29 replies to this topic

[MSwiss]

Seeing some of Phil Donaldson's recently-posted cars, and checking out fellow raceway owner, Mike McMasters, chassis building handiwork, inspired me to post a few of my chassis.
 

 

 

 

 

 

[Phil Donaldson]

Awesome cars, Mike!

[NY Nick]

Thanks for posting this hand-cut true art.

[garyvmachines]

I love the Olympic Rings chassis!!! I would love to repop this frame on my waterjet... yes!!!

 

I bet you would not allow close-up pics like this back in the day... top secret designs!!!

 

Cool pic!!

 

GAV    

[MSwiss]

The offhand comment about that chassis was, "It looks like a baseplate for a Holley four-barrel."

It was pretty hard to keep chassis designs under wraps. 

 

The most famous attempt was Csaba S. at a Midwest USRA race. He teched his car in with the bottom covered with masking tape. He even kneeled down and removed it under the driver's panel, when he went to qualify.

It was all motivated by him building a perimeter car, a design by Stuart and myself, that he had spent the previous few months badmouthing.

He then proceeded to set a world record, being the first racer to break the 2.5 second barrier.

[Tom Thumb Hobbies]

Yeah... Csaba... the one who would palm a steel ruler cut off to about 4.75" and hang out around tech to take "secret" measurements on other chassis.

 

And don't even try to engrave his chassis for tech... holy crap!!

[MSwiss]

I saw the engraving "situations" many a time.

With that first perimeter car, even with the tape on it, he would not permit the tech guy to turn it upside down.

62% of my three-beer old slot car stories involve Csaba.

[Rob Voska]

Mike, what cars won what events?

[MSwiss]

I'll repost the pics separately, with a blurb, at future breakfast and lunch breaks.

Back to work.

[Half Fast]

Mike-

 

How long did it take you to cut one of these chassis?

 

Cheers

[MSwiss]

Maybe four-eight hours.

[tonyp]

Two hours for me.

[Half Fast]

Four-eight or two hours!

 

I can't cut my toenails in that amount of time. 

 

Love this work.

 

Cheers,

[MSwiss]

Two hours for me.

 

You have to remember, I was doing this for my personal cars, not for evil $$$, like you.

 

Plus, I wasn't all gooped up on gop, like you.

[Mbloes]

Mike,

 

It looks like those are posted oldest-to-newest, correct?

[MSwiss]

Yes.

Early '83-91.

[jimht]

Originally, I spent half the time changing those small 3/4" discs; one Dremel disc for each three inches of cutting.

 

Things went much faster when I started using the 1.5" ones. You guys were slow.  

[Dave Crevie]

Mike,

 

You have been keeping these hidden from me. I love to see old slot cars, and you have some of the most interesting.

[MSwiss]

Dave,

 

Didn't know you cared. LOL.
 
Next time you're in, make sure I show you this one. With some of the slot car stuff you fabricate, this one may impress you the most.
 
An aluminum minimal skeleton, laminated inside three and four layers of carbon fiber.
 
Not great, but better pics are now shown.

 

 

[mjsh]

The folks that race on the Purple Mile need to see the design you used to beat all those USRA National Champs in 1990.

[MSwiss]

I was trying to avoid EDM-cut chassis.
 
I'm not sure if this is the exact Quadrail, but it looked like this. I designed it, inspired by the four-rail wire cars Jay Horn and Dan Green ran well with in that era.
 
Those chassis may or not of been inspired by chassis built by East Coast racer, Gary Pearce.
 
IOW, not sure who copied who.
 
My Quadrail was more of a visual copy since it didn't have the outer rails flex like the JH, DG, GP wire cars.
 

 
 

[MSwiss]

I got back into slot racing in late 81, essentially based on Jerry Kulich and his daughter walking into the wholesale company I worked for, and ordering Parma merchandise for his new raceway in Berwyn.

I picked up a Womp and a G15 RTR, and soon was racing seriously.

After building a few of my own chassis, using the Parma center section, and then cutting a few of my own, I thought it would be fun to build something different.

Proslot, or possibly Camen, sold 3" X 5" pieces of 1095 spring steel.

Having a Dremel drill press, I decided I could use those outer edges to cut real straight lines, and by flipping it over, have the right and left rails match almost exactly.

Getting at cutting out the middle rail presented a clearance problem with the drill press clamp, but I notched that, and I was in business.

While cutting out the center section turned out to be easy, hanging the pans was a nightmare.

As you can see from my below pic, it was adding one down and upstop after another.

I remember saying to myself, this chassis better run good, because it's way too much work.

At the first race I ran it, G27 on a fast Hasse King in Kankakee, I was pretty underwhelmed.

I qualified 5th and probably finished about the same.

The car was predictable, but loose.

The outer rails were about as wide as the middle rail, so I decided I had nothing to lose, and using the Dremel drill press, quickly trimmed them in half.

This totally transformed the car.

At the next race, on the much slower American Red at Mark Mattei's Cycle Smithy, I easily TQ'ed and won the race, beating the other, mostly Pro built cars in the race.

I still remember the reaction from two of the "big shots" at the race.

Before the race, in tech, I asked my future boss, Stuart Koford, what he thought of the chassis.

Rolling his eyes, he replied "Ooookayyyy".

After the race, Csaba, who had built the cars favored to win the race, quickly threw my friend Mark Rosenwinkel, under the bus, "Mark's an OK driver, but he doesn't compare to you".

The below chassis, without gaps between the pans, where the outer rails were radically narrowed, this must be the 2nd one built, made so I could run #1 in G27, and use this one to start racing Semi-Pro G7.

This chassis would of been used to win the the first G7 race, I entered, the Midwest Nat's, beating out Texas big bucks racers David McClain and Henry Pena, along with Fantom's Ray Birmele.

The car was good, but I didn't dazzle the field.

I just used the strategy that worked well for me in future years, run your own race, get as many laps as you can get with the equipment you have that particular day.

Attached Images

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[Mbloes]

Crazy.

 

What body did you run on this?

[MSwiss]

O/S Ferrari's.

 

The car(s) didn't really behave much different than conventional cars of the day.

 

Where things really started to change, was in 1984, when I ditched the conventional plumber and pans.

 

Will get to that in future blurbs about the other chassis.

[NSwanberg]

This might be broken off into another thread. It may have been covered.

 

As long as we discussing cutting steel chassis with Dremel tools I am wondering if there is a supply of the THIN 409 Dremel disks that can be bought?