them in place until we got a bolt in, they were easy to assemble after that. We went off the rails a bit and created our own mega monster but thats what STEM is about anyway. This ended up being a really cool gift and we spent an entire afternoon creating things with the pieces. Fantastic for creative minds who like to build beyond the instruction sheet suggestions.

I hate those promo pictures. The ones where it's an adult and a child fake smiling at each other while they both hold the object in question. It obviously panders more to the adult than the child. It's almost as if the image is saying, "Look at all of the fun YOU could be having with your child." It makes you wonder who you're really buying it for.So anyways, I got this and tried to put it together with my 8 year old daughter. How did it go? Well, read on and find out!We were immediately confused the second we started reading the manual.None of the parts are labeled and are all very cheap, with several looking identical but obviously aren't.For example, there are three different types of headless bolts, but almost all 3 look identical in the manual and are NOT labeled. There are also 3 different kinds of nuts and, again, all 3 are not labeled and look exactly the same in the manual, with 2 also looking exactly the same in person, too. But of course only one type will fit on one bolt and only one will fit on another, and you have no way of knowing this until you try to put them on AFTER you have already assembled half of the reindeer.The included tools are cheap and just don't work. I had to go downstairs to get my proper tools so we could finish it. The reindeer we ended up making was very creepy and confusing. How all of the parts are supposed to fit together isn't explained in the manual. In fact, very little is explained in the manual. It's all just a vague and badly labeled diagram. For some reason the reindeer has two heads. For some reason it also has a beak? Reindeers don't have beaks, right?I could go on, but to summarize:1. The manual was useless and everything was poorly labeled.2. The included tools are trash and you should invest in your own quality tools.3. The parts are cheap and if you really care about the project then you should just buy parts separate.4. You don't realize you're putting it together wrong until you're halfway done.5. The final product ends up being laughable and just plain creepy.So is this a good introduction to DIY projects? Yes, it is. It's a perfect introduction. That's exactly how it always goes down. But that's not why I give it 5 stars.I give this 5 stars because my daughter and I had a wonderful time laughing at the instructions, laughing about how we put it together wrong, complaining about the cheap parts and useless tools, and singing our own adlibbed christmas songs about the creepy reindeer we made. I haven't seen my daughter laugh that hard in some time.We had the fun those promo pictures promised. Worth every penny. Thank you.

I love the fact that this "toy" is also an engineering lesson. The description says 6+, but the parts are very small. I remember my 5yo brother swallowing a metal washer he found on the playground of our new school. It didn't pass naturally, so a couple weeks later he was having abdominal surgery. My point, great concept, make it bigger or be realistic about a higher age of use.

I've gotten several kits...what I initially thought was a neat way to use some "spare parts" to make something interesting and teach kids about fasteners has turned into frustration while building this with my son. Nuts with contaminated threads, difficult assembly operations (e.g. pushing a spring while tightening a set screw to hold a piece on) made what I thought would be a fun kit into a frustration for my son and I. Neat idea...just use better parts and a more thought-out design.

My five-year-old son loves building sets and typically is able to do those designated a bit older than his age. I decided to give this set a go because it was a bit different from his usual ones. I liked the STEM focus as well since I'm always eager to encourage his math and science skills. I also liked that he could make several different things with the same components, giving him more options. This set was smaller than I'd anticipated, but it was well organized, had all components, and the pieces fit together well. My son had a bit of trouble following the directions, but since he's on the young end of the age range, that's only to be expected. This product would be a great (small) gift for a kid, and its small size would make it a good option for travel too!