Wooden Toys

[Donny Lawson]

I was wondering if anyone makes wooden toys such as cars,trucks,trains? I would love to see some pictures of your work. Here is a few of mine.

[Jeff Wittrock]

Very cool toys!

When my son was young, I made him a couple of wooden cars. I also made him him some homemade "tinker toys" since he was always running out of regular tinker toy pieces. Sorry no pictures (probably just as well. They were pretty crude compared to yours ).

I love to see wooden toys, especially ones with lots of nice details like yours. Looking forward to seeing others as well.

-Jeff

[Tim Anderson]

What is every one using for axles? I've used hickory and ash and they have not held up to the abuse.

Tim

[Kenneth Speed]

Very nice toys! They bring back memories; I remember toys I made for my son out of wood. A biplane, A sailboat and an ambulance. I made the ambulance out of a cut off from a 4" x 4" cedar fence post, the red light was the cut off top of a broom handle, the wheels were the off cuts from a hole saw with a hand power drill so they were very out of round and rumbled like the Wrath of God when my son pushed it across the floor. I remember thinking someone would NEED an ambulance because my son grew strong enough to sort of shot put the thing across the basement! I think the ambulance took a wrong turn after flying across the basement a couple times and "disappeared" before someone got knocked unconscious.


Ken

[Lee Schierer]

I've made quite a few wooden toys for my grandkids. I use "The Great All American Wooden Toy Book" by Norm Marshall for some ideas. Here's some of my toys.
241946241947241948241949You can view the rest at my website.

[Carl Babel]

Jeff,
The trick, as near as I can tell, is to have minimal play in the axle, while still allowing it to spin smoothly. All my "first generation" toys ended up with broken axles (except one I made with a steel axle). I never got any reports of broken axles from my "second gen" toys. Same wood (maple), but minimal side-to-side play and nylon shims. The first gen toys probably had more than 1/4" play.
Sorry, no pics - these were all made in the polaroid era ;-)
Carl

['Jacques Malan']

I make small batches of toys to sell. It is not a way to get rich, but I have fun. At work we have a standard product where the cnc router cut out little plywood wheels for me that I glue 3 together for the wheels and then clean up on the lathe. Axles from 6mm round steel. Lights is upholstery nails painted white. I also make helicopters and aeroplanes, but I do not have pictures on this computer.

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['Jacques Malan']

The helicopter and the aeroplane. I'm pleased with both but the helicopter has got just a little bit too much work in, and I'm looking for a way to simplify it.

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