I bought our son a 16" for his 7th birthday last June, as he seemed to be having trouble learning on my (heavily chopped!) 20". He was freemounting and riding well enough to go out for 1 mile or so rides within 2 weeks. We've done a lot of muni together, no serious drops, but lots of technical singletrack and steep, loose descents. Last Tuesday we did a 6.5 mile trail ride in just under 2 hours, mostly singletrack. I felt a bit of a 'bad dad' as I was on my 26 x 3 (Duro) with 150's while Obe was on a 16 x 2.25 with 89's. He slept well that night! I'm playing with the idea of making up a shortie superlight 24" muni for him, copying the 'short persons coker frame' on unicycle.uk.com. By my maths he would just be able to reach the pedals on 127 cranks. The only concern I have is that as he can keep up fairly well on his 16", on a 24" He'll be leaving me for dead.
My little one started to learn shortly after his 3rd birthday. It wasn't his only Xmas present, honest! He found this a little early in life to comprehend what-the-hell was going on. Now the Winter is over with, we can find the time to practice more. He's now 4 1/2 and I'm convinced he'll be riding unaided by his 5th birthday.
