Eric's first 1/24th scale slot cars were Revell brand. A couple of them were given to Eric by his brother back in the mid '60s, when Eric was about ten years old. The cars are long gone, but Eric remembers how much fun they were to run and how nice they looked. I remember the Revell cars being for sale at the local J.J. Newberry Store. They even had a couple of them on top of the cash register for sale. The cars were cool, with their bright metallic paint jobs. The cars came with either a brass or aluminum chassis. As Eric and I remember, the aluminum ones were the cars of choice. The aluminum chassis cars were very easy to drive and fairly durable, whereas the brass ones would fold up into a pretzel after one wall shot.
I decided to build the green Lotus for Eric. I patterned the set-up of the car after the Ben Jones "day glow red" Ford GT. Ben ran the red car in many vintage races over the years. The Lotus was carefully assembled and has ball bearings and silicone rear tires installed. If you run these cars, the pinion gear is probably cracked. I recently ran the Ben Ford GT, and the pinion gear exploded. I installed a brass pinion gear to replace the plastic one.
I decided to assemble a Revell car for myself. The brass chassis pieces came from the Ben Jones parts box. I made three junk ones into one good one. The chassis pieces needed some straightening. I had a painted Lancer Mustang body to use. The chassis wheelbase was extended with bits of tubing to match the Mustang. The chassis was then soldered together. I later realized that soldering the chassis together prevented the removal of the motor.
All of the cars are nice to drive and have good power. Ben's car has a hot Mabuchi armature and is faster. The Mustang has fresh German tires that work very well. Yes, for novice slot car racers, the Revell cars ran good out of the box and were easy to drive.
