Tobar Gyroscope Spinning Science Toy

Cheap looking looked rusty

Gyroscope was quite a fun for my 10 years old son. He was playing with it continuously and discovering many possibilities for almost two days. Unfortunately the quality of materials is not very high and after a day and a half the gyro started precessing and was not turning smoothly any more. My son was very disappointed and sad, because he didn't do anything wrong and now nonfunctional gyro is just left alone and reminding us of a day and a half of total fun.

Bought it for my young cousin for Christmas, and out of all the high tech gadgets and toys he got bombarded with on Christmas day, this was the one he kept going back to, making me wind it up for him and spinning it on his hand, seeing him try to get his head around the physics as he tilted it and felt the resistance.And to be honest, I enjoyed playing with it just as much, and so did my Uncle. It's strange how something so low tech and old school can have such allure when surrounded by today's toys.Great educational toy, and great fun for kids.

Arrived from vendor in good time and was well packaged. Upon opening, it has to be said the finish on this product is not of a high standard. During use the product was continually handled with care to avoid damage. Prior to the first use a drop of a 'popular' lubricating oil was applied to the spindle points on the gyroscope frame.Unfortunately within 1hr use and approximately 15 spins, the rotor (main spinning component) came free from the gyroscope frame. Upon re-alignment and attempted re-use, the rotor would not remain in the gyroscope frame housing, continually falling out when placed under normal side force from pulling on the winding string.Upon further inspection, the manufactured split in the gyroscope frame appeared satisfactory and did not appear to be misaligned etc. however the gyroscope frame female openings that accept the male rotor spindle pins were found to be worn and rounded and were unable to give the expected level of security to the spinning rotor. It should be noted that the gyroscope frame appears to be manufactured from a different and softer material to that of the rotor (however this cannot be personally verified).All in all a poorly manufactured product which has not proven to live up to the manufacturer claim of giving "hours of creative play" and "....for years to come".It would be appreciated that the vendor will read this review and contact myself anon to offer a full refund.

This is similar to the gyroscopes we had in the early 1950s, and it works exactly the same way. You thread the string through the hole in the axle, and turn the gyro until the string is wound up on the exle, then give it a mighty pull to set it spinning. Then you can do tricks with it!Educationally very good - but a little less fun than I recall because it does not spin for as long or as smoothly as I remember. The vibration is enough to make it fall off its little plastic stand every time we tried it, but it will still do the usual tricks of balancing on a string, albeit not for very long, since it soon slows down. We've tried tuning the adjustable bearings, adding a drop of lubricant, but it still slows faster than one would hope.The price *looks* a lot more than the 3/6 (threee shillings and sixpence) that I recall them costing way back when, but that translates to about £5 in todays value, so it's fair.On the positive side, the fairly rapid slowdown means that it will keep a patient and inquisitive youngster engaged longer in rewinding the string and spinning it up again, but it would be nice if it kept going longer.Whilst spinning, its massive flywheel demonstrates precession well (that weird feeling you get when you move it one way and it responds by moving in another - conservation of angular momentum) and will intrigue the embryo engineers amongst us. Recommended.Still fascinates me!

This is a fab product product lasts for years easy to use builds a interest in science and fun to watch you can find little tricks to do with it like balancing on its string ect it's a brilliant product

There aren't many good gyroscopes around anymore, but for the price, this is a fair deal. A good toy too. I got this to demonstrate a spinning proton in a magnetic field. It didn't exactly do what I wanted but gave good insight. Go on and buy this, there probably aren't any better alternatives in its price range.

It's a good product and works very well. Who needs pretend magic when kids can see nature letting a gyroscope do things which shouldn't be possible.The gap between the spindle and the frame is big enough so as not to trap little fingers so it's ok to be played with by young children (I've had this problem with a different gyroscope so got this one instead).