Operation Junkyard, airing Saturday mornings on NBC as part of the Discovery Kids line-up, is a half-hour kids version of the adult series on TLC.

Operation Junkyard gives 4 kids 6 hours to build a machine. Instead of rummaging around the junkyard, a modified schoolbus pulls up outside of the houses where the teams are assembled. Inside of the bus are all of the tools and junk required to build whatever machine they have been assigned to build and each team's bus is stocked with the same stuff. Just before build time, the teams are sent into a tent to find cogs. If they can find the cogs and properly assemble them to make a series of gears rotate, they can win up to three "bodgits."

A bodgit is either; a series of 'specialty' tools that will help in building their machine, a "trunk of junk" that may have more parts for building the machine or 10 minutes of design time with an engineer who can help them with their project. Should they win less than all 3, they can choose which one(s) they want to use. The expert is not allowed to help with the design (if the 10 minutes aren't up) but only to give them advice and help with some physical stuff (like cutting, welding, etc).

In the 2nd and 3rd rounds of competition they are given the tools and extra junk but compete to win up to 20 minutes of engineer time. A pyramid of 21 paint cans stands before the teams and they must look through them for as many as four alarm clocks. However, they only have 30 seconds.
 

After the 6 hour build day comes test day. The machines are taken to a test area where they get one hour of "tinker time" to make any last minute adjustments. The teams compete against each other and the team that wins advances in the series while the other team is out of the running for the grand prize.

There is also a pair of new hosts (Kamaya J and Rob Czar) who keep the pace moving.
 
 

Machine	Red Team	Blue Team	Winner
Cannon	Renegade Recyclers	Junkyard Jugglers	Junkyard Jugglers
Water Bailer	Scrap Scavengers	Rummaging Robots	Rummaging Robots
Water Bike	Scrapheap Henchmen	Gearhead Gremlins	Scrapheap Henchmen
Catapult	Bangin' Builders	Jurassic Junkers	Jurassic Junkers
Baseball Pitcher	Trash Talkers	Demolition Dudes	Demolition Dudes
Master Water Blaster	Funky Junkers	Garbage Gorillas	Funky Junkers
Go-Kart	Jurassic Junkers	Rummaging Robots	Jurassic Junkers
Mechanical Crane	Funky Junkers	Junkyard Jugglers	Junkyard Jugglers
Ice Drag Racer	Raging Racers	Demolition Dudes	Raging Racers
Mud Scooter	Scrapheap Henchmen	Jurassic Junkers	Scrapheap Henchmen
Pie Filling Machine	Junkyard Jugglers	Raging Racers	Raging Racers
Battleship	Raging Racers	Scrapheap Henchmen	Raging Racers