Test Track In Hawke'S Bay

[Capri-corn7]

Hi all

 

Since meeting up with the HBMRC back in October - it has really rekindled my love for slot cars. Having had an HO layout on a board as kid and then collecting diecast since then, seeing the detail, range and quality that the rtr cars have now - it blew me away.

 

So long story short, a few cars later and many fantastic race meets with the lads, inspired me to build 3 lane routed track in my shed at home. Months of reading track builds on forums like this I realized a practice build would make sense. I saw some neat car-park themed single lane tracks, so that was what I decided to do.

 

A - give me some experience of building a small track - i.e could I build the big one or have to outsource?

B - allow me to acquire some of the items for the big track - power supply, tools & one controller station.

C - give me something to actually run a car on once I'd faffed about fitting tyres ( nothing worse burning the midnight oil on preping a car and then having it bunny hop down the straight on race night.)

 

So this was my basic idea:

 

 

The idea is for an outer oval - and then I had an idea for a simple, manual switch to divert the car onto the in-field, with a few tighter turns for a bit of interest.

 

So I've taken a few pics of the build and i'll endeavour to update this thread regularly.

[Capri-corn7]

The track was going to be layed out on a single 1.2. x 2.4 sheet of 1/2" MDF. I wanted it to be moveable and removable if phase II of fill the shed with track ever eventuated.

 

So stage one was to build a small table frame and some hinged legs. Used 'ceiling batton' timber for the frame. It is about 70 x 35. and liteweight. Cheap too.

 

 

Then the legs and angled supports were cut from the same 1/2" MDF I borrowed the curved and weight shifted idea from SlotsNZ and it works. The curves allow the table to be easily rolled onto the rear face and 2 wing nuts later the legs are folded flat. Will be heavier once the top is on, I'm sure.

 

[thekop]

Looking like a good start. Good luck

[Capri-corn7]

The next step was sourcing a router. Borrowed two from my 'builder' brother in law. 1st one was the size of a small keg and twice as heavy. The smaller one was more manageable but didn't have the right sized chuck for a small bit - plus it could have gone straight into a museum. So I bit the bullet and bought a new one - that had instructions - and I also got a 1/8th (3.2mm) router bit.

 

A scrap piece of MDF was clamped to my work table, and I was ready to do my first route. 40cm later it suddenly got a little easier and looking where I'd been i could see the snapped end of the bit. a rather disappointing start. It was duely replaced by the power tool people and my second attempt allowed me to route my lane change concept - before that bit snapped!!

 

Car goes straight ahead:

 

 

 

Piece of flexible plastic is inserted into the lane on a slight angle and diverts car onto the curve.

 

 

Rolling my trial Porsche down the lane it appears to work just fine.

Anyone done something similar?

[SlotsNZ]

Pat, if the router feels hard to push, - you're trying to go too fast.

 

Plenty of revs, and move really slowly, so it feels like a knife through butter.

 

Also, I bet the blighters sold you single cutting edge bits. Not great for cutting a slot at least twice as deep as it is wide.

You should use router bits with double cutting blades. Thompsons Power tools carry a Scandanavian brand, I forget the name, which have a 3.2mm one like that.

One of mine has cut over 100metres of my tracks by hand, and since than, been used by a CNC shop in Napier to cut about 500 metres of MDF.

- It's pretty blunt and stuffed now, but you get the idea.

[Capri-corn7]

Exactly Mark. They'd sold me a mild steel one - for soft natural wood.

 

As soon as I got a tungsten carbide one, this one in fact, progress was much better.

 

 

It is a single edged one and I think for next time I will try and source the twin edged one.

[Capri-corn7]

So on to the routing. next step was to draw the track to an actual scale of sorts to fit the board.

 

 

 

I even had to buy a $2.99 compass to achieve this. This was then scaled up to the full sized board using a pencil & a length of string. Not the most accurate depending on how tight the string is and the angle of the pencil - but close enough.

 

I made one of those trammel ?sp? things to route the curves and in the end the entire track became constant radius curves and straight lines which made it a little easier.

 

 

and the first curves looked like this:

 

 

and the other end of the circuit.

 

 

Curves were easy - It was actually the straight lines I had the most trouble with.

[thekop]

Nice

[Capri-corn7]

I'd read and been told many times - do the corners first - which was the best advice. As you can see the curves cut, didn't quite mate up with the pencil marks.

 

The idea for the straights was to drop the router into the slot at one end, lean a straight edge against it, tack it, move the router to the other end and line up the straight edge at that end as well.

 

 

This worked pretty well for most straights but for one where the straight edge must have moved and where the straight meets one of the inside radiuses the slot is slightly wider than it should be. The plan will be to go back and correct this.

 

The other issue I had was over confidence after doing the curves and whilst I was doing some of the longer straights my mind would wander and in turn, so would the router. So some straights ended up with little variances but they mostly sanded smooth so as not to affect the car's motion. The key, I think now, is to concentrate and keep constant light pressure against the guide edge.

 

 

So here is the routed track. The Porsche is parked on the aforementioned 'wide' part of the slot.

[slotmadmac]

Good skills. Great write up.

[branco]

Nice work.

[j2theK]

Liking it Pat.

 

Keep up the good work

[SlotsNZ]

Pat, are you going to copper tape it or braid it?

I still have a rebating bit with a bit of life in it if you want to use it.

[Capri-corn7]

Pat, are you going to copper tape it or braid it?

Copper tape this time - bit already itching to make something bigger & better for next time. I think braid for the next one.

 

Thanks for the comments all.

 

The next thing I did was to attempt to transfer my conceptual lane change technology from the prototype to the actual.

i.e route a straight line on an angle...

 

Before:

 

During - Decided to try and get a tighter angle this time so the entry to the infield was a tad more natural....

 

 

And the end result:

 

 

This time the sacrificial Porsche takes the corner much more more naturally (after a big shove) so hopefully when the power is on it'll work as anticipated....

[slotmadmac]

Munter.

Are you watching this?

This is called 'Routing a slot car track'.

[Capri-corn7]

The next stage was sanding smooth all the routing variances especially where the straights met the curves. I found an old hotel access card (credit -card size) wrapped with a heavy-ish grade sand paper did the trick.

 

 

I've never vacuumed any of my garages before but it is my new favorite quick clean up method. MDF makes lots of dust.

Then came the paint. So keeping with a car park theme I picked only one shade of grey, a light grey 'el cheapo' paint.

 

 

The paint was low sheen and after two coats it looked the part but the whole idea was to try and emulate the glossy finishes of the HBMRC tracks so I'd also picked up a small tin of exterior varnish. One coat of this and the effect was to my eye pretty close.

[slotmadmac]

This is like watching a time lapse movie that's been sped up.

[Capri-corn7]

This is like watching a time lapse movie that's been sped up.

If only... It was so time consuming I'm only getting round to writing it up now....(I can't imagine how long 3 lanes would take...)

[branco]

I am pretty confident that you will soon find out how long a 3 laner is going to take to build.

You have already shown you have the skills.

My experience in building a track is seeing how it all comes together, then I sit down race a couple of thousand laps and then think "hmmmm wot shall I build next........."

If we could get a few more of these 1 laners built in NZ we could host a proxy rally titled "Rally Of New Zealand"

Now theres a challenge.

 

cheers.

[Capri-corn7]

Thanks for those words of encouragement Branco... Already sketching ideas for the space. Although to keep my better half happy I've promised a play-house for the kids as next project. I will need a new skilsaw though.

 

Also meant to say I really like your latest rally track. Just having the long overpass with the flowing change of elevation adds a whole new dimension to a small track. Cheers.

[branco]

cheers.

[Capri-corn7]

I did some basic calculations and estimated one roll of copper tape should do the whole track.

Sourced a roll of 7/32" approx 5.5mm in a 33m roll, from the local auction site, but when it turned up it looked rather small.

 

It also exploded into spirals as soon as I released the tape, so the first stage was to construct a tape dispenser out of spare MDF.

 

 

Then it was onto to taping. Took a little while to get to grips with the grippy tape but you soon learned how to apply enough pressure to stretch the tape around the curves. The later ones were much more successful than the first few.

 

I did the outside loop first and it started to look like a track.

 

 

In the foreground of that last shot you can see a small rubber roller. That was my method. Unravel about 20 cm of tape, peel back and stretch gently to fit. Then follow up with the firm rubber roller. I actually could only find a wooden wallpaper roller on the day I'd planned to start taping and so being impatient I spotted a rubber doorstop of almost exactly the same dimensions. A quick swap and we were away.

 

All up it took about 3 nights of faffing about but I was pleased with the end result.

 

The smallest hairpin has a dia of approx 30cm and I learnt how far copper tape stretches. i.e not very far. Had two snaps on the way round that corner. That slowed things up as to repair You have to overlay the break with new tape after ensuring approx 10mm has been cleansed of the gum. I used nail polish remover which worked quite well. then once the new tape was rollered smooth, i used an Xacto knife tip to make a series of fine depression across the non gummed area to attempt to ensure voltage flow.

 

 

And of course the 9v battery for christening the circuit. A slightly weird driving method but the poor dusty Porsche made it round fine. A new meaning to lifting off for the corners. Maybe this thing is going to work.

Edited February 5, 2013 by Capri-corn7

[munter]

Nice work Pat, very nice work!

[Drifter]

Briliant!

[Capri-corn7]

Thanks guys. Wiring not so flash. I decided to use the brass screws through the tape method. I drilled and countersunk my holes and tap holes prior to taping. After a lot of head scratching and colourful diagrams of where the lanes' tape reaches and stops for cross over I realised I actually only needed to additional taps and the could all be on the same side of the board. So 6 holes in total.

 

 

i didn't quite allow for the head of the screws on the first two, so a little filing was required.

 

 

Once the tape was laid carefully in the hole depression, I made a small hole in the tape with the trusty xacto knife tip. Having pre threaded the holes with the screws I then carefully reinserted them but this time passing them through the copper tape hopefully ensuring good contact.

 

Then it was simply adding some length of wire to each of the taps. I haven't soldered anything in a long while but it appeared to hold and so a little bit of tape for good measure and that part was done.

 

 

I then applied more copper tape over the screw heads to smooth the ride a little.

Edited February 5, 2013 by Capri-corn7