Once again, a long delay between updates and articles. Well, this is as much due to a lack of time to write and prepare the column as it anything. I've been quite busy with the weekly racing, have come to a bit of a halt when it comes to adding scenery to the track and what slot car time I have, has been spent either building up cars, modifying them or doing some running.
First the track. I have added in all the various
elevation bits and pieces after finalizing the design. It looks very much like
what was shown in the previous edition in terms of shape. I used a lot of
Woodland Scenics inclines for this and doubled the incline over the previous
section of switchbacks. In about an 8 foot length, I went up 8 inches in
elevation. The initial ramp up is along the back straight, which leads into a
decreasing radius turn made up for the widest and next to widest R4 (radius 4)
and R3 curves. This allows some ability to slow down in the turn itself. I
installed Ninco walls with upper fencing to keep cars from crashing to the floor
some 4 feet below.
Once through the wide turn, it immediately starts going
back downhill. The up transitions are not a problem, but there are two down
transitions that are a bit steep. A problem with plastic track is that you
cannot really have smooth up and down transitions. You pretty well will get a
rather sharp angle if one goes down much as I have. Anyway, some cars do tend to
deslot at this transition into a short straight which has another decreasing
radius turn, this time using R3 and R2 corners. Once again, Ninco walls and
fencing have saved cars.
At the end of an even shorter straight are a pair of R1 ess turns
that go into an R2 to R3 curved section. This then goes into a series of R3 and
R4 esses that are sharp at first and then broaden out. This transition from the
sweeper to the esses gets a lot of cars as well. In fact, a couple of Carrera
cars with a protruding reverse switch on the bottom have had to have the switch
removed as it catches at the start of the down plunge. These esses also incline
back up a bit before going down to the hairpin sections. In all, it makes for a
very interesting section that despite the additional length, really doesn't add
all that much to the total lap time. Most cars will now lap somewhere in the
20-23 second bracket. This is without magnets at 12 volts.
One of the big changes to the track was the purchase of a variable power supply several months back. This provides additional current to hotter motors that drew more than the 'wall warts' could supply. I then reduced the voltage from about 16 volts down to 10 volts. That worked fine for a while, but thanks to voltage drops across all the track sections, wasn't enough for some motors so I've moved it to 12 volts and that seems like a good place to keep it. Still have minute drops across each join, but it isn't so telling. One long term project is to put copper foil tape over the existing power rails. This will provide optimum voltage without the drop across each section as it will be pretty much a continuous section. It comes in 80 foot rolls so I'll need quite a few.
Regarding scenery, I've put up some starter cliffs and cast a couple of pieces of rock face, but that has been done for months and waits for motivation to start filling in the blanks. I'm going to do a water fall section and have all the materials, but perhaps I've overextended myself a bit. I'm sure that once I get started on the scenery, things will move along well. That is what happened with the switchback section that sat for months then got underway with a vengeance.
The other part of things have been fixing up and hot rodding some derelict cars. I bought a box full of Scalextric GT-40 body and chassis parts for a song and have been refurbishing them. Three of the cars are up and running while one is nearly done and two more are in the works. In several cases I've had to get all new running gear, but it has turned out some nicely running cars.
Well, that is about it for this session. I hope you learned a bit and if you have any questions or wish to share your experiences or images of your track, I'd like to hear from you on the subject so please e-mail me at mmreaders@aol.com.
Scott