Marbleocity Dragon Coaster

Before I forget, if you end up purchasing this kit - you may want to note the two items that I mention below. TWO QUICK CLARIFICATIONS REGARDING THE INSTRUCTIONS 1. On the bottom of page 17 in the instruction book they neglect to tell you that PART 19 should be sloping slightly to the left (rather than perfectly level). I didn't realize at that particular point in the construction, but this is the chute that feeds marbles into the pinwheel-shaped rotating piece that in turn feeds marbles into the largest gear. Little did I know that the "marbles" (actually more like ball bearings) would CONSTANTLY stall there unless PART 19 sloped to the left. So I ended up squeezing a 1/2 round needle file in there and I filed and filed until there was finally a slope. 2. Page 19, installing PART 30 - in the middle of the paragraph of text they mention that this is press-fit, and not to be glued. Everywhere else in the illustrations they include an image of a bottle of glue with a line through it to remind you if parts are NOT to be glued, but they missed it in this particular illustration, and I ended up gluing the part in by mistake. Luckily, everything functioned as it should have and so I didn't need to remove the piece. OK, now for a quick review. I am really very impressed with this kit. The laser cut pieces are very well done, easy to pop out of the plywood sheets, and fit together well. There is a tiny bit of play when connecting most pieces, but this is desirable because it means that there is room for the glue, rather than a force-fit that may scrape off the vast majority of the adhesive. As I was assembling (and certainly once it was up and running) I couldn't help but marvel at the level of though, engineering and cleverness that went into this design. Very few things manage to impress me on an intellectual level AND excite my inner child at the same time. The Dragon Coaster kit did both, and I was delighted. Lastly, here are some things I found useful as I assembled the project. They were nice to have, but by no means absolutely necessary: 1. Bamboo Skewers. I used these instead of the toothpicks provided in the kit to apply the glue. The blunt ends of the skewers also came in handy for popping the smaller pieces free from the plywood sheets. I think I got mine from a dollar store, but here's an example of them here on Amazon Bamboo BBQ Skewers, 100ct 2. Condiment Cups. I use these all the time to mix small batches of epoxy, or to hold paint. In this project, I poured small amount of glue into the cups, and then would dip the tips of the skewers in to get glue for assembly. Crystalware, Disposable 2oz. Plastic Portion Cups with Lids, Condiment Cup, Jello Shot, Soufflé Portion, Sampling Cup, 100 Sets - Black Cups with Clear Lids 3. Needle Files. I used the round file to remove the tiny burrs inside the teeth of the gears left over from where they had been attached to the main plywood sheets. I also ended up using the half-round file to fix an assembly mistake that I made. These are probably the least necessary, but I was happy that I had the set. Needle File Set (HIGHEST QUALITY 6 PIECE SET) Hardened Alloy Strength Steel - Mini Needle File Set Includes Flat, Flat Warding, Square, Triangular, Round, and Half-Round File. 4. Wooden dowel with a disk magnet glued to one end. A quarter inch dowel fits nicely (9/32 inch might be a more precise fit) into the holes built into the base. I cut one to about 4 inches in length and glued a quarter inch diameter neodymium magnet to one end. This comes in handy ALL the time. If a marbles falls off of a track for whatever reason, they seem to have a distressing tendency to hide under parts that I can't get my fat fingers into, lol. The magnet on a stick grabs them from out of wherever they may try to hide. The non-magnetic end of the stick can be used to nudge a ball back into motion. I highly recommend this kit!

Great fun to make. Found only a few parts somewhat difficult to fit and did a small amount of trimming on just one. Extremely well engineered and designed kit, although I really don't think it would be good for anyone that didn't have a fair amount of modeling experience. I used 5 min. epoxy instead of white glue. Could have used carpenter's glue, but wanted faster curing time. Did have to split each day's worth of work and mix small amounts of it frequently, but I could go back to work after an hour if I wanted. A GREAT help are these: https://smile.amazon.com/Tooltron-00015-Micro-Applicator-Brushes/dp/B004KYYOH2/ref=sr_1_9?ie=UTF8&qid=1523185692&sr=8-9&keywords=microbrush They let you get glue onto joints after you've put pieces in place as well as only put glue where you want it and in just the right amount. There are other versions of these, but most can't be bent in angles to get into tight spots. One BIG issue I have with Tinkineer is their using grey fonts for the instructions yet going all out for the cartoon preface. WHY????

