Toy question! Alternative to Hot Wheels?

[Bossybessy]

DS desperate for Hot Wheels track for Christmas. I’m trying to be a bit mindful of money AND not buy plastic tat (also trying to have as environmentally friendly Christmas as possible).

For other DCs toys, I’ve bought wooden, eco-brand, or secondhand like eBay / Facebook marketplace.

I am struggling with Hot Wheels! It’s so expensive and looks like tat. Is it tat? Even on eBay it’s expensive.

Any alternatives? He has some of the cars already, bought for his birthday from a friend. What other tracks can these cars go on?

I’m after a “set” rather than just pieces of track so he can play straight away.

Any tips would be great!

Bump

Most of the alternatives are also plastic and tend to be a little less robust.
We have a load of hotwheels given to us when a friends son grew out of it and it all still fits together and works perfectly.
Maybe have a scout of selling pages or ebay for some preloved sets.

It’s good to hear that they’re not tat as, online, they look so flimsy and cheap (but are expensive). I sort of don’t mind spending if it’s not going to be a landfill toy but would rather buy second-hand!

And - if others agree that hot wheels are better than alternatives - is it better to look out for tracks or sets? What’s better play-value?

We had hot wheels too and my son really loved it And played with it loads. I think it was a great toy - we got most of ours second hand (school Christmas fairs with a toy stall are great for this). He loved building the tracks as well as actually playing with it - and all the loop the loops etc actually worked, even with second hand stuff.
We passed it on again when he grew out of it, so it does hold up well.

Oh gosh I wish I knew you in RL!! We have so much hot wheels stuff, that I'm getting rid of 😩
Personally I wouldn't buy it again, the tracks don't hold together very well..kids see the adverts and expect the toys to do everything like in the adverts, when in RL it's not like that at all!

It's hard when your child wants something specific! I do know that cheaper make track sets fit hot wheels..could you try and find a second hand hot wheels garage or something and then buy all the much cheaper track sets?

Oh no that would have been perfect! Ha!

That’s a good idea on the garage. I’ll start my search for that - have been concentrating on track sets maybe a bit too much!

Maybe I'm out of touch but isn't the point of hot wheels the little metal cars? DS1 had hundreds of the things. I think we had one playset which he never played with. The cars went everywhere with him though.

Yes, a garage got played with, and a car transporter lorry. Sets no. They are too gimmicky and boring.

Hema do a set of roads which jigsaw together which is quite good. If you don't have one near you you can buy online.

Scalextrix!
Sorry for detail - but much better

Following.... I've been looking at the colossal crash set for 5yo but it is so expensive and looks like track already built so not sure how much fun it would be? Is it just a matter of whizzing cars around the track manually? Girlwhowearsglasses, is scalextrix better then? Thankyou