Thursday 28 September 2017

Meccano, is it just for children?

As usual at the moment things are hectic around the house, so I was so happy to give my Meccano off road racer to TJ for a little space. 
This will be the first time TJ or myself have ever made a Meccano model and my first thoughts were that it looked quite easy and once the model had been finished he could build another one of the twenty-five models.


Emptying all the pieces into the box so nothing is lost, I left TJ in charge of putting together the first few pages of the book. With 406 pieces I thought this may take him a while to complete. 



Finding the pieces and slowly and carefully putting the screws and nuts together. By step 10 TJ was fed up so I took over. Twenty minutes later my fiddly fingers found it difficult to place small nuts around the screws. Finally I gave in and started looking at the tools properly. It was then that i realised that the monkey wrench had various purposes. 


The instructions are clear, and with the picture of the screws and a 1:1 picture of each screw that is needed on the each instruction. The Meccano is built out of black plastic or metal and each piece has a place to go.


 After three nights of spending a little time and doing 6 instructions a time I still haven't finished.


I'm loving the fact that this isn't just a 5 minute job and that it is taking time to build. I like to take my time making things and love a good jigsaw puzzle so this is right up my alley. 
Although TJ has lost interest I'm enjoying making it as it's helping keep my mind off of some family problems of late.