Thursday 16 August 2012

How to use bathroom supplies to entertain the kids

I really have to thank the commenter who left a link for making these, I can't find the comment now! If it was you please shout up!
The video we watched made a more complicated version using battery packs and soldering, this is my simplified version of it.

What you need:
A nail brush
Cheap electric toothbrush
tape
pliers/scissors
optional- pens and paper


First take the head off the toothbrush.






Next, use the pliers to pull the bristles out of the top of the nail brush, we tried cutting them first then realised that they would pull out. It is quite hard so you might end up doing it rather than your child.



Next is where your experimentation starts, I would explain to the kids that they need to try placing the toothbrush on differ parts of the brush because depending on where it sits will effect it's performance. We used masking tape to hold it in place until we found the 'sweet spot' and then we secured it better with duct tape.


So have fun playing around with the placement, we found that sometimes it would just go round in circles and other times it was really slow and the we found the position to make it go faster. There are a couple of little video clips below since photos don't really explain it well. We also tried taping  a pen to the brush and later in the day Ebi-kun made a maze with his books, this kept him quiet for ages! As the whizzer hits the book, most of the time it changes direction, occasionally it did get stuck.








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3 comments:

  1. Ah, It was us! So glad you made it. I like your more simple version too. Awesome! I spy at least three of our books in your picture, I guess cool 7 year old boys have similar taste even if on opposite sides of the world. My son was just telling me about the Ghibli Museum in Tokyo and I told him I read a little about it in your page.

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  2. That reminds me of one of my first dates with my partner. We made vibrobots from MAKE Vol 10. I bet Ebi would love to make one! Here's the link we followed to make it.
    http://boingboing.net/2011/05/11/make-a-vibrobot-from.html

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  3. That looks fun. Mike and I made a vibrobot on one of our first dates. Ebi might like it. It was part of MAKE Vol 10 http://boingboing.net/2011/05/11/make-a-vibrobot-from.html

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