Put this together with very engineering-minded 7yo and it was super-enjoyable! Easy to follow directions (though I don't understand why after a few steps, they decided to stop highlighting in the illustrations where glue should go - they were just like "OK, we've shown you a few times so now we're not showing you anymore, you figure it out," and it doesn't seem like it would have been that much more effort for them to keep doing that). Works really smoothly and looks great.

I have built 8 marble runs now. This one is very good for younger builders and a fantastic price. It is thicker than most. It does not plug together nearly as tight as others. You MUST glue it, glue not included. It is a very cool coaster. The ferris wheel has some issues. I could not get the 2 sides to stay snug against the wheel.the directions say to be careful to them perpendicular to the base. That is bogus, I tried flying them in meaning in and they didn't stay right. It would drop about 1 ball in 10. I took a piece of scrap wood larger than the axle diameter and screwed on to the end of the axle. It is basically a set of washers to hold the sides in against the wheel.. It now works well.

After building the mini Dragon and mini Skate Park coasters with my son, we moved on to this kit. The instructions are broken up for a 5 day experience, but we finished this in a couple of nights. As with the mini Dragon coaster, this is really an impressive kit. It's very sturdy once assembled, and having been very careful with our construction -- particularly the slide connections -- the coaster runs flawlessly. As with the mini coasters, I find the real fun was in the build, and we don't very often run this coaster. My son does like to show it to folks who come by who haven't seen it (doesn't happen a lot right now due to COVID). Despite that, I think it was a great value considering the fun my son and I had doing this together. Getting him away from video games for a while made this a tremendous value.

I was really excited to build this project, everything looks well designed, and fairly simple to follow for day one, which was unfortunately the last day I finished, due mostly because of user error. I didn’t realize that this warning was talking about the paddle being flipped, not the gear and paddle being swapped. And after a day of waiting (because the next instructions for this piece are on Day 2), everything is nearly welded together, and I doubt I will be able to separate the paddle from the rest of the assembly anymore. It’s disappointing to see a nice set be left unfinished, so I’ll try to remove the bonding agent from the two parts holding the paddle in place. I wish either the entirety of the paddle’s instructions were on the same day (so you could fix an issue like this before the glue dried) that that there was a replacement set for this piece, or that there was a warning as to what to have looked for when building (that second “reverse” could possibly be integrated into building the end result somewhere), so that you knew what was the “backwards” install. Overall, I don’t blame the developers for this issue, as it was written out as a warning, but I wish it would have been more clear as to how it should not have been

My son loved building this! It had clear instructions and held up well! He had so much fun building and playing with this.

As an engineer, I love this marble run. You can tell they spent a lot of time making it. Not only they use laser cut pieces, each piece was painstaking done so that they are unique (eg. piece could be symmetrical but they made little changes so that they can fit one way). Quality is quite high (pieces to make sure that the ball stays on the path) and they didn't skim (they even supply wax and toothpicks) on parts needed to build the kit. All in all, the build is quite fun and you get to learn a bit of physics along the way. Since I bought both this and skate park, I'm just waiting for the motor so that I can automate the set and run it all the time in the office!

Extraordinario producto... De gran calidad e ingenio. Pase un tiempo de altisima calidad con mi hija, armandolo.... Y hasta el dia de hoy nos da deleite jugando con el... Totalmente recomendado.

Beautiful experience with this project of Marbleocity Dragon. Well done brochure with excellent details !

fun to build join to the other toy skate park get the motor

Está muy bonito y fácil de armar, justo cómo se ve en el video

This product was fantastic. My Grandson loved it.