42 replies to this topic

[team burrito]

First, you want to find the widest 1/24 body possible. Tamiya and Hasegawa made older GTP plastic car kits just perfect for this application. They can found on eBay, in mail order stores, or at your local hobby shop. The price can be in the 30 to 40 dollar range, so it pays to shop around. Regular domestic manufacturers such as Revell, Monogram, and AMT will work as well. The Ferrari models are generally wider, but some domestic models may be too narrow to be effective on the track.

Next is chassis selection; you could scratchbuilt your own chassis, use a JK or Mossetti spring steel chassis or build one from a Champion center section with brass pans. Building your own chassis is not so easy, so it helps to have a base to build on. JK and Mossetti makes excellent spring steel chassis, perfect for hardbody racing. A lighter chassis is not necessary a better thing because of the additional weight from the body itself. The JK 4.5” Unlimited chassis is the best choice; good movement, wheelbasem and weight. It’s not real fast off the corners, but it is predicable and handles very nicely. If you find one on eBay, buy it. You will not be sorry you did.

Spring steel chassis are available from JK are 4” WB (JKP-1023) and 4-1/2” WB (JKP-1033) at $29.95 each. Mossetti also manufactures spring steel chassis; #216B True Scale NASCAR (C/D can) - $65.00, #217A True Scale NASCAR (C/D) Kit - $55.00 USD, #219A 4.5" NASCAR Chassis Kit - $55.00, #222A/B True Scale Vintage NASCAR (Plafit/Falcon) - $65.00.

Another good choice would be the JK Indy Flexi chassis; it fits the re-issued Monogram Chaparral Coupe model kit with no modifications. Just add pin tubes & wheels and you’re ready to rock. This chassis is good for narrow width bodies and the pin tubes can be cut to length. Some of the 4-1/2” chassis fit the re-issued Tamiya Porsche 962 kits with ease and makes a nice-handling car. One hint I can give you is drill one pin hole at a time. This will save you from drilling the second hole in the wrong spot; believe me, I know.

I could get into the technical side of building a hardbody chassis, but that will be another chapter. Later, kitties.

[TSR]

So now, Russ, you dump us with a perfectly nice exact-scale body and a list of chassis using go-kart wheels. And you are going to leave this there?

[team burrito]

I would not say they all use go-kart wheels:



What can I say, different strokes for different folks. :mrgreen:

[TSR]

That rear wheel is about 3/8" too small in diameter and 1/4" too wide to be in scale for this body.

It is just the idea of throwing an exact-scale body on a chassis with tiny wheels that bothers me. If you promote injected bodies that are for the most part perfect scale replicas, on chassis designed to fit chopped, channeled,or non-replicas of real cars, it is only going 50% of the way. It generally looks a bit bizarre and repels the scale enthusiast. However, eh, if you like it, I have no problem with it. But why not get it right to begin with?

[team burrito]

...check these guys out for raw marerial: http://www.mshobbies...LASTIC CAR KITS
They still carry most GTP kits including the Porsche 962 & decals of different liveries (?). And my dear Phlippe, I did get it right. I never said it was true scale & nobody asked.

[TSR]

I asked...
Cool site.

[sportblazer350]

i too enjoy 1/24 real scale cars. I would choose a different chassis type myself for these bodies, any of the nuts and bolts style chassis (Plafit is my favorite) or a TSRF.

of course this is your idea for a class, and it is a good one if that is the direction you choose to go. have fun racing'!! 8)

[team burrito]

...is this more like it?

[



This one features a JK Indy chassis with the wheels jacked-up and Overdrive lighting system. It handles great, but I don't dare to race with the other guys. :shock: All of my other hardbodies are beat up, including the Nissan GTP.

[TSR]

Better. Now put the rear wheels under the fenders where they belong, remove the white markings on the tires and fit some decent BWA mag inserts, and remove the cheese bell off the top of the driver's head and give him a real helmet. A Cox driver's head would be perfect actually. 8)

:mrgreen:

[team burrito]

i too enjoy 1/24 real scale cars. I would choose a different chassis type myself for these bodies, any of the nuts and bolts style chassis (Plafit is my favorite) or a TSRF. of course this is your idea for a class, and it is a good one if that is the direction you choose to go. have fun racing'!! 8)

Don't you own one of my old hardbodies? :shock:

[n9949y]

Check out the various Oregon slot racing web sites where all over the Western part of that state many folk are scratch building and racing exclusively hard body scale appearing slot cars.

[team burrito]

...those are some good looking cars. Too bad the guys I race with are speed crazed mooks.

[TSR]

Now the Truth comes out...

[n9949y]

Speed kills, and has almost killed this hobby.

(Alan Mann GT40, Le Mans 1969, F. Gardner, M Guthrie, driving)

[sportblazer350]

...hey, didn't this hobby start out with scale cars?????.........i really do not mind the old Thingies or the low profile handling bodies, some of which are not too bad......i actually quite enjoy these two types of Thingies.......but the super duper 1.blahblahblah lap times, no front tires or wheels, chassis that are barely there, hundreds and thousands of dollars spent on going faster.......what really is the point to all of that???? :?

Wanna bring all of this back down to earth?? make rules such as : scale racing bodies, chassis specs and hand out motors: let's see who the REAL world nats champ racers are now!!!

speed crazed moron racing is not what i call anything that should be listed as world nats...... :x ........just a class for a few who want to do it, but no way should that be listed anywhere as the top gun racing class and racers to identify this hobby with......or so that is my opinion.....

heck, even 1:1 racing has slowed down over the years and is highly regulated......so should slot cars....... :roll:

[TSR]

...hey, didn't this hobby start out with scale cars?????.........

Actually Glenn, no, it did not. In fact and with very few exceptions the first truly decent scale slot cars were produced in the 1990's. Everything else made before was never that good.

[sportblazer350]

are you sure P?? in some very early slot car books i have, there were home made tracks and cars with carved out bodies, parts used from model trains and planes, and it apppeared that scale cars and layouts were the order of the day.
I do agree that the best scale cars were made starting in the 1990s in 1/32 scale (e.g. Fly, Scalex, Ninco, Slot-it, etc).
I was trying to make the point that this hobby started as scale model racing and it turned into a phenomenom (or fad, if you will...) in the USA in the mid 1960's with the large amount of slot car raceways around the country, the speed and lack of scale, etc etc nearly killed it......and the wing ding speed demons of today are not doing anything to keep it alive. Scale cars, especially in 1/32 scale, will keep this hobby alive for quite some time to come.

[Tex]

For what it's worth, it was through a 1/32 enthusiast in the DFW area that I re-discovered slot cars. I owe Stuart Boyle a LOT for doing me this favor. I do plan, someday, to have at LEAST a 1/32 track of Watkins Glen(routed, braid, with elevation changes) in my living room.

[n9949y]

Glenn,

Oregonians been building and racing1/24th scale appearing model hard body race cars for 20+ years now. With 7 active club tracks scale racing is thriving, unmatched anywhere else in the US- and there’s not any commercial tracks around- Oregonians don’t want ‘em and the nonsense, including speed crazed morons, that goes along with them.

Oregon tracks are not copies of the usual 8 lane punchbowl monstrosities. Competition is the key and remains the enduring object of Oregon racers. No where else are groups racing different kinds of model cars that in miniature capture the essence of motor sports history from the 1950’s to the present. Gives slot car racing a variety unmatched.

Your comment is a widely repeated lament, uttered for a generation now. Yet few seek to return to scale racing which is proving, in one state, to be the key to 1/24th slot racing durability.

Recently there’ve been an attempt or two to reintroduce nationally scale racing with the manufacturing of 1/24th model car racing components. But absent any concerted effort to also reintroduce and make available more scale appearing race tracks to run scale cars on, the viability of scale racing remains widely ignored. What remains for 1/24th slot racing is the commercial shop paradigm which is a business plan that without fail, fails!

Amazing how some hidebound some slot racers appear to be………….. left with little but long ago past memories that pretty much have rendered most of slot racing thinking moribund into the 21st century.

[Jairus]

... but with tiny non scale wheels it's not really in-scale is it Todd?

Recently there’ve been an attempt or two to reintroduce nationally scale racing with the manufacturing of 1/24th model car racing components. But absent any concerted effort to also reintroduce and make available more scale appearing race tracks to run scale cars on, the viability of scale racing remains widely ignored. What remains for 1/24th slot racing is the commercial shop paradigm which is a business plan that without fail, fails!

Amazing how some hidebound some slot racers appear to be………….. left with little but long ago past memories that pretty much have rendered most of slot racing thinking moribund into the 21st century.

Probably shouldn't type while imbibing my slot friend from the south....

[n9949y]

Jarius,

So what with the occasional use of small rims/tires..... Their use is a darn sight better than the big vacuum which seems to be the state of slot car racing elsewhere.

You're great with a paint brush, but when it comes to actually building and racing and developing viable racing programs, what have you accomplished recently..other than, as you said in an earlier posting, driving 2000 miles to Sou CA to race on a commerical track where you got your butt whipped.

[Jairus]

I never tried to develop a racing program! My interest was simple to participate in something that was popular and creative and that is what Division 3, at this point, is all about. I see nothing creative or innovative about the "scale" racing you continually tout. The cars on the web site(s) and those you post are the same tired battle weary pieces we have seen over and over. At least Division 3 is something new and different while providing a taste of retro (days gone by) that many aging slot lovers crave.

I applaud you and the other good ol’boys who ply your local private tracks, but that is not what is hot right now. If you don’t want to play then fine but why put D3 down because of it?


And!!!!!
Todd, there are plenty of scale wheels and tires available on eBay. I see them close each week in original sealed packages from Riggen, Dynamic, Pactra, Revell, Monogram and Testors. Not to mention the modern scale wheels and inserts from BWA!

Of course there is the vintage stuff from E.J.s Hobbies and Professor Motor but, if you complain about vintage rubber not having traction or hard to find there is always Michael Ortmann’s fine rubber tires available on Professor Motor and Electric Dreams! (Link at the top of this page…)

Basically I am saying that there is no excuse for running non-scale diameter wheels and tires when you state on your web site that the cars are “SCALE”!!!

[n9949y]

Well, using smaller tires has to do with balance between appearance and performance. Some people are willing to sacrifice performance in order to create a realistic (trackside photo) "image". People who don't actually race their cars, usually have no problem making this "sacrifice", because it happens in the abstract, for them.

Our current racing Culture first evolved 20+ years ago when little in the way of easily obtainable slot car components were commercially available, which lead to the unique state wide custom of scratchbuilt chassis.

Our rules are designed to encourage chassis improvement through competition. To require competing chassis builders to use a particular part (like tires) that doesn't perform as well as another, simply for the sake of appearance, ran contrary to the basic philosophy of our rules. How can you be in a constant Formula One-style development program, if you have to use rock hard tires that don't allow your chassis to perform? So, we're willing to sacrifice the perfect photographic "image" in order to have the fastest and most FUN to race, hardshell slot cars in the world.

The "beautifully detailed, and tastefully built" bodies don't require any sacrifice in performance. Our rules don't require this severe attention to realism. It is encouraged and our Culture has developed to the point where it is an integral part of our definition of the hobby. We think we have found the perfect balance between appearance and performance.

You've focused entirely on PPS... as though it were operating in a vacuum. Although PPS has become perhaps the most visible Oregon track on the internet, actually it is just one of many private "club" tracks scattered throughout Oregon- Bob Hanna's and Rich Vecchio’s tracks in Roseburg, Tom Street's track in Bend, and several nice tracks in the greater Portland area.

Although there's been an effort to bring all these venues under one "umbrella" i.e. OSCAR , there are tracks such as PPS, that prefer to remain "independent".

However, in spite of different "sanctioning bodies" operating these different facilities, the basic rules package has remained the same for 20 years. This means, a Eugene racer can participate in a Big NASCAR event on Bob McFarland's track in Portland... and his PPS car will be legal under the rules. Similarly, Bend guys can come to PPS, knowing that their cars will be allowed.

Moreover, this means that if one track... such as PPS... were to change it's rules... requiring larger wheels and disallowing small wheels, it would not only "obsolete" scores of cars currently racing at PPS... it would effectively "close the door" to all our slot racing buddies that live around the State. It would place out-of-towners in the position of having to build "PPS specials"... if they wanted to race with us.

Intentionally creating a unique new hurdle to clear in order to race at PPS is totally contrary to our approach to dealing with visitors. Furthermore, it would be considered unfriendly and very "politically incorrect" within the State of Oregon slot racing community.

But if you want to convince 50+ guys to change their thousands of tires and 100’s of chassis so that they are building slot cars meeting your singular expectations, join our programs, convince us otherwise. You live in Salem; you're surrounded by a community of slot racers unmatched in any other state. I doubt you're participating in any equally active Div 3 program.

One thing to sit on the sidelines kibitzing; another to actually participate…

[Jairus]

This is a scale model car:

It has won two best of show awards and more than a few class awards. It is just one of many that I have built!




This is a slot car:

It is meant to go fast and win races. No pretense about that! I have not built any winners but continue to build regardless.



This is a scale slot car:

It is beautifully built, detailed and able to go around corners pretty fast. To be scale means sacrificing speed for scale accuracy.



ANY QUESTIONS?

[n9949y]

But since you didn't build it or are racing it (do you race anything?) where does your racing expertise lie?
(These 2 are also scale model cars)