88 replies to this topic

[Dave Crevie]

I intend to restore my car, and would be up for running it on 36 volts, because that is what the motor was designed for.

 

The car in post 42 is closer to the one I remember. Gene ran it at a West Coast meet I also attended, and had already broken the 1 second barrier. I also was running at or just under 1 sec. locally, but couldn't do it at that meet. Since all dragstrips of the period were using multiple truck batteries for power it may be that my car would only do that when the batteries were fully charged. With so many cars making runs, the batts were most likely down a bit. Which makes Gene's times that much more amazing.  

[TSR]

"Not to take anything away from Gene, but in the 21 years he held the ET record, was there much, if any, 36v drag racing going around?"

Mike, I do not know. I suppose that drag racing continued for years after 1966, while I was only paying attention to track racing. That record would have been beaten in 1987 apparently, and I suppose at a lower voltage, again, I don't know.

There is a vast void in my slot car racing knowledge, from mid 1973 through 1994 when I began paying attention again.

Paul, Gene used commercially available setscrew wheels that he modified, on which he epoxied hard-sponge tires. There were literally dozens of small companies manufacturing slot car wheels in the 1960s, actually it was bordering insanity to see the number of manufacturers and products. Gene told me that no commercially available tires stood up to the job, the rubber flying off the rim instantly.

I will check on weights of both the Hustler and the record car soon.
 

[TSR]

Well, over the weekend, Scott and dabbled at completing the car that was missing parts of its guts, namely the armature, bearings, gears and brush spring/tensioner.
Fortunately, we have Gene Husting's boxes that had a suitable rewound/balanced arm, albeit not exactly the same as the commutator on the original appears to be spaced 1/4" farther than the actual poles. Never mind as we can change this quite easily if we find the exact same arm later.
First, removal of the aluminum body and inspection of what we have here:



We found that the filed lamination and the brushes, still soldered to the lead wires, were present. Next was to find a suitable armature, and we did just that. There are tons of flanged 1/8" ball bearings in Gene's box (must have been a fetish or something!) and we set the arm in place, with aluminum spacers to get it in the center of the field, to select a set of gears that would mesh perfectly:



Next was finding longer screws and spacers to set the brush retainers:



Here is the finished beast with gears and brushes in place:





We cleaned up one of Gene's wheels set (the magnesium rims heavily corroded) and installed them with correct spacers. Next was to fit the body over the chassis, using the original screws:







The Hustler on its temporary display tray before it will be on permanent display on one of the shelves in the museum room, this getting pretty close to be completed:



This thing did a 1.26" on the scale quarter mile in February 1965...

 

[Gator Bob]

Dokk or any historian of this period.

 

So... this was Gene's 1965 car. How late in to the 60s did these magwinders and padlocks run competitively.  

Who knows of a late or very late race reports running these?

 

1966, 67, 68 ....?

 

BTW, we are getting these type cars going pretty good a 14.7 volts. 

[Dave Crevie]

I ran mine through the spring of '66. These cars were still being run at that time. When summer came, I quit slot racing to

get more involved in full size cars.

[Phil Smith]

Is the Challenger car belt drive?

 

I've never been into drag racing, but could get into racing vintage padlock motor rails. Those are just too cool!

[Dave Crevie]

Looking at the other cars I would say it is gear driven, with a very nice gear guard to keep the 'chute from getting

jammed in between the gears. The one I wonder about is the Russkit car, which seems to have the motor in

backwards. I guess I will have to dig mine out to see if it is the same. I can't for the life of me remember what

side the gears are on with that car. My magwinder had the gears on the left side, but I used a comm side motor

frame so that the gears would be inside and protected by the side rails. Also I used a Ram 857 which had the thin

lams, and tapered them down to match the length of the stack. 

[Tom Katsanis]

Might be a Ram motor I built my car with the brushes & gearing the same way after reading the Husting impossible article in R&C Gene says that the Ram motor needs to run that way as the comm is timed that way if you look at the record setting car it has the brushes & gearing the same way.
Tom

[TSR]

 

So... this was Gene's 1965 car.

One of at least three nearly identical cars we were able to identify on old pictures in Rod & Custom and other mags.
 

 

The one I wonder about is the Russkit car, which seems to have the motor in backwards.

The armature timing makes it run faster that way.
 

 

Is the Challenger car belt drive?

All are gear driven. A belt (like a stretched O-ring, pretty much all you could get then) would never be able to take the torque and would likely split the instant when power would be applied.
The gear guards were not designed for parachutes since none of these cars ever had one. But there were some foam blocks to receive the cars and the guards protected the foam from being chewed by the gears upon "landing", according to Gene.

 

[Gator Bob]

One of at least three nearly identical cars we were able to identify on old pictures in Rod & Custom and other mags.
 

 

Three near identical 1965 cars ... ok.

The question was

 

How late in to the 60s did these magwinders and padlocks run competitively.  

1966, 67, 68 ....?

 

Anyone know of any late or very latest race reports running these?

[hiline2]

Ok I thought I had posted some questions but guess I didnt !

 

Dokk,

 

1: the pic of all the cars, is there a full description on each somewhere else ? details etc ?

 

2: the weight on front of Gene's car, lead shaped ?

 

3: the under-body trim over motor, for aerodynamics or just keep gunk out of motor ?

[Dave Crevie]

Hmm... I rewound the armature in my car myself. I was not able to detect any reverse timing. It looked to be the same as the

Pittmans I also ran. I'll have to look again, but if that is true, my car should not have run as fast as it did.

[Phil Smith]

This thread has me Jonesing for a vintage padlock motor rail. I saved a new eBay search to find one.

[TSR]

 

How late in to the 60s did these magwinders and padlocks run competitively.  

1966, 67, 68 ....?

I do not know, but when I was seriously racing slot cars between 1971 and 1973, I recall that there was drag racing going on at the various raceways that we visited, that had a drag strip.
 

 

This thread has me Jonesing for a vintage padlock motor rail. I saved a new eBay search to find one.

Save yourself some time and PM me ...

 

1: the pic of all the cars, is there a full description on each somewhere else ? details etc ?

 

2: the weight on front of Gene's car, lead shaped ?

 

3: the under-body trim over motor, for aerodynamics or just keep gunk out of motor ?

Here are your answers as best as I can tell:

1/ No. I will concoct one for you at the end of this post.

2/ Ground and polished stainless steel, could be boron.

3/ Neither. Gene told me that it was to deter prying eyes on some mods he was doing on the motor.

Now for the cars in the picture:



1, 4, 8 and 9: K&B production dragsters expertly and correctly built by Rick Thigpen.
2: car built in 1966 by by former magazine writer Ben Millspaugh
3: car built in 1966 by former drag racer Bob Braverman
5: standard Russkit dragster, designed and produced by Bob Braverman, later marketed by Russkit
6: gorgeous car built in 1966 by one of the greatest slot car racers ever, Gene Wallingford
7: Gene Husting's Hustler, painted by Bob Kovacs, a beautiful survivor of a magic era

All are powered by either stock or modified Pittman DC85 or modified RAM motors.
 

[hiline2]

Thanks Dokk, great info !

 

I was impressed with the simple answer of Gene trying his best to hide the secrets ! 

 

Last question for now:

 

On the custom cars what is the tire dia ? Just curious more then anything,

 

Just how close do we want tire dia to be to spur gear ?

[TSR]

I do not know much about slot-car drag racing but assume that just like the full-size jobs, the larger the tire diameter, the more traction the car can generate. The diameter of tires on these cars is about 1.5" to 1.75". As far as gears, as long as when the tires compress on initial acceleration from the starting line, they do not drag, it is whatever one wants to get the adequate gear ratio.

[Dave Crevie]

As I recall, even if the spur gear was bouncing on the track surface when the car was sitting still, there was enough "grow"

in the tire when the motor spun up that the car was raised well above it's normal clearance. I used Grumbacher model

airplane tires at the rear of my car, and they grew considerably at full speed.

 

Dokk, you have no Idea how much joy you gave me by adding the Braverman car to that shot. I didn't know who he was at

the time, or who owned that car. But I remember how impressed I was with the engine turned body. I thought it was the most

beautiful car I had ever seen. 

[TSR]

Happy that you are happy! 

[TSR]

Just found this picture of the car taken by Al Hall for Rod & Custom, that is the very car!

[Electric Dream Team]

P,

You forgot to tell the folks here that Gene's box was painted by none other than Bob Kovacs!!

If you look closely enough you can see "Kovacs" hand lettered by him in his signature style, but is partially rubbed off, so it's like trying to find waldo!

sb

[Phloidboy1]

why does the HUSTLER seem wider than it has to be, 1/4" nylon spacer @ the brush insulator, & 1/4" spacer on the arm shaft. this is pushing the rear wheel width beyond the maximum allowable. wassup wit dat?

excessive clearance for what purpose? I thought narrower is better for dragsters

[TSR]

Floyd,
I do not know the answer and Gene is no longer with us. However he set records that no one was able to touch in many years, so maybe he got something right.

[Dave Crevie]

The cars were a bit wider than scale to track better going down the strip. The wider the car, the less likely it would "fishtail" during the run. As we learned to better balance the cars, they got narrower.

 

The padlock motors were pretty wide, which aggravated the situation. Eliminating the endplates fixed that to an extent.

[Phloidboy1]

thanks guys, also is the original spur gear, the red Weldun or the gray gear in the images?

[TSR]

The "gray" gear was a red anodized Weldun that was machined down.