Kids under 10 may need adult help and supervision but these RC kits feature easy-to-follow instructions. While the RCs built with these kits might not be the fastest or coolest looking cars on the block, they provide a fun learning experience for all ages.
RC Kits for Teens
Older kids can get a taste for the real world of transmitters, receivers, and the gears, circuitry, and motors of RC racing by building the Elenco Turbo King RC Car Kit. Aimed at ages 10-16 years this no-soldering kit comes with a full-color assembly and training manual, has a flashing top light, 7 remote functions. You may find this RC car kit listed by various vendors as Funology, Amerikit, or Turbo King.- Buy Direct: Shop All About Toys / Hobbies for the Funology RC Turbo King Car Kit
- Buy Direct: Shop Dax Stores for Amerikit RC Race Car
- Buy Direct: Shop HobbyTron for the Turbo King RC Car Kit on Clearance
Elenco R/C Car Kit - Soldering Version
The RC members of the LEGO Racers family include the 58 piece X5-Igniter and the Sunset Cruiser for ages 8-14 and the 104 piece Outdoor Challenger, an off-road beast suitable for ages 9-16. The 71 piece Red Beast and the Dirt Crusher are older LEGO RC Racers. Unlike some other LEGO building sets, there's not a lot of customization involved and the parts aren't really interchangeable between models. The Outdoor Challenger has a top speed of 14 mph while the Igniter, Sunset Cruiser, and Red Beast do a respectable 6.2 mph. Some of the RC Racers are harder to find than other LEGO Racers, you might have to shop around.
- LEGO X5-Igniter
- LEGO Outdoor Challenger
- Buy Direct: Shop All About Toys / Hobbies for LEGO Racers
- Buy Direct: Shop the LEGO Store for the Sunset Cruiser
Instead of assembling an RC that just drives around after you're done, how about building one that you can then use to engage in combat? The Titan Tank Robot kit is a solderless kit for ages 10 and up. Buy a pair of them then once built you and your child can have an infrared tank fight where the tank that takes too many hits dies and has to be restarted.
RC Kits for Pre-Teens
Building an RC really is a snap with the Elenco Snap Rover RC Kits. Kids will work with the circuit boards but no soldering required -- the 30 plus parts all snap together. For ages 8-13, the RC Snap Rover comes with color coded instructions, has a working headlight and side lights, turns left and right, and you can race up to three Rovers at a time. It looks nice and geeky rather than sporty because the lower body is clear to expose the colorful moving gears and a circuit board sits right on top.Learning Resources M-Gears RC Kits (part of the Gears! Gears! Gears! line) come with color-coded instructions so that even kids as as young as 7-12 can easily build the off-road truck, roadster, or Grand Prix racer from colorful plastic, interlocking gears. Sets can be mixed and matched for more variety and they come with extras like a driver, pylon cones, and flags.
RC Kits for Younger Kids
While they may need some parental assistance, there are also RC building kits for 4-9 year olds. The Floppy Jalopy RC kit is one of several colorful, fanciful, motorized building sets in the Gears! Gears! Gears! line from Learning Resources. The Floppy Jalopy has color-coded instructions for its 133 pieces or kids can arrange the parts in other wacky ways. Comes with wireless remote control and needs 7 AA batteries.- Gears! Gears! Gears! Floppy Jalopy RC Building Set
- Buy Direct: Shop All About Toys / Hobbies for Floppy Jalopy
