13 replies to this topic

[MSwiss]

My friend Mark Rosenwinkel (muskie^man19) came up with this when he was gifted the late Rick Davis's collection of 60's periodicals.

This must of been the start of Tom Thumb morphing from a huge commercial raceway, to a craft and skateboard distributor.(along with still being a full service hobby shop)

Wasn't a high end 1/32nd Revell set, $79.99 or $99.99, back then?

[Dave Crevie]

The Revell sets sound expensive for the 1960s. My first slot track was an Eldon figure eight, $9.95 at Western Auto. That would have been right around 1960. A couple of years later I bought an Aurora Model Motoring set with the vibrator cars for $24.95 at Al's Hobby Shop to use on my train layout. The train set was a Revell set with a Docksider 0-4-0, two cars and a caboose. It came with an oval of track and transformer/speed control. It also was $9.95 at Western Auto. I know this because my mother made me keep a ledger of what money I earned and what I spent it on. That ledger was still in my bedroom desk when I cleaned it out two years ago. 

 

Incidently, over the next year or so I added eight straight and eight curved sections of HO track, 49 cents each, two switches, $3.95 each, and two crossings for the slot track to cross over the HO track, $4.95 each. I didn't add any track to the Model Motoring set since it came with quite a bit of track to begin with.   

[MSwiss]

Dave,
Four lanes sets were more expensive than you remember.

The top one is 89.95, from a Slotblog thread you participated in.

It's hard to read to price on the 2nd pic, but it might be 99.99.

Anyway, my point was more when someone wanted to get rid of a track, that was in their way, they weren't afraid to sell cheap.

[bradblohm]

The Monogram Sebring 4-lane set was $100 when released.  Cost at Kresge's or Kmart or Woolworth's or any other discounter in '67-68?  Even at $40-50 it would have been expensive, and how many were willing to dedicate the space for the size it would have taken.  We're silly enough to do it now, but then?

[MattD]

We all know when the fad part of slot racing died, big commercial tracks were thrown out and had no value.   How many tracks may have survived to today?   1 track out of 500?    .    

[MSwiss]

The Monogram Sebring 4-lane set was $100 when released.  Cost at Kresge's or Kmart or Woolworth's or any other discounter in '67-68?  Even at $40-50 it would have been expensive, and how many were willing to dedicate the space for the size it would have taken.  We're silly enough to do it now, but then?

I do remember Monogram sets were high.

I hadn't remembered if they had a 4 lane set.

Googling it, it looks like the Sebring set came with 4 nice looking cars.

Did they have a metal chassis like the separate cars, or was there a plastic chassis for the set cars?

[bradblohm]

The cars in that set used the aluminum RTR chassis.  When I make 1/32 sports cars I like that chassis best.  Usually needs a little weight here and there to settle the car, but it has built-in guide stops!

[Dave Crevie]

I was only thinking of two-lane sets. No one I knew as a kid had a four lane plastic track. I lived in what was then the lower income part of town. Not so now. Almost every high-schooler has their own car, and the high school I went to now has indoor parking for students. I only saw a few commercial tracks that had been taken down, and most of those were pretty beat up. One of my hot rod buddies got a track for free, and we shortened the front and back straights so it would fit in his basement. But generally speaking, a commercial slot track just takes up too much room, and when interest died, they were just pink elephants.   

[MSwiss]

Even more interesting, from Mark R.

[slotcarone]

Polks must have had a really big warehouse to store those 23 tracks plus all of the other stuff!

[Mike Patterson]

WOW! Two Purple miles in that listing! Or was the track labeled "220-2A" an Emperor?

 

I gotta get back to work on that time machine!

[MSwiss]

Mike,
Any opinion on my comments in post #288, in this thread?

http://slotblog.net/...-12#entry821753

[Cheater]

American's own publicity photo and track diagram indicate the Monarch was 100 feet. See below. Primary source info as far as I am concerned.

 

 

[Mike Patterson]

Mike,
Any opinion on my comments in post #288, in this thread?

http://slotblog.net/...-12#entry821753

Sure, I always have an opinion! In the ad above, I would go by the given lap length, not the name. Also, the ad differentiates between regular (paneled) sides, and deluxe (Formica®) sidewalls. The only American tracks that I have ran on that had paneled sides were a Monarch and an Aristocrat. Every other one had Formica®.