I really believe if daughters have strong dads, they're a lot less likely to get into trouble later on. I have two step-daughters 7 and 8. Full disclosure: Their dad is very involved in their lives, and lives right around the corner. They live with us, so naturally I see them more. But he's a great dad, so no put downs there. Just not real "manly/tear **** apart and see what happens, etc, etc". The 7 year old likes to ride, but gets bored easily, so she's not into working on stuff. My 8 year old is a brainy geek (spoken by a brainy geek) and as such loves to see how stuff works. I got a little '73 TS-50 dirt bike the other day for $50 off Craigslist because it needed rings. The parts dealer had rings, but couldn't get the base and head gaskets. I know I could get them, but I wanted to buy a Honda copy HF engine anyway, so I just bought the 2.5 HP engine for <$60 OtD. I plan on putting a cent. clutch on it and making a little mini bike type rig out of the old TS-50.
My 8 yo has been bugging me all week to work on the bike, so after I got the kitchen finally cleaned up from the remodel, we went outside for the first night tear down. We got the left side cover off and the clutch exposed. I already had the head and the jug off, so we got to play with the piston and I showed her how the piston made the wheel go around by explaining how combustion works and how the power from combustion gets transferred the rear wheel. Then we started working on getting the engine off the frame so we could take the case apart and I could show her the actual engine guts. She was enthralled the whole time! She kept poking and playing and messing with stuff. She also got her first tool lesson:
Topics covered included:
Differences in socket drive sizes
Metric vs SAE
Deep vs Shallow well
Proper way to use a wrench
Lefty loosey, righty tighty
Top cabinet vs bottom cabinet of the tool box
It was an awesome time. We didn't stay out too long, I just let her be the guide. When she got bored, we came inside. There's no deadline, so I'm taking all the time in the world to work on this with her. Soon enough she'll be grown and hopefully we can reminisce about the time we tore apart the dirt bike. She's already talking about painting pink.......
Here's the obligatory pic: