23 replies to this topic

[cosmicnode]

The first round of the UK championship took place at the North London track on the 12-13 May, the field consisting mainly of Raceway 81 members and a few locals. The Wellingborough drivers failed to appear for some unknown reason, pity they missed a good two days racing.

As you can see the track is tight and twisty, a typical track designed mainly for 1/32 racing and to fit into a restricted area.The home of the North London society of Model Engineers the pit room was full of thousands of magazines dating from 1904 and original models of rail cars, the precursor to slot cars.





A few photos of the winning cars and drivers of the first race, for saloons.

Bottom to top Richy Kettleson's second place car, Steve Kempson's winning car and Graeme Stephenson's third place car



The drivers Steve Kempson, Richy Kettleson, and Graeme Stephenson.



The F1 winning cars. Richy Kettleson's second place car with the winning car of Graeme Stephenson and Steve Kempson's third place car. Graeme made a clone of the car I built for Richard, he reckons it was a "no brainer", having watched Richard win with it so often.



Can-Am was won by Graeme, centre followed by Richy - left and Steve - right.



The Can-Am field.



The Tottenham class was won by Graeme centre (borrowed one of my Group 20 motors) Richard was second and George Kimber was third.



Steve Kempson and his lovely wife. Steve organized the meeting and raced hard, and his wife fed us all. So a great thank you for a super weekend.

[Ron Hershman]

Thanks for the GREAT report and pics and keep 'em coming.

[TSR]

Mike,

Very nice report, thanks!

[Tex]

VERY cool track!

[tonyp]

Makes me hate Florida more. LOL...

[Rick]

Nice report and photos. As said before, keep them coming to the colonies.

Congrats to the podium winners...

[Tex]

Makes me hate Florida more. LOL...

Bite your tongue, Tony! Florida is home to... to?.... LIZARDS! And expat boa constrictors! All GOOD eatin', iff'n ya know how!

[tonyp]

I want to get to the UK before I die. I think I was secretly born British and stolen by Polish gypsies on their way to the USA to Ellis island.

[TSR]

Tony,

Go to Goodwood for the FOS.

It's like being kissed by God (if it is not raining!).

[Noose]

I agree, great job guys and great report.

[Larry Mattingly]

Two thumbs up...

LM

[The Bugman]

Very cool report, Mr K.

Nice to see your UK cars, too.

[cosmicnode]

Go to Goodwood for the FOS.
It's like being kissed by God (if it is not raining!).

This year is for Carroll Shelby and Cobras He died last week before being able to take the honors at Goodwood. RIP.

I'm hoping to attend this year, fingers crossed. It may give me incentive to get my Pilgrim Cobra replica back on the road.

Come on over you will get a warm welcome.

Mike

[TSR]

Mike,

I was there last year for the fifth time, but was not on the guest list this year, and we are running 78-year old Bobby Unser in our Eagle a week before in California, so there is no time. Hopefully the good Lord (March, that is... ) will invite us again when he needs a really cool turbo-Offy rocket going up the hill!

I love your Retro racing of the old anglewinders cars with the Mura C-cans. This is a bit what we wanted to do here, at the beginning of Retro racing in SoCal, but we kind of lost our way a bit. It's all good now.

[George Kimber]

Hi to our US Retro friends .
I have been trying to load pictures of chassis for a while but could'nt get any joy.
I finally consulted the Cheater directions and changed the size of the photo's .
The only hard part of the Tottenham Sports class is finding the lighter C cans.
You can find replacement modern parts for the rest of the motor and the gears
are obviously much better than the 60s-70 .
The whole chassis without body weighs in at 114 grms
This is my Totteham Open Sports from last weekends UKKRA Retro Championships .

Attached Images

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[TSR]

George,
It looks very cool. What are you allowed for added air control over the stock bodies please?

[John Secchi]

Phillipe
The Tottenham Retro rules were drawn up about 10 years ago by Ian Fisher and myself, these were based on the old A.R.C raceway rules from about 1970, you can find a copy for download on the CSCRA site.
[oneofwos]

[John Gorski]

Congrates to our UK Retro Friends on a great race & report!!

[George Kimber]

Hi Philippe.

If you look closely you can just make out a Wing on the sides and rear of the body.
The maximum height of the car is 38mm .

The Outisight Lancer Porsche can only be mounted to minimum height of 34mm to accomodate the 'C' can .
This leaves a wing of 4mm with a length on the sides of 1" projected forward from the centre of the rear axle.

At a recent Tottenham class club night at Raceway 81 Mike Kettleson ran a Wing height of 42mm in practice
but was advised of the 38mm limit and after reducing it proceeded to go 2 /10ths quicker in Qualification!

We can also run 750 minimum diameter Rear Tyres . Mike ran Wonder rubber and by contrast I used JKB
untreated on 13.5 Alloy hubs and had virtually no tyre wear.

Did you experience any problem with Spurs slipping allen screws in those far off days.
I ground Flats on the axle for wheels and gear and really tightened them hard but it still slipped on the gear.
Which is best Flats or no flats?

[TSR]

Hi George,
By 1973, the Lancer/M.A.C. Porsche (it was an 8-cylinder, so was more a "908" than a "917", but was simply a pro-racing body designed to simply go fast!) had become the choice of the fastest racers in the USA. Incredibly enough, that body required very little added implements to work really well, and I personally won my best races with using only added 1/4" front side dams blending to nothing on top of the fenders to keep the nose down, and 1/8" or so rear "lip". Then, with a fairly stiff chassis with independent front wheels, the cars could use all the power of a 18-turn of 24-gauge in a C-can fully.
I am sure that Tony P and Joel Montague can tell you the same thing today!

As far as the setscrews, I cannot recall much of a problem, I cannot even recall ever spinning a spur gear even once. I was not always making "flats" on the axles, but always made the end of the setscrews flat, so as to have greater thread grip.

As far as tire diameter, the rules were still 13/16" for the rears, and the tires were pretty crummy then, the best we had were the Steube "orange" (the stuff Bill Steube was making), and there were few other options besides the Limpach "Fresh Cuts" and Associated production stuff.
Today with relatively heavy spray glue, the Wonder Rubber is the ticket, and the wear is excellent. I run generally at least two "retro" races on our King track with one set.
If the glue is light, I revert to treated natural and it seems to work good but wears fast.
All in good fun...
Please keep us informed of what you are doing, it is so great to see that we are all somehow, "vintage racing" nowadays... and it is a bit more relaxing than it used to be!

[tonyp]

Yup! What he said.

[Tex]

George,

Is that really wire mesh at the rear and at the front radiator exit, or is it photo-etched material? And I just LOVE that engine detail!

[George Kimber]

Hi .
Philippe & Tony ,always great to hear from guys who were around and racing in the glory days.
I based the design on chassis of Barry Magee around 1972 but with panlets at the front to strengthen
the bumper rail. With full pans ,one trip into the wall and the front bumper was bent back into the pan.
Unlike your very stiff chassis ,this is very flexible and the thin wire on top of the centre section hinge
coming from the motor plate gives almost a flexi hinge feel .

Tex. the grills are vinyl stick on material from a TI22 vinyl decoration sheet made Czechia Rep.
I purchased them from SCD /Chas Keeling in UK

[AB Slotsport]

A full photo report and results are now published on the Raceway 81 website at http://raceway81.com/page43.html
Click any image for a full size pic. Enjoy!
Best Regards
Andy BS
AB Slotsport