My son had his boyscout pack race over the weekend and we had his car setup as a rail runner. When we got to his race I noticed there was a gap between each track piece so I asked his cub master if we could try and get the gaps out of the track, he said we couldn't touch it because it would mess up the timer. We did fairly well the first two races then we got an outside lane and the car rode on top of the center guide rail the last two feet of the track, I looked at the guide rail and where the pieces meet the center rail corner was bent out so our FDW hit this everytime we ran this lane and killed our overall time. How would you guys set up your car to run on a track like this, we may have it at districts?
Crazy Track!
- Thread starter Hogans Racing
- Start date
- Nov 24, 2011
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This center rail is buldged on both sides, it looks like someone hit it with a hammer maybe trying to get the gaps out of track?
What do you mean by "killed our overall time"? How much slower were the outside lane runs that hit the rail bump? Did you win the race? or lose? by how much overall?
I would be happy to suggest what I would do, but I don't know whether to tell you to just accept it and railrun or change the set-up and run straight.... it depends on how you did really.
I would be happy to suggest what I would do, but I don't know whether to tell you to just accept it and railrun or change the set-up and run straight.... it depends on how you did really.
You might be able to tell the district guys running the race that your track got damaged and needs repair- you volunteer to help make the gap smooth before the race. They would then either tell you they will find a different track, or tell the pack to let you repair the track.
I was able to fix a side shift that was killing our rail car with a bit of clear packing tape over the defect. It smoothed out the jump to where we could maneuver it and did not involve cutting the track.
I was able to fix a side shift that was killing our rail car with a bit of clear packing tape over the defect. It smoothed out the jump to where we could maneuver it and did not involve cutting the track.
Straight or rail runner, it will kill either. The striaght cars bounce down the rails all the way too.
If there is nothing that can be done to repair the track. I would take some steer out of it. If I had it set at 4 inches over 4 ft I would back it off to 2 inches. Fixing the joints will have no effect on the timer, he just didn't want to take the time and effort to fix it.
ehogan0222 said:
My thought line was if the straight runners were making it past the problem spot some of the time then would I play the lottery with a straight runner or stick with a railrunner and hit it every time I ran that lane. To me it would depend on how well I was doing against the other cars and how much the problem effected my railrunner.
I agree that the first thing to try and do is to get the fool to fix the track.
I agree that the first thing to try and do is to get the fool to fix the track.
It sounds to me like they set the track up backwards in that they assembled from the stop section back to the starting gate. The way that the pieces slide together you can end up with gaps between some of the sections.
Thank you for all your replys, I did volunteer for setting up this track they said they had it handled, I assumed they knew what they were doing. Our car ran a 2.542 then a 2.539 we got the outside lane and ran a 2.615 on the other outside lane 2.578. We ended up 2nd overall. Good news is I found out we are running a very well maintained track at districts this Sat. Will let everyone know how it turns out.
